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One of the more astute things we’ve heard a coach say about prospective talents was from Matt Painter this year. Basically, he said that once you get past the elite talents, from about 30-100, it’s a crapshoot. You just don’t know who’s going to turn out.
After you watch this video, you could probably take it further.
It’s amazing to see names scroll by year after year only to fade from consciousness. This video examines what happened to various players like Ivan Rabb, Josh Jackson, LiAngelo Ball, Nico Mannion and many others.
Some of these guys just weren’t as good as they thought they were; some had bad luck with injuries and others just made terrible life decisions.
Included in here are Duke’s Harry Giles and Jabari Parker, who both struggled with injuries, and Trevon Duval, who we learned at Duke was essentially blind in one eye. That’s obviously a real problem for an athlete. Jahlil Okafor shows up later as well.
It kind of underscores both the difficulty of competing at the very highest levels and the importance of having a backup plan.
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