Five Thirty-Eight Model says Karl-Anthony Towns, Justise Winslow will be best pros
Statistical modeling gurus at Five Thirty-Eight took a look at NBA Draft prospects and believe Justise Winslow and Karl-Anthony Towns have star potential.
The NBA Draft is a futures game.
As much as we want a sure thing or to ensure a superstar in the making with every Draft pick it does not happen like that. Remember, even Dwight Howard was a big mystery. And the college star who played three or four years at his school and came to the NBA more or less a finished product does not happen anymore. It is how a raw guy like Aaron Gordon gets drafted fourth.
The NBA Draft is a futures game. It is about predicting the future in every way possible.
And every way possible includes using math and statistical models to try to predict the future. There are patterns that emerge and you hope can replicate.
Past results are no predictor of future success, but everyone wants to see the future. I do not know how much we can say that. Nobody knows exactly how any of these guys will turn out.
Five Thirty-Eight though will attempt to predict the future using numbers. They created a model for college prospects using Statistical Plus-Minus, a measure of a players plus/minus impact on a team per 100 possessions. The model also used physical attributes along with Chad Ford’s top 100 rankings to take into consideration how scouts view these prospects. It also factors in statistics that project well to the next level like assist rate, offensive rebound percentage, usage rate and effective field goal percentage.
What their markers show from the college careers of NBA Draft prospects is that Karl-Anthony Towns, Justise Winslow and Stanley Johnson have the best projected statistical plus-minus. Winslow though has the highest probability of becoming a starter with D’Angelo Russell holding the best probability of becoming a star or becoming a bust.
"Instead of this draft being a battle of big men at the top, then, the model thinks a pair of small forwards — Duke’s Justise Winslow and Arizona’s Stanley Johnson — are more likely to succeed in the NBA than Okafor is. Winslow, in particular, is fascinating: His overall projection is better than what the model gives to both mega-hyped wings from last year’s draft (Andrew Wiggins and Jabari Parker), although it’s driven not so much by his ceiling as by the low likelihood that he will bust out. While Wiggins and Parker both had roughly a 35 percent bust probability, Winslow’s is 23 percent, perhaps because he has no glaring statistical red flags."
This draft is full of players that seem to project to solid player, but not All Stars. Towns and Russell are the only ones who seem to have a good chance at that mark. But a lot of players, including Winslow, Johnson and Willie Cauley-Stein, have a good shot at being solid starters in the league.
This is a Draft of doubles and singles and less of home runs. Not counting the foreign-born players, Kristaps Porzingis and Mario Hezonja, who did not play in college.
Cauley-Stein actually presents an interesting statistical model. He has a 40.6 percent chance of being a starter but a 30.4 percent chance of being described a bust. It seems he has as much risk/reward to him as any freshman in the Draft.
It should all go to say the NBA Draft is still something of a crapshoot no matter how much you prepare and how much you know the player. It is not easy.
We can at least try to pry into the crystal ball.