Bullet point summary by AI

• The NBA Draft Combine this week brings interviews and tests but often serves more for networking than deep analysis.
• Insiders focus on which front offices like which players rather than the measured stats themselves.
• The only combine numbers that truly impact draft decisions are two physical traits that affect defense and floor control.

The month of May is an action-packed one in the NBA calendar. Not only do you get to witness the semifinals and conference finals of the NBA Playoffs, but the framework for the draft is finally revealed. The NBA announces its draft order for the first 14 picks, and then immediately after that, the NBA Draft Combine takes place.

At the combine, we get to interview prospects and watch willing participants take a place in a litany of events and open runs designed to tell us about each invitees skill level and physical profile.

Over the next few days, we will be flooded with information about many of the individuals who will walk across the stage and shake Adam Silver’s hand next month. But what does any of this stuff really mean?

Which NBA Combine measurements really matter?

I’ve had the privilege of going to the NBA Draft Combine three times now, and one of my biggest takeaways is that most of this week is about networking and gathering intel.

The interviews can be pretty insightful, but for the most part, these guys have been training for them for weeks and won’t say anything that hasn’t been rehearsed a thousand times. And in the gym where most of these testings/drills are conducted, most people are chatting it up with their favorite media member buddies rather than really trying to see what they can absorb from watching top picks do their shuttle run.

The goal of insiders/beat writers is to try and figure out who front office decision-makers like and don’t like. And if you are someone who specializes in player scouting that doesn’t work for an NBA team, your goal is to meet people in front offices with some hiring power.

This isn’t to sound jaded to the player evaluation process. But, at the end of the day, what the NBA combine measures doesn’t really tell you about the things that really matter in actual games: decision-making and functional athleticism. For instance, seeing a player hit 37 of 40 open corner 3s tells you very little about a player’s ability to launch accurate shots with a 6-foot-9 defender sprinting at them. And since most of the whose who’s opt not to participate in the scrimmages that take place, we don’t get to a real look at their real-time processing speed.

With that said, the only numbers I really like to look at are height with shoes on (you know, since you don’t play basketball without shoes) and wingspan. You’ve heard it before at some point in your life: size matters. Basketball is no different. In today’s NBA, the teams that are still fighting for the title have good defenses (outside of the Cleveland Cavaliers, all the teams left in the postseason were top-10 in defensive rating in the regular season).

You can build a good defense with a smaller team (see the Phoenix Suns). But when you have more size and length, it gives you far more margin for error. When you are taller/longer, you can generate more steals, rebound the ball better, shrink the floor better, and safeguard the paint better.

Since size is so important, the players who don’t have much of it try to inflate it or keep it disclosed as much as possible. So, when you have a platform like this that forces players to step up and receive these measurements to avoid scrutiny, it reveals a lot to you.

With this said, the NBA Combine is largely antiquated and serves more as a hotspot for NBA diehards rather than a venue where true analysis takes place. So, if you really liked a prospect before this week, don’t let what you learn change that opinion.

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