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Project O'Bust vs Yi Jianlian

By Atma Brother ONE

After the Warriors selected Patrick O'Bryant with the 9th pick and Kosta Perovic in the 2nd round of the 2006 NBA Draft I thought Chris Mullin and Rod Higgins screwed up another draft royally. A few NBDL stints later it unfortunately appears as if Project O'Bryant is headed nowhere fast.

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A Super-Lotto D-League player.

This recent scouting report by Jonathan Givony for DraftExpress isn't exactly inspiring either:

O'Bryant made an appearance in the five on five pickup games in Vegas, and looked fairly rusty as you might imagine after not having played many minutes at all this season outside the D-League. His body looks similar to how it did last time we saw him in person about a year ago (also in a private workout), but he seemed to be showing more of a face-up jumper than we recall him having, even shooting a 3-pointer at one point, which he missed. O'Bryant also looked to utilize a Kareem-esqe skyhook that didn't quite fall for him, and wasn't quite the presence defensively that you might hope considering his height and wingspan. More than anything, it seems like the year he spent riding the pine (outside his time in the D-League) has affected his confidence, something that isn't that much of a surprise all things considered. It's pretty clear that Don Nelson's style of play doesn't suit him (or any other 7-footer not named Dirk for that matter) very well, so it's quite possible that some NBA team looking for an athletic big man with freakishly long arms and great upside could be able to make something happen if they really wanted to. It's obviously way too early to give up on him.

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At least LL POB?

Not that favorable comparisons to Patrick O'Bust mean much right now, but here's what Joe Abunassar who is currently training both Yi and O'Bryant told Janny Hu of the San Francisco Chronicle when comparing the two big men:

"Patrick's an interesting athlete as well. High vertical leap, long arms, but at this time last year, lacked Yi's maturity in terms of explosiveness and ability to pound the defender. He was not nearly as powerful." Now, Abunassar didn't mean that as a knock on O'Bryant, but given how quickly last year's No. 9 pick fell out of favor after training camp, it wouldn't surprise me if O'Bryant is moved this summer.

Actually I'd be somewhat shocked if POB was still on the Warriors' roster by the start of next year's training camp if Nellie's still around. By the way Hu's sources in that piece say Nellie's coming back- thank you Nelliebelly!

One of the side jokes of The Yi Movement during its inception was that Warriors Nation could pretty much randomly select someone in the NBA Draft and fair better than the (at that time) directionless and clueless Warrior front office. With Nellie on board it's an entirely different story now, but it does crack me up that almost a year later Yi is a superior prospect to POB. Who knows though? Maybe the Warriors end up with Yi and Nellie sends him to go jam in the D-League. Nellie's Golden State is a funny place.

Just for fun let's pretend Patrick O'Bryant was a member of this year's draft class. Where do you think he'd go? Top 10? Top 15? First Round? Second Round?

 

More on The Notorious P.O.B.:

 

More on Yi:

 

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