Beat me to it. I’m sure someone will want to do a more thorough investigation. My first reaction is that James Harden just solidified himself a Top-5 pick, possibly in Oklahoma City. Derozan, Budinger and Williams all jumped through the roof, as expected. Griffin didn’t fly w/ steps, but he had the third-highest vert w/ no steps and he had amazing lane agility quicks. Budinger and Curry both also surprised me in that regards.

Very interesting.

Since I love Jonny Flynn, I was of coursed impressed with his 40 inch vertical leading the draft this year.

I also was surprised at Ellington and Budinger’s verticals. Those two guys don’t play that athletically on the court but sure had some hops.

For a guy who rarely plays above the rim and has never really reeked of “I’m ridiculously athletic,” I am stunned.

And he beat Ty Lawson in the 3/4 court spring. Nice.

The differential between standing vert and max vert is interesting. These are pretty interesting as guys like Blake Griffin basically add just a few inches with a runway. DeRozan, Budinger, and Ellington are all adding about 10 inches in their max vert.

Austin Daye records no successful bench presses at 185? Anthony Randolph did 7. Daye was also the slowest in the 3/4 quart sprint. 3.55 is on par with Brook Lopez and Brian Butch.

Tyreke Evans looks great across the board. Is he going to be a SG or a PG in the NBA? Would he be gone by #6?

He was the fastest at sprinting and 5th best at agility. I guess that helps explain how he’s the best one-on-one collegiate defender I’ve ever seen. Also had the 9th lowest body fat % at 5.2, which surprised me a little bc he’s no waif.

Surprised he beat Flynn & Lawson so easily at the speed/agility. Thought Flynn would win out at that.

Of course his vert was predictably avg (well, no step was higher than Hansborough, but max was avg).

Add that to his size (6’2" – 183) and surprising wingspan (6’6") and TD has to be happy with these results. He’s going to make some team who needs a backup PG very happy in the late 1st round…Paxdorf, are you listening???

Basically what I did was this:
1. I went through the measurement list and filtered out players at each position who have been successful players in the league. I just picked this based on my judgement, no advanced metrics or anything. The numbers are small enough here that I think that’s fine.

2. For the group of successful players, I looked at their average measurements and took the standard deviation. Then I did the same for everyone else.

3. I compared the two groups. I found that, as we’d expect, in most cases, the average successful player is a little bigger or more athletic, but the margin is pretty small. In almost every case, the average measure for the successful player group was higher, but in only a few cases was the average measure for the unsuccessful player group further than a standard deviation for the successful group. In general, here’s what I found:

Average		Successful players		

PS	NSV	MaxV	Bench	Agile	Sprint

PG	 30.8 	 36.7 	 9.2 	 10.94 	 3.15 

SG	 31.0 	 37.0 	 10.9 	 11.28 	 3.19 

SF	 29.5 	 34.5 	 8.9 	 11.59 	 3.31 

PF	 29.4 	 34.0 	 13.1 	 11.58 	 3.31 

C	 29.6 	 34.0 	 11.2 	 11.78 	 3.34 

					

	Average		Non successful		

	NSV	MaxV	Bench	Agile	Sprint

PG-	 30.8 	 36.5 	 6.6 	 11.3 	 3.21 

SG-	 30.0 	 34.9 	 8.4 	 11.5 	 3.25 

SF-	 30.0 	 35.1 	 9.7 	 11.5 	 3.25 

PF-	 29.2 	 34.1 	 13.3 	 11.6 	 3.29 

C-	 27.3 	 30.9 	 12.7 	 11.8 	 3.39 

				

	Average		Difference		

	NSV	MaxV	Bench	Agile	Sprint

PG	0.0%	0.5%	40.0%	-2.9%	-2.0%

SG	3.4%	6.2%	28.9%	-1.9%	-2.0%

SF	-1.7%	-1.6%	-7.7%	1.0%	1.6%

PF	0.7%	-0.2%	-1.4%	0.0%	0.7%

C	8.3%	9.9%	-11.8%	-0.1%	-1.4%

	

Here’s the standard deviations for the successful players

	NSV			MaxV			Bench			Agile			Sprint	

 29.0 	 30.8 	 32.6 	 34.6 	 36.7 	 38.8 	 5.0 	 9.2 	 13.4 	 10.54 	 10.94 	 11.34 	 3.07 	 3.15 	 3.22 

 29.3 	 31.0 	 32.7 	 34.3 	 37.0 	 39.8 	 7.6 	 10.9 	 14.1 	 10.78 	 11.28 	 11.77 	 3.07 	 3.19 	 3.30 

 26.9 	 29.5 	 32.1 	 31.4 	 34.5 	 37.6 	 5.2 	 8.9 	 12.7 	 11.18 	 11.59 	 12.01 	 3.22 	 3.31 	 3.39 

 26.8 	 29.4 	 32.0 	 31.0 	 34.0 	 37.0 	 8.6 	 13.1 	 17.5 	 11.13 	 11.58 	 12.02 	 3.22 	 3.31 	 3.41 

 27.0 	 29.6 	 32.3 	 32.1 	 34.0 	 35.9 	 5.6 	 11.2 	 16.7 	 11.23 	 11.78 	 12.33 	 3.20 	 3.34 	 3.48 

4. What’s all this mean?

• Note that the average unsuccessful PG score for the sprint is 3.21 and the upper std.dev for the successful ones is 3.22. This suggests speed down the court is a more important factor for PGs. Obviously a slower guy can be successful, but other things being equal, you should value speed highly for a PG, and be concerned if he appears slow. This difference is also pretty close for SGs, but speed seems less of a determinant for successful players at other positions.
• Agility. Similarly, the average unsuccessful PG is notably less agile than the average successful PG. 11.3 vs. 10.94, with the upper range of successful PGs being around 11.94.
• Strength. The bench press standard deviations widely overlap, but successful guards and forwards tend to be stronger.
  Now for size metrics. Here is +/- 1 std dev from the average for successful players
  

  
  
  	Weight		Height		Wingspan		Reach	
  
  	Min	Max	Min	Max	Min	Max	Min	Max
  
  PG	175  204 	6’ 0"	6’ 2.3"	6’ 2.9"	6’ 7.8"	7’ 11.1"	8’ 3.3"
  
  SG	195  218 	6’ 2.3"  6’ 5.5"	6’ 7"	6’ 10.7"	8’ 2.8"	8’ 7.7"
  
  SF	211  232 	6’ 6"	 6’ 7.9"	6’ 10.2"	7’ 2.5"	8’ 8.3"	8’ 11.9"
  
  PF	225  248 	6’ 7.3"    6’ 9.6"	6’ 12"	7’ 3.4"	8’ 10.2"	9’ 1.7"
  
  C	232  256 	6’ 9"	 6’ 11.2"	7’ 1.3"	7’ 4.8"	9’ 0.1"	9’ 3.8"
  
  

  
  (Sorry, I can’t get this formatted worth a damn)

Here are the averages for successful and unsuccessful players, as well as the difference (in lbs or inches)

	Average

PS	Wt	Ht	Wing	Reach	

PG	        189.4 	          73.1 	          77.3 	          97.2 	

SG	        206.6 	          75.9 	          80.9 	        101.3 	

SF	        221.5 	          78.9 	          84.4 	        106.1 	

PF	        236.4 	          80.5 	          85.7 	        108.0 	

C	        243.8 	          82.1 	          87.1 	        109.9 	

					

	Average

	Wt	Ht	Wing	Reach	

PG-	        191.9 	          73.6 	          78.7 	          98.3 	

SG-	        203.8 	          75.7 	          80.8 	        101.5 	

SF-	        213.3 	          78.0 	          82.8 	        104.2 	

PF-	        233.5 	          79.7 	          84.9 	        106.5 	

C-	        248.8 	          81.6 	          86.2 	        109.1 	

					

					

					

PG	-1.3%	-0.7%	-1.8%	-1.1%	

SG	1.4%	0.2%	0.1%	-0.2%	

SF	3.9%	1.2%	1.9%	1.8%	

PF	1.2%	1.0%	0.9%	1.4%	

C	-2.0%	0.6%	1.1%	0.8%	

					

					

PG	        (2.50)	        (0.51)	        (1.41)	        (1.11)	

SG	          2.82 	          0.17 	          0.06 	        (0.21)	

SF	          8.28 	          0.90 	          1.58 	          1.91 	

PF	          2.91 	          0.78 	          0.77 	          1.50 	

C	        (4.95)	          0.51 	          0.91 	          0.86 	

					

Lessons:
1. Athleticism is more important than size for your guards, especially PGs. Successful guards tend to be speedy, strong and agile. Size is more important for SFs
2. There is a wide range of successful examples in bench press scores, but we find that guards successful guards are on average, significantly better in the bench than unsuccessful ones. This difference goes away when we look at bigger players, and at the big positions, extremely strong guys, on average, seem not to be as good. I attribute the importance of strength for guards to being able to fight through contact. A marginal improvement in strength makes a difference for them. For bigs, on the other hand, most of them are pretty strong to start with, so there’s not that much difference. Also, you get the long-arm problem (makes it hard to bench press) which might obscure the results a bit.
3. Athleticism doesn’t seem to matter as much for forwards as guards. You want better athletes, obviously, but size matters. There’s a more clear distinction between 2s and 3s than I would have thought. Height, weight, wingspan and reach all seem to be significant factors in SF success.
4. Successful SFs are on average 8lbs heavier than unsuccessful ones. Reach and wingspan are important.
5. Successful centers tend to be a bit lighter but still long, and importantly, are guys who have some hops.

Picking good players.
1. Ideally you want a player within a std. deviation of the mean for successful players. Obviously there are exceptions, but that’s a good starting point. Other things being equal, better size and athleticism is good.
2. For each position, some things have more importance than others
a. PG: Sprint, agility, bench
b. SG: Spring, agility, bench
c. SF: Ht, wt, wing, reach
d. PF: Ht, reach
e. C: Ht, wing, reach, NS.Vert, Max.Vert

Wouldn’t mind seeing him as the second first rounder