Issue #11 - Obligatory Draft Day Post
getting back into the swing of things
It’s been roughly 1 year since I last made a post and I’ve had the most unbelievable case of writer’s block. I’m not claiming to be a great writer, but honestly - the 2025 Oklahoma City Thunder have blown my wildest expectations out of the water, and I frankly just couldn’t organize my thoughts fast enough to keep up with what’s happening.
I’m writing this post roughly 24 hours after my beloved Thunder won their very first championship. And I have A LOT of thoughts and I’m gonna try hard to get them all on paper by the end of this summer. It felt fitting to get back into writing by returning to this silly newsletter’s roots: yet another draft day post.
I’m realizing that as the years have gone by, I’m realizing I’m doing less and less research and preparation for this annual tradition. And uncharacteristically - I really had no idea that the draft was coming up so soon. In the past I’ve described some of these newsletters as a stream of consciousness - this one might be the most literal one to date!
Two caveats:
My Big Board will roughly be best player available, but I obviously have an OKC bias. Because I’ve done very little research this year, I’ll add a very, very short blurb to quickly summarize what I see in them.
Despite the Thunder picking at both #15 and #24, in the interest of time I will conveniently end this at roughly 15-ish people
Anyway, here goes:
Big Board
Tier 0 - Guys I’d love to have but OKC will never get
I’m not gonna bother writing anything for these two guys because they are way out of OKC’s ability to get. These are franchise cornerstones
Cooper Flagg - Scottie Pippen
Dylan Harper - Cade Cunningham-ish
Tier 1 - Guys who are probably out of reach
V.J. Edgecombe
Comp: Kentavious Caldwell Pope, Lu Dort
Edgecombe is a defensive stopper who is a freak athlete. He would be a dream for OKC to have with his ability to stay in front of the ball and his motor. The combination of the two have made him an excellent shot blocking guard while at Baylor. He seems like he could be the perfect 3 and D player if he can harness his athleticism effectively at all times.
Kon Knueppel
Comp: Gordon Hayward on Utah when he didn’t hate basketball like he did on OKC
Watching Knueppel play basketball at Duke was like watching the perfect complementary player. He could do a little bit of everything at a very high level. Whether he was asked to run the offense when Flagg was hurt, spread the floor with his shooting, dribble and drive as a secondary creator - he could do it all with his incredible feel for the game.
Tre Johnson
Comp: Tyler Herro-y
Tre Johnson is a shooting guard with an emphasis on “shoot”. He is arguably the best shotmaker in the country with an incredible ability to score the basket from all over the court in all sorts of wild ways - even from 3. Defensively he has some room to improve with his instincts and effort, but overall his ability to be an offball scorer for any team is hard to pass up.
Tier 2 - Guys we might have to trade up for
Khaman Maluach
Comp: Clint Capella; Isaiah Hartenstein if he could expand his game over time
Khaman Maluach is a freak of nature physically. He’s as tall as a redwood with literal branches for arms and moves effortlessly across the floor. He seems to have a pretty good feel for diving down to the rim and attacking pick and rolls on offense. I’ll say that it feels a little hard to see how he would fit entirely into a pass heavy attack - but the tools, potential and motor seem to be there and I’d be bullish in betting on him figuring it out.
Collin Murray Boyles
Comp: some combo of 2022 Thaddeus Young, 2022 Aaron Gordon, and 2022 Draymond Green
Collin Murray-Boyles is probably the exact build of player that the Thunder are missing: a 6’8, super strong and switchable tweener wing who can do a bit of everything. He’s a talented passer and can operate an offense from the post which would add some interesting wrinkles to most NBA team’s offenses. His most obvious deficiency is his lack of shooting, but if that ever came along to a reasonable level - he would become the steal of the draft. And frankly, he already might be that!
Cedric Coward
Comp: Mikal Bridges-lite, Ayo Dosunmo sorta?
Cedric Coward is built like the classic Sam Presti ideal NBA player. He’s 6’7 with an absurdly long 7’2 wingspan that doesn’t make sense. He feels like he could be a seamless fit as a switchable 3 and D wing with the possibility to defend up and down the line up. Coward still has a lot of room to develop into a full fledged wing who can dribble, pass and shoot with consistency - even if he can stick to his traditional archetype, he should find success in the NBA eventually.
Carter Bryant
Comp: Trevor Ariza, maybe Patrick Williams
Carter Bryant is a very intriguing prospect because of his physical build and projectable tools despite having questionable college production due to low minutes. He’s a great defender (especially on the perimeter) who knows how to use his length and athleticism to effect shots at the rim and passes across the court. Offensively his shot looks really good despite the small sample size. He projects to be the ideal 3 and D wing.
Tier 2.1 - Tier 2 Guys that I have no interest in
Ace Bailey
Comp: Rudy Gay? Kinda? Maybe?
Honestly, he just seems way too raw for the Thunder to reasonably develop despite having some interesting physical tools. He’d probably bust on OKC, but could be good on a tanking team.
Kasparas Jakučionis
Comp: D'angelo Russell, Brandin Podziemski
Jakučionis was honestly pretty fun to watch in Big10 Hoops. He’s a talented passer, solid shooter and is capable of attacking the rim despite his subpar athleticism. I just don’t care for the Thunder to draft another ball dominant point guard, especially given we have Nikola Topić and Ajay Mitchell on deck already.
Jeremiah Fears
Comp: worse version of Jaden Ivey
Fears runs into the same problem of me not wanting another ball dominant guard on the Thunder. He has great athleticism despite his small frame and a pretty incredible motor.
Tier 3 - Reasonable Targets
Rasheer Fleming
Comp: Jabari Smith Jr.
Rasheer Fleming is another one on the list of dudes with freakishly long arms. His 6’9 body and 7’5 wingspan combined with his 39% 3pt shooting makes him super intriguing as a floor spacing rim protector. His lack of an off the dribble and playmaking game seem like they may hinder is ability to be more than a role player, but that might be fine for a a fringe lottery guy like Fleming.
Nique Clifford
Comp: Moses Moody, Aaron Wiggins
Nique Clifford has developed into a versatile wing with a diverse skillset who has played a number of roles across his long 5 year career in college. He has a decent looking jumpshot, a knack for playmaking and is a fantastic rebounder. Some downsides to him are his inconsistent shooting despite his form as well as his as self creation ability.
Derik Queen
Comp: Alperen Şengün-lite
Derik Queen is coming off an awesome March Madness campaign at Maryland. He has a great ability to dribble and attack the rim, which combined with his passing ability and strong finishing talent makes him project to be a strong offensive hub in the post. I think my concerns arise defensively where he seems to have a tough time staying in front of his match up and lacks the size to be a true rim deterrent.
Thomas Sorber
Comp: slow Isaiah Hartenstein, Jakob Poeltl
Thomas Sorber is a giant 6’10 human with a 7’5 wingspan in a 263 lb body. His footwork allows him to use his size near the rim to make him a very effective post scorer. But more interestingly, he has some creative passing ability that could make him a bit of a secondary offensive hub on the right team. His biggest downside is that despite his fancy feet, he moves pretty slowly on the perimeter and that could prove to be a problem in the NBA.
Tier 4 - Other Names to keep an eye on
Danny Wolf - Mike Muscala
Jase Richardson - Immanuel Quickley-lite
Noa Essengue - Pascal Siakam lite
Egor Demin - Josh Giddey
What do I think OKC will do?
After winning the championship, you really can’t say the Thunder need anything and as a result, I think the Thunder are now at the point that they don’t necessarily need to reach for any particular player or archetype. I believe any pick they make in this coming draft should be made with the idea that this player could and should be a rotation player in 2 years as the Thunder potentially cycle out of important role players like Isaiah Hartenstein, Isaiah joe or even our beloved Kenrich Williams.
BUT, we don’t have a ton of space on the roster going into 2025-2026 and for the first time I might almost admit that we have a bit of a roster crunch1. I wouldn’t be surprised if we did something like trading OKC’s #15, #24 and #44 picks to move up to get Phoenix’s #10 pick and try to grab one of my Tier 2 guys. However, it’s too hard to predict what trades, if any, are feasible and could actually happen so I’ll make my official pick without any trades in the draft order.
I’ve been rambling for a bit, so I’ll just get straight to it - my official pick for Oklahoma City Thunder in the 2025 NBA is Cedric Coward. I was very torn between Coward and Murray-Boyles, but I just think Murray-Boyles has too much upside make it all the way down to 15. Coward on the other hand is the classic Presti archetype of switchable wing who can defend up and down the lineup who can shoot the ball. 3 point shooting was the one flaw that plagued OKC in a few games on their championship hunt, and i think drafting with that in mind would be a smart move in both the short and long term.
Mock Draft
Dallas Mavericks - Cooper Flagg
San Antonio Spurs - Dylan Harper
Philadelphia 76ers - VJ Edgecombe
Charlotte Hornets - Ace Bailey
Utah Jazz - Kon Kneuppel
Washington Wizards - Tre Johnson
New Orleans Pelicans - Jeremiah Fears
Brooklyn Nets - Kasparas Jakučionis
Toronto Raptors - Khaman Maluach
Phoenix Suns - Derik Queen
Portland Trailblazers - Noa Essengue
Chicago Bulls - Collin Murray-Boyles
Atlanta Hawks - Nique Clifford
San Antonio Spurs - Carter Bryant
Oklahoma City Thunder - Cedric Coward
Conclusion
I managed to keep this Draft Day Special ~3000 words shorter than last time and managed to do it in 5% of the time needed. It feels good to be able to get this out so quickly, but I don’t feel as confident in any of my statements compared to prior years. And I wasn’t really that confident in earlier years either!
This is probably coming out with very shortly before the draft, so hopefully you’re able to tune in and maybe be able to make fun of my predictions!
I have some new plans for what I want to write now that the Thunder have made it to the top of the mountaintop and have tentative plans to put them out this Summer. Hopefully I don’t get too lazy/busy!
If you ever want to talk about anything I’ve said, you can find me at most places on the internet as @ankitpancakes. Here are links to some of those places: Twitter, Threads, Bluesky, Reddit.
Helpful Links
Here are some sources that I would highly recommend checking out if you want some actual smart people to help you learn about the draft!
And probably some others who I have forgotten to list!
This isn’t really any kind of disaster that a lot of people outside of the Thunder world claim. It’s pretty easy, and fairly doable to cycle through end of the roster guys or low tier draft picks and turn them into future draft picks many years down the line.