Slam N JamAndrew Schlecht and Alex Speers discuss the 2025 NBA Draft with Sam Vecenie of the Athletic. They deep dive on Cooper Flagg, Dylan Harper and which player is most likely to go number 3? How many tier 1 players are in this draft and a lengthy discussion on the depth of the draft. They then transition to a discussion about the 2024 rookie class and hand out awards as a way to talk about 9 rookies who are standing out above (or below) the rest. Then the boys play a fun edition of Andrew vs. the Beat, a trivia game where Andrew is pitted against a beat writer, this time a trivia show based on the 2024 class.Host: Andrew Schlecht and Alex SpeersWith: Sam VecenieExecutive Producer: Andrew SchlechtAudio/Video Editor: Jake Kleinberg Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Chapter 1: What is the focus of the 2025 NBA Draft Preview?
Welcome to the Saturday Slammin' Jam. I'm your host, Andrew Schlecht. With me, as always, is Alex Spears. Today, we have a special episode. We are talking about the 2025 NBA Draft, and we're talking about the current rookie class. And there is nobody better to talk about both of those things with than our guy, Sam Vecini. Sam, welcome back to the Slammin' Jam.
Truly, there is no show I enjoy doing more than this one. It is fun. I get my ass kicked in trivia every time. And it's just such an enjoyable, enjoyable experience. So I'm glad to be here, and I'm glad to get to chat with you.
Yeah, so we do these episodes a little differently because we just need to talk to Sam. We just need to pick his brain for the entire hour plus. So buckle up. So Sam, every year at the draft lottery, there's a fan base that feels like they missed the top tier of prospects by one spot. This year, will that be the same team that gets the number three pick?
Or do you think that it's possible that another prospect joins the top tier with Cooper Flagg and Dylan Harper by the end of the season?
I don't think it's likely that another prospect will join that top two group, but I have had this question posed to me by a few people, like how many players would go number one overall in the 2024 draft from the 2025. Right. And I do think Casperis would go number one in 2024. Okay. Uh, Look, Ace Bailey, I'm sure we'll talk about him, like fascinating player.
I think if you ask GMs right now, would they take Ace Bailey over whoever they had at number one, which was very widespread and different for every front office last year? I think that some would take Ace Bailey. So I think it'd be like three and a half right now would be my response. But I would say in terms of like real franchise changing players, talent. Cooper flag is absolutely that.
I think Dylan Harper could be that for sure. I really liked Dylan. He's like right on that precipice of like tier one, tier two grade for me. Uh, I love everything I've seen from Dylan Harper. Uh, all of the Intel with Dylan is extremely, extremely high level, much like it is for Cooper. Uh, Cooper's Intel is just like some of the best Intel like I've gotten about a prospect.
Uh, and then Dylan's is also exceptionally high level. So I, There aren't a lot of red flags with either of those players, and I think that's what's so exciting about those two particularly.
So if this is a two-player draft at the top, let's just say, if you're looking at the bottom seven or eight teams in the NBA right now, which teams do you think most need to jump up into that top two? Who should be most desperate?
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Chapter 2: Who are the top prospects in the 2025 NBA Draft?
I'm probably, I wouldn't say I'm like higher or lower on him. I just need to watch more of him in sec play because he has some real tendencies that concern me in terms of his ability to finish at the rim. He has not been great as a finisher at the rim and half court situations this year.
Uh, turnovers does not, you know, consistently make great decisions as a passer, in my opinion, and can sometimes over penetrate and over dribble and get himself into a little bit of trouble. He's also not really a shooter at this point. So. there are a number of things that I think he's going to have to work through in order to be a good NBA player early in his career.
And I don't really see him being a good NBA player early in his career, but he might be so capable of getting paint touches in driving, you know, buckets at the basket because he is such a lightning quick driver of the ball and has good last step. Acceleration has good first step acceleration. Like I, the name Monte Ellis is one that has kind of come up when I've talked to NBA scouts.
Like that's kind of an interesting one to me, but yeah, you know, he's one that has certainly risen up the boards this year. And, you know, we all kind of want to see more. The last guy, this is more like in Maui and just throughout the course of the season is Jace Richardson at Michigan state, Jason Richardson, you know, former dunk contest champions kid.
Couldn't be more different as players like Jace is basically kind of ground bound and is not this high flyer like Jason was. And is, you know, just this really smart, super high level decision maker more than anything. Um, whenever I watch him, I am such a big fan of watching the way that he makes defensive decisions, watching the way that he makes consistent decisions as a passer.
He played with the Boozer Twins at Columbus down in Miami, and
you know, didn't really get a chance all that often on the ball necessarily because cam particularly, uh, you know, potential number one, overall pick number two, overall pick next season, uh, is on the ball all the time there because he's, you know, Apollo Bankaro type kind of prospect, maybe a little bit thicker and not quite as capable on the ball, but, uh, something in that vicinity.
So he hasn't gotten a crazy amount of on-ball reps throughout the course of his career. And at Michigan State, he's obviously not getting a crazy amount either because Tom Izzo doesn't really hand the ball over to freshmen regularly. But I do think there's a lot of latent ball skill there.
Really big shoulders, kind of in that... People will bring up the name Jalen Brunson when I talk to them, but... I don't quite think it's that necessarily, but Jalen wasn't what he is now when he was a freshman, so you never know, right? But big shoulders, really good footwork, really good gathers, great decision maker, just kind of has all of that.
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Chapter 3: Which teams need to jump into the top picks?
I don't even think that there were many... I'm really trying to think through that class. For some reason, I think that was a college-heavy class.
dude i i don't know dude i don't i don't have an answer i can't even think of an international player from the 12 draft it's like why i'm saying this that's like the that's the dion anthony davis draft right was there anybody that's definitely right andrew in terms of the draft year yeah i mean i don't know evan 40 i think evan 48 evan 48 That doesn't make sense as an answer, but whatever.
That's wrong. Okay. Sam, you got any guesses?
I mean, like my immediate response was like, yeah, I'm like really trying to think through it. Like, So, Eastern Conference playoff team. My first... The first place I went was Dario Saric. But I don't think he turned the ball over that much. And I don't think... He came over late, so I don't think he even... I think that that's three years too late, even.
I'm trying to think who it could even be...
I have no idea.
To be clear, I said his rookie season.
Yeah, obviously he was not in the 12 class, but Boyan Boyan Bogdanovich is going to be my guess.
That feels like a right era.
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