FoxSports’ Jeff Goodman on Draft, Trades, etc.

by Chris Alvino on June 26th, 2009 at 3:54 pm

Jeff Goodman is a senior college basketball writer for FoxSports.  Check out his blog at Good’N'Plenty.

Interview with Jeff Goodman, Foxsports.com

CA: How did you like the draft overall?

JG:  It was okay. It didn’t blow me away.  There were interesting picks with Minny and Curry to Golden State. I don’t know what Kahn was thinking taking Rubio and Flynn.  Both are playmakers and they both need the ball in their hands to be effective.  I don’t see them being a good match together in backcourt.  They have to deal one right away.

CA: Some say it was a weak draft class.  Do you agree?  Or do you think this draft was simply filled with potential solid NBA players, and not necessarily all-star NBA players?

JG: Other than Griffin, there are a lot of good pieces.  A lot of guys will play a long time in the NBA.  It is a good draft, not a great draft. 

CA:  Biggest Trade of the Off-season thus far?  Shaq to Cavs?  Carter to Magic? Jefferson to Spurs? 

JG:  Big names. Big contracts. Shaq is probably the biggest acquisition for the near term.  Cleveland is now in position where the addition of one more player can lead the franchise to a title.  I do not know if any other trade will do that for their respective teams. 

CA: If Cavs had Shaq last season, do they win the title? 

JG: I do not know if anyone was going to beat the Lakers.  The Lakers were the best team last year. If Garnett stayed healthy, the Celtics could have beaten them again, but he was hurt.

CA: What do you think of Knicks draftee, Jordan Hill?

JG: I saw Hill play more than most people.  He is very raw and athletic, but he is mechanical.  In an ordinary year, Hill goes in the 20′s.  He is  a hit-or-miss prospect.  I do not know if he can handle NY.  He is a deep south kid, and he might be eaten up in NY. As a defender, Hill is not very smart.  He leaves his guys open on a block sometimes and allows for easy lay-ups. He is just okay as a defender. He’ll help as a shot-blocker though.  Hill is foul prone at times.  He commits dumb reach-in fouls consistently.  He doesn’t know how to use his body well.  I see Hill as more of a good big man off the bench.

First of all, Goodman is a good dude.  I met him last night at the draft, and he was nice enough to stop and chat with me for a second.  He was a bit busy, but he gave me contact info and I was able to talk to him for a while today.

As a college basketball writer, Goodman obviously has an abundance of insight on the players selected last night.  As he told me, he has seen a lot of Jordan Hill.  Much to my dismay and probably to the dismay of every Knicks fan, Goodman is not as high on the big forward as the Knicks front office.  He did not especially like the pick and he believes that the Knicks should have used the pick on point guard, even if that guard was a risky pick.

I would love to sit hear and disagree with what Goodman said.  I would love to be able to respond by pointing out the qualities that make him a sure fire bet as a legit NBA big man.  I would love to say, “Hey Jeff, you’re wrong.”  The problem is that I cannot do any of those things.  I have not seen Hill play enough to make a definitive judgment on him as a player.  I have heard comparisons to Amare Stoudemire.  NBADraft.net has compared him to Bosh.  HoopsHype.com compares him to Chris Wilcox and Ronny Turiaf.  Based on what I have seen, Hill is not any of those players.  Because Amare blew up in D’Antoni’s system, some people expect Hill to fit into that mold.  Here is the problem with that idea.  Amare Stoudemire is Amare Stoudemire because of his explosive attitude and explosive athleticism.  Hill is a good athlete, but he is not Amare.  Not many people are on par Amare Stoudemire in that department.  Chris Bosh is a silky smooth offensive player.  Hill is not that.  Wilcox and Turiaf are not as good as Hill offensively.  I can almost see the Wilcox comparison.  Like Hill, Wilcox does not use his size well on defense.  He leaves you scratching your head at times because he is so athletic and he has so much potential to be a force on the defensive end.  Also, Wilcox, for his length and athleticism, is a poor shot-blocker.  Because of that, Hill is not quite on par with Wilcox if you ask me.  But based on what Jeff said above, I can almost see the Wilcox comparison defensively.

At 8, Rubio, Evans, and Curry were all off the board.  Terrence Williams, Brandon Jennings, and Jrue Holiday were all left.  But would any of those guys have been a smarter pick than Hill?  Williams is going to be a good player.  No question.  But will he be a star?  The jury is still out on Jennings and Holiday being able to make it as premier point guards.  One thing that cannot be taught is size.  At least Hill has that.  But as Jeff noted above, Hill can be a bit mechanical with his game.  Guys like Amare and Bosh are fluid on the court.  Athleticism means nothing when you are clumsy in the basketball sense.  Hill will have to continue to become a more fluid player on the court. 

My friend Danny Kilduff wrote to me, “I’ve never been to a draft where the crowd applauded a Knicks first round selection, so I’ll hold my critiquing for the summer league when I get to see this kid play a bit more.”  I agree.  As of right now, I like the pick, but he was not the guy that I wanted.  He was more the guy that was left when the Knicks made the pick than he was the guy that I hoped would fall to us at 8.  To a lesser extent, I believe Walsh and D’Antoni feel the same way.  I will try and hold off any real judgment until at least the summer league, but more likely until about 1 or 2 months into next season.  If he turns out to be a 16 ppg, 8rpg, and 1.5 bpg type of player, on top of doing the intagible things that help win games, then this pick will be a great pick.  It is tough to find an elite PG, but finding a serviceable one is possible.  Finding a legitimate starting PF / C that is very effective is much harder than finding a serviceable PG.  Next off-season, players like Amare and Bosh will receive max contracts.  If Hill can provide 70% of what those two players would  give us, then I would be happy.  But Hill still has to do all of that first.  If the Knicks retain Lee, I am also unsure if Hill can play the center position.  Perhaps Hill and Lee can combine to form a strong, but under-sized front court, but that remains to be seen.

Time will tell on this pick.  Hill will have the opportunity to play almost immediately.  His selection also tells me that Gallianri will likely see a lot of time at the SF position.  If Hill cannot play center, then D’Antoni cannot play Gallo and Hill as power forwards at the same time.  That all said, if Curry comes back healthy (and is not traded in the meantime), the Knicks suddenly have a big front court rotation with Hill, Curry, Darko, Gallo, and perhaps Lee, with Al Harrington and Wilson Chandler in the mix at the SF spot.  The Knicks’ depleted front court hurt them last season, but next season figures to be a bit different…

… we hope.

About Chris Alvino

Chris Alvino grew up in Crestwood, NY. He graduated from Regis High School in 2005. There he played both basketball and baseball. Chris is currently a student at Boston College, where he practices with the varsity Women's Basketball Team (... seriously). Chris has been a Knicks' fan for years and can literally talk about them all day long, every day of the week. Chris enjoys writing on this blog and seeing what everyone out there has to say about it. View all posts by Chris Alvino →
  • callamari

    i hate to say this, as much as i wanted rubio/curry/evans, if the front office felt hill was the right move i am definitely behind it as a fan. The only thing is i think this guy is right about hill not being able to handle ny. The guy looked stunned and sad during the interview after being drafted when he was booed alot.

  • Jeff Cykiert

    I am completely behind this pick as a fan. i know we need a point guard, but do you guys realize how rare it is to actually find a great young point guard who we can all confidently agree is ‘the PG of the future.’ Anything short of that, and its not worth our draft pick. We had 2 or 3 PGs we really believed had a pretty good chance of being that guy, but clearly they all got taken, and it would be flat out foolish to pick another PG who the front office believes is less than likely to become that guy. Hey we still need our PG of the future, so lets just draft jennings and prey we can turn him into that.

    Athletic 2-way big-men are almost as valuable, but they have a much less chance of becoming useless, because at the least they can become a good rotation big man. What good is a ‘rotation’ PG? None at all, when you’re talking the lottery. It was either likely PG of future, or best available. We chose best available. There’s no question in my mind about our pick.

  • Cheech

    ESPN is calling it breaking news and saying that the Knicks will call the the T-Wolves about acquiring Rubio. I would give them Hill and Nate in a heart beat if they wanted that. Again, they are calling this breaking news.

  • Chris Alvino

    I wonder if that is what Minny wants. I think Wilson Chandler and Chris Duhon for Rubio and one of their bad contracts can get it down maybe.

  • Magik_Trick

    Its breaking news because were going to contact them? Sheesh..

    Hope a deal gets done, and if so…i hope he doesnt go back to Spain..but I doubt he’ll do that, he likes NY

  • Jeff Cykiert

    Let’s not forgot that throughout the entire college season Jordan Hill was #3 on pretty much every website. not that much could have changed since then. the 4 best PG’s got taken in this draft. Does this guy who tommy interviewed really want us to settle on the 5th best PG with the 8th pick, PRAYING he might become the guy for us? A year from now we would be looking at another duhon. Good, but not good enough. I’d much rather take the 2nd best power forward, a guy who can automatically make an impact based simply on his size and athleticism, than the 5th best point guard. Now you could argue that the draft was deep enough at that position to settle on the 5th best pointguard, but clearly our scouts and coach knew who they thought could play the roll, and those players were gone. I trust them more than ANY journalist. We can’t just SETTLE on our PG, its to much of a waist.

    By the way, i HATE every fan that booed jordan hill. A bunch of dumb ignorant fans who would probably become nets fans if they moved to brooklyn and got LeBron over us.

    i hope Hill understands that they weren’t booing him, they were just booing at the absence of Curry. They would have booed anyone who got picked there, it didn’t matter who it was. I hope he doesn’t let this hurt his motivation, that would be sucky. I want to call him and tell him that we are lucky to have him, and that he should come read this blog.

  • callamari

    if he goes to ny he is staying 100%

  • Cheech

    Either one of those trades are good for me. Right now we have a log jam in the front court so Hill or Chandler as a center piece for Rubio is great with me. Im watching espnews right now. And Chris Brousard is saying Rubio will get traded and play in the NBA next year.

  • bockers88

    Can you source a link? I cant seem to find what you read on espn.

  • Cheech
  • pedro

    https://twitter.com/Amareisreal

    Amare tweets: Amare to Lakers.

    probably a joke

  • bob go knicks

    JEFF,good post,for the past 2 months alls i kept reading was that JORDAN HILL would not even be there for the KNICKS to pick . now all of a sudden everyone is saying the guy stinks? i dont think so .i also like the pick .if we end up with HILL and RUBIO ill kiss donnie walsh on the lips

  • ChefOak

    Cheech, I hope like hell that broussard is right. If Rubio is traded, I think he’ll be wearing blue and orange. Goodman just summed up a bunch of my fears with hill. We weren’t looking for a backup with this pick, we were looking for Lebron bait.

  • Eduardo15

    I’m not condoning the boos, but on the other hand, one would expect that a future star or at least quality player should posses mental toughness to endure it.

    Being drafted in NY, by NY, after our favorite player just slipped through our hands.. I guess the boos were kind of expected.

  • Eduardo15

    *possess

  • http://www.theknicksblog.com/2009/07/15/first-impression-jordan-hill/ The Knicks Blog » First Impression: Jordan Hill

    [...] the pre-draft process, Hill was widely regarded as a top 5 talent.  Some people, such as Jeff Goodman, were not as high on Hill as others.  Goodman believes that in a strong draft, Hill would project [...]