Trey Burke and his family announced last week that they are examining NBA draft possibilities. Burke submitted paperwork to receive feedback from the NBA draft undergraduate committee and plans to make his next decision at some point after receiving that feedback. As expected, Burke’s announcement of a possible announcement has generated its fair share of media frenzy. Here’s a round up of what scouts, advisors – a list that includes Satch Sullinger, Tim Hardaway Sr. and Darius Morris among others – and an array of other people are saying about Burke and his NBA options.
Names linked to full articles with additional quotes.
“You don’t look at what’s outside,” Satch Sullinger said Saturday, before Jared was to play in the Elite Eight for Ohio State. “We didn’t look at what was outside, we looked at what was inside of our son. At 19 years old being out there with money, we felt like we weren’t ready. His game may (have been) ready. We encouraged him, (but) it still was his choice. We encouraged him (that) he needed to stay. Hopefully, Trey makes the best decision for him.”
“I told him how to go about it and not to listen to everybody, but get honest opinions, which Coach (John) Beilein will do an excellent job of assisting him,” Morris said. “It’s exciting, but at the same time, it’s a very delicate process because a lot of thoughts are going through your head and you want to gather the best information you can to make a very important decision.”
“In terms of him as an NBA prospect, players in his mold are definitely in vogue right now: very quick, very aggressive, shot creators that can also shoot the three and also know how to run a team and can get other people involved. That’s in demand right now,” Givony said. “We personally weren’t expecting him to be in this draft considering that you don’t see a lot of 5-11 guys end up one-and-done. I think he might be the first.
“Teams are looking for an athletic point guard that can penetrate, make plays, find guys in traffic, run the offense and definitely play good defense,” Hardaway said. “Trey is somewhat like (Clippers guard) Chris Paul but a little bit quicker.”
Burke will be a NBA player one day, but he isn’t ready yet to make the jump. His ability to run the pick and roll will be attractive to teams, as well as his ability to knock down jumpers, but he is small, his defense needs a lot of work and he will need to focus on being more of a distributor than scorer at the next level. If he was to come out now, I say he would probably go in the late first-high second round (25-40) range. There have been quotes recently about this draft lacking point guards, which may lead underclassmen to declare. Teams are not going to pick a point guard just because they may need one and there is a certain amount available. They will pick them because they are available and can help the team. I think it will be another year or more before Burke is ready to help a NBA team.
The deadline to withdraw from the NBA Draft is April 10th but players have up until April 29th to declare for the draft. The NBA undergraduate committee is required to provide feedback by April 6th.
