Trae Young apparently not expecting a lot out of No. 1 pick Zaccharie Risacher this season

2024 NBA Summer League – Atlanta Hawks v Washington Wizards

The Atlanta Hawks used the No. 1 pick in the draft on Zaccharie Risacher, the French wing with plenty of upside.

Trae Young apparently isn’t expecting much out of him this season. Most of the time, when a team’s star player talks about a draft pick, it’s in cliche terms of how much he likes the rookie’s game or work ethic, and always about potential. However, when Young went on Podcast P with Paul George, he was not sugarcoating the reaction to this draft class and Risacher, specifically.

“I spoke with him. A lot of people were talking about how I didn’t tweet about ’em or stuff on draft day and things like that. I’ve always done that and stuff, but I messaged him behind the scenes right before Summer League and just shot him some good luck. Just stuff like that… We ain’t got to work out yet, but he played right before summer league overseas…

“I mean to be honest with you, and no disrespect to the guys that got drafted, I mean from the outside looking in… a lot of us look at them as role players coming in anyway…. I feel like the GMs all this year are probably just trying to figure out who’s going to be the best role player for their team. As good as Alex Sarr is I don’t think he’s going to be their [Washington Wizards] franchise player going forward. You know what I’m saying? He’s going to be a great, great player, have a long NBA career, but just the outlook on any of these guys coming in. It wasn’t like they were going to be Luka [Doncic] type guys or Zions [Williamson], you know what I’m saying?”

Two quick thoughts.

First, Young just summed up pretty much every scout’s analysis heading into this draft. A player or two are going to break out and be stars, but this is a class full of role players.

Second, Risacher might be one of those breakout stars, but Young is right that in this season they shouldn’t expect too much out of him. Risacher is an incredibly graceful and fluid athlete who showed flashes at the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas but also had stretches where he just floated through games, not impacting much.

Risacher averaged 14.5 points…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/trae-young-apparently-not-expecting-160123712.html

Author : NBC Sports

Publish date : 2024-08-13 16:01:23

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.