We’re just days away from the 2018 Draft.
Instead of mock drafts, spend a few minutes mocking the draft. Jimbo Rudding provides our regular dose of levity here at Salt City Hoops, and he does it by answering the burning questions to which Jazz fans just must have answers. This time around, he dedicates the full mailbag to next Thursday’s draft. You can submit questions to Jimbo at mailbag@saltcityhoops.com or by tweeting to @JimboRudding.
Q: Hey Jimbo, are you gonna do another mock draft this year?
@JimboRudding
Why, yes Jimbo, I am! Thanks for asking!
Not only do you get one of the most informative mock drafts, you also get fun facts about every draftee.
Enjoy!
Deeter is an amazingly tall man with a pterodactyl-like wingspan. Whenever he goes to the mall, people are always like, “Wow, what an incredible wingspan!” and Deek doesn’t mind one bit—he LOVES the attention and can often be found hitting on the perfume lady at Dillards.
Fun Fact: Deadre LOVES Cookie Crisp cereal and one time at two boxes in one sitting.
Don’t let Mel’s last name fool you. He actually plays basketball very Goodley. Marvin is a seven-footer out of Duke who can palm the ball as well as just about any athlete out there. He just wraps his giant hand around the ball and BOOM! it’s snug in his grasp.
Fun Fact: Bradley has conquered Super Mario 3 over 17 times even though he can’t stand the underwater worlds.
Trent is a light’s out shooter who really prefers to shoot with the lights either all the way out or at least dimmed quite a bit. He likes to dribble with both hands at once, which gets him in a lot of trouble because it’s against the rules.
Fun Fact: Treb isn’t allowed at the Kinko’s in Santa Barbara anymore because of an “emergency bathroom incident” back in 2012.
Jerome is a stellar basketball player who recently stubbed his pinky toe on the leg of a coffee table while carrying nachos to the couch. It was a gruesome injury (TONS of blood, nail was a goner, carpet needed professional cleaning). It was a real bummer because Jerry was really playing well in his workouts and also because he was excited to watch “Pitch Perfect 3” that night. The good news is the doctors say he should be fully healthy and ready for training camp.
Fun Fact: Jackie has never in his lifetime touched a horse.
Luther has been a European sensation for the last two years. He scored a record 64 points in a game against Harch Gerg, Shirm Delch and the rest of the boys on the Estonian national team last April. He’s been nicknamed the “White Werewolf” because he’s scary good and also he’s shown a dog-like obedience to his coaches.
Fun Fact: Lucerch has been tackled by Celine Dion’s security in three different countries.
Mack is another long big man who has an incredible knack for the ball. He loves to shoot—and I mean, he LOVES it. He’s been known to yell, “I LOVE SHOOTING!” after most shots. Scouts are saying that Mehmad could be the steal of the draft.
Fun Fact: Marge once ate three Dairy Queen Blizzards in one sitting after his girlfriend broke up with him.
Mickey has been wowing teams during his workouts lately. Even though he’s a great defender, his specialty is tickling the twine. He’s been doing it ever since he was seven years old, which is when his first basketball coaches introduced him to twine tickling.
Fun Fact: Mitch has never seen the movie Titanic and sadly has absolutely zero plans to do so in the future.
Martin is another big guy who, according to one of his college coaches, can “run the floor like frickin Prefontaine.” Mattis could potentially be a league-leading shot blocker if he works hard and eats a lot of well-balanced breakfasts. Rumor is–his dad has run out of room on the shelf in the garage to mark his height.
Fun Fact: Malty is a HUGE Matchbox 20 fan and often, out of the blue, will bring up Rob Thomas in conversations at parties and family reunions.
Werther is a gym rat who really took the college basketball scene by storm last year. Last year in practice he jumped so high that he landed on some steel girders in the roof and was too scared to jump back down to the floor. Luckily the school had some industrial ladders and an off-duty firefighter was able to coerce him to climb down.
Fun Fact: Wellen was born without earlobes. The ones he has now are prosthetics.
Older brother to Marley Barges, Montell is an explosive wing who has a great motor. His basketball IQ is a whopping 73, almost unheard of even for the NBA. He needs to work on his core muscles, particularly his six-pack, but for the most part, Madge is one of the best athletes in the draft and has the potential to really excel at the next level. Fun Fact: He was so mad about coming in dead last at the Pinewood Derby that he set his pinewood derby car on fire. The fire eventually spread to his father’s work shed. Thankfully, no one was hurt in the fire, except for the family cats. They were singed up pretty bad.
Fun Fact: Merrell collects antique harmonicas.
Corey is a point guard out of the great state of Alabama and has all the makings of a true leader. He is a slasher, he’s a giver, he’s scorer, he’s a runner. He plays his bball in the sun. The one knock on Celtzer is that his hair is pretty funky. It almost looks like the top of his head exploded, but you know, to each his own.
Fun Fact: Calvin often attends Comic Con dressed as Grig from The Last Starfighter.
Shaz could be the point guard of the future for the Clippers. He has one of the quickest first, second, and third steps that I’ve ever seen a grown man have. His wiry, athletic frame is ideal for being able to run around for long periods of time and not get tired and out of breath like the rest of us fatties.
Fun Fact: Shant voted for Carrie Underwood in season 4 of American Idol and cried when she won.
Zippy was one heck of a shooting guard in college. In fact, the nerds at Texas Tech are trying to come up with an algorithm that can by integrated with microchips and inserted into the brains of elementary school children so that they will automatically shoot with the exact same form and technique as Zorro.
Fun Fact: Zeek can tell the thread count of sheets just by lying in them.
Brob is a giant power forward out of Texas A&M. The “A&M” should stand for “Athletic and Meaty” because Bert is a VERY strong and athletic big man who is hungry to prove himself. His desire to be the best comes from always being bullied when he was younger. Kids would call him “sir” and always give him the desserts from their school lunch and then pretend to be scared of him. Ugh, kids can be so cruel!
Fun Fact: Babs once got fed up with a game of Monopoly that he threw his grandma’s coffee table into the power lines above her house.
Liz is another shooting guard out of Miami who speaks multiple languages, including Nordic. He excelled in high school, is a terrific speller, and has dreams of owning his own fleet of hot air balloons. If the Wizards land Lorne at 15, expect some happy Washingtonites.
Fun Fact: Lambie once broke his parent’s bay window by practicing his homemade Indiana Jones whip indoors after he was specifically told not to.
Devo is a combo guard with some serious skills. He can pass, he can shoot, and he can do the Macarena in his apartment when his roommates aren’t home. This draft is full of good shooters and Danch can shoot with the best of them…and also the worst of them…he basically just shoots with everybody. He probably could use a little work on the defense end, but really, who couldn’t? I mean, let’s be honest, people. Players who want to be good defenders just say that because they can’t shoot. Am I right?
Fun Fact: Once during a game of Spin the Bottle, Darrell spun the ketchup bottle so hard it got ketchup everywhere and he ended up having to kiss everyone in the circle.
Kerry is a long, athletic wing who can really get up and down the floor. He got into basketball when he was very young, and I mean VERY young. Like, his dad tried to make him dribble a ball when his was just a few months old. It didn’t go well, but eventually Karen was able to perform well enough that his dad wouldn’t scream at him every time they practiced.
Fun Fact: Kelly has a concave sternum, which he uses as a cereal bowl from time to time.
18. SAN ANTONIO SPURS – Tadd Borne
Tom is a 6-foot, 7-inch beast of a human being. He’s versatile, has a warm personality, and is great at finishing what he starts. He’s a terrific gardener and enjoys pointing out different types of shrubbery to passengers on his famous long car rides. There’s really not a whole lot else to say about Turk; he’s just a sweetheart of a guy.
Fun Fact: His all-time favorite movie is “Big Top Pee-wee.”
Michael is a big animal lover; he REALLY isn’t a fan of little animals. He’s been working on his dribbling lately and can now dribble between his legs! One scout was overheard saying, “Wow! Did that go through his legs! Love the improvement!” Just for that fact alone, I would be surprised if Marty falls this far on draft night.
Fun Fact: Misty’s teammates in college used to call him “Poppins” because at his 14th birthday party he jumped off a deck while holding onto his parent’s lawn furniture umbrella.
Antone could really thrive in the Minnesota system. He’s a great player who plays downhill, which is probably because growing up Antioch’s backyard had a pretty steep slope to it. One of Arthur’s best attributes, besides his smile, is his ability to make a layup with his off hand. Pretty rare in today’s NBA.
Fun Fact: Argon once drank all the blue liquid out of a Magic 8-Ball on a dare.
Jem isn’t your usual NBA prospect. He’s a workhorse and in reality is probably a lock to help take the Utah Jazz to the NBA Finals next year. He’s always the first one in the gym and the last one to leave because he rents a room from the gym owner and gets to stay rent free so long as he sweeps and mops every night after the gym closes. Josh has been dunking the basketball since he was 11 years old and plans on dunking well into his late 50’s.
Fun Fact: Jared was an extra in “X-men Days of Future Past.” He was a passenger on a city bus and was instructed to look “extremely frightened.” Check it out; he did a great job.
This behemoth of a man out of the great state of Idaho has been wowing basketball crowds since day one…if you call day one the first day he played well in an organized basketball setting. Chunk doesn’t do one thing really well, but he does a lot of things pretty OK. He hit a half-court shot once. Not in a game, just after practice. Although, most of his teammates don’t believe him because they were in the locker room.
Fun Fact: Chester helped foil a robbery at a McDonalds by throwing a McGriddle at the would-be robber.
Ella is a basketball player from France and is just one of those guys who just has a nose for the basketball…so much so that he broke his nose last year after the ball hit him square in the face. He’s known for his hustle and is probably one of the quickest guards in the draft. He can get in the paint almost at will and is already amazing at getting deflections and steals.
Fun Fact: Ernie thinks the Toby Maguire Spidermans are the best of all the Spidermans and he is willing to fight anyone who says otherwise.
Kody has been away from the game for quite some time. He got a nasty case of pink eye that lasted the better part of last year. The pink eye got so bad that one eye was swollen shut and he wasn’t allowed to touch any of the practice basketballs for fear of infecting his teammates. Doctors have given him the go ahead to start playing again and the NBA scouts have so far been impressed. One scout said, “He’s a great player, so if he can get his eye thing figured out, he could really open some…eyes.”
Fun Fact: When he was 9 years old he swallowed three small Legos and he swears he still hasn’t passed them yet.
Kit has a beautiful-looking jump shot. His form is almost perfect and his follow through is more than ideal. The only knock on Kurt is that in his interviews with NBA teams he always brings up how he wants to eventually become an orthodontist. In fact, in college, he would frequently mention to coaches and teammates everything they’d need to do to correct their over/underbites.
Fun Fact: Kirk is a distant relative of Cindy Crawford and Connie Chung.
Jorge is a creator on the court and has mastered the art of getting into transition after a turnover. He is an accomplished woodworker and has sold numerous coffee tables at the local farmer’s market. When he’s not in the gym hoopin, you can always find him either sanding his coffee tables or looking for pieces of wood that would make a nice coffee table.
Fun Fact: Jerms still hasn’t kissed a girl, but he HAS kissed a lot of girl’s backpacks.
Lori has a standing reach of 920 inches, which converted into basketball measurements is about two-thirds the way up the net. If the Celtics could land Lester at #27, this could potentially change the franchise and possibly even the game of basketball as we know it. Trust me, he’s THAT good. Side note—he also might not be that good at basketball. Only time will tell.
Fun Fact: Lars cried when he found out that Pluto was demoted from planet status.
Gary is an amazing ball handler and shooter, but he has some intense anger issues. That’s one reason he fell out of the lottery and all the way down to #28. He hates most television shows and has been in numerous arguments with teammates about which Saved By the Bell actress was hottest.
Fun Fact: George LOVES to drink some of the water when he goes down waterslides.
Arnold is probably one of the most underrated players in this draft. He would fit perfectly on the Nets because expectations would be low and he would be given the freedom to play however he wants because really, the Nets have like 50 fans total. Allan likes to do tumbling in his spare time, but he does NOT like when people watch him.
Fun Fact: Arol was reprimanded by Disneyland security for jumping off the Pirates of the Caribbean ride and trying to pull the keys out of the dog’s mouth.
Olan never really thought he’d ever be an athlete. Sure he was tall and muscular, but his heart was always in the theater. In fact, Orion was playing Curly in his high school’s production of “Oklahoma” when the head basketball coach first noticed him and asked him to come try out for the team. Oden didn’t want to, but his dad made him do it and look at him now—probably about to pay off his dad’s house for him.
Fun Fact: One time Oz tried to start a flash mob, but it didn’t take and he ended up singing a solo of Memory from “Cats” dressed in spandex in the middle of a mall eatery.
That does it. Be sure to tune in on Thursday to see it all unfold exactly as Jimbo called it.
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