DI Review: The 2008 Draft

The following is the ninth in a ten part series in which we'll review the past 10 NBA drafts, provide the Draftability Index Score for every American college prospect, and analyze the findings. One note before we dive in, all of the data is being pulled from Basketball Reference and the NBA Geek and the win share numbers are the players' career average per 48 minutes to date. If you're new to that measurement, a league average score is .100 and 'star' level production correlates to .200 and above. 

The rating system is as follows: Green level prospects are the strongest and will be notated with an E, Gold level prospects are reasonably desirable prospects and are notated with a G, Red level prospects are suspect prospects and are notated with an R, and Gray level prospects are highly suspect and are notated with a Y.

Whether the basketball establishment realized it at the time or not, 2008 turned out be a pretty strong draft, with preciously few players selected in the first round failing to at least hold down regular jobs in the league. With that in mind, we turn to the Index and see who would have been at the top of our board on draft night.

Round One
                                             DI Score           Rating           WP per 48
1) Derrick Rose                        2.16                   E                     .116
2) Michael Beasley                   2.00                   E                    -.012
3) O.J Mayo                              0.38                   R                     .071
4) Russell Westbrook              1.57                   E                      .114
5) Kevin Love                           1.97                   E                      .245
7) Eric Gordon                         0.37                   R                      .074
8) Joe Alexander                      0.50                   G                      .030
9) D.J Augustin                        0.78                   G                       .076
10) Brook Lopez                      0.60                   G                       .076
11) Jerryd Bayless                   0.10                    Y                      .036
12) Jason Thompson               0.16                    Y                       .078
13) Brandon Rush                    0.87                    G                      .114
14) Anthony Randolph              0.25                    R                      .081
15) Robin Lopez                       0.47                    R                       .069
16) Maresse Speights              0.85                    G                       .023
17) Roy Hibbert                        0.60                     G                       .067
18) Javale McGee                    0.28                      R                      .139
19) J.J Hickson                         0.04                     Y                       .095
21) Ryan Anderson                  0.14                      Y                       .140
22) Courtney Lee                     0.42                      R                      .112
23) Kosta Koufos                     0.46                      R                      .146
26) George Hill                         0.44                      R                      .129
27) Darrell Arthur                     0.77                       G                     .012
28) Donte Greene                    0.28                       R                     .000
29) D.J White                           0.71                      G                      .068
30) J.R Giddens                       0.56                      G                      .027

Notes: It's actually pretty rare to see all of the green prospects clustered at the top of the round, and we do hit on everybody but the enigmatic Michael Beasley. Things get pretty ugly- many of our gold prospects didn't do much while the reds and grays have some significant hits (Mcgee, Anderson, Koufos, Hill). It would be tough to say what we would have done with a mid-round pick here, until you get a look at Round Two that is...

Round Two

                                             DI Score           Rating           WP per 48
33) John Dorsey                       1.87                   E                     .196
34) Mario Chalmers                  1.52                  E                      .099
35) DeAndre Jordan                  0.49                  R                      .184
37) Luc Richard Mbah A Moute  0.90                 G                      .123
38) Kyle Weaver                        1.05                  E                      .051
39) Sonny Weems                     0.30                  R                      .010
40) Chris Douglas-Roberts       0.77                  G                       .051
42) Sean Singletary                   0.30                   R                       .006
43) Patrick Ewing                       0.28                  R                      -.016
46) Trent Plaisted                      0.27                   R                       .000
47) Bill Walker                           0.69                    G                      .089
48) Malik Hairston                      0.21                    Y                      .000
49) Richard Hendrix                  0.42                    R                      .000
50) Devon Hardin                       0.12                   Y                       .000
51) Shan Foster                         0.13                    Y                      .000
52) Darnell Jackson                   0.64                    G                      .059
54) Maarty Leunen                     0.37                     R                     .000
55) Mike Taylor                          0.34                     R                     -.003
56) Sasha Kaun                         0.33                     R                     .000
57) James Gist                          0.35                     R                      .000
58) Joe Crawford                       0.10                     Y                      .037

Notes: Three green prospects and a high gold in Mbah a Moute open this second round- Chalmers and Moute have been solid, Dorsey had a good year in Toronto but from what I can glean he's a bit of a loose cannon and teams got sick of dealing with him...Weaver had one decent season with the Thunder and has been bouncing around the D-League ever since. After those guys come off the board, things look a lot more typical- low scores and low production abound. We do like that CDR, Walker, and Darnell Jackson stick out a bit though...

Tan was big in '08....