Kendall Marshall improving his Draft prospects with a renewed shooting game – NBA Feature Part 1
With the NBA Draft just around the corner, teams have picked up their preparations for the big day, with backdoor trades and deals being discussed as we speak.
This year’s draft includes some good prospects at the centre and forward positions, with Anthony Davis leading the way. He is the unanimous number one pick of June 28th draft. However, there is one position where the
draft class of this year is not so deep, and that is the pivotal point guard position.
Kendall Marshall is one of those few point guard prospects who is anticipated to be picked up in the first round. He played for North Carolina while at college, and is a pure point guard which is considered a rarity in the NBA
of today. Most of the point guards nowadays tend to shuffle between the number 1 and number 2 positions and normally need to make that transition to become a pure point guard. Marshall is one of those players who do not need to make that transition which is
why his worth increases even more.
The one guard is an excellent ball distributor with a knack of finding the open guys on the floor and making plays. His abilities helped his teammates at North Carolina score, but the same cannot be said about him. If there is
one weakness in Marshall’s game, it is his ability to make shots. He is not a prolific jump shooter and has actually quite an awkward release style which will prevent him from being picked higher up in the order.
In the NCAA tournament, Marshall did dismiss that perception with an excellent field goal percentage, which has brought him back into the spotlight and has made him a wanted man on the draft roster.
The recent improvement in his game with respect to his shooting has improved his draft chances more than any other player.
“His shooting has gotten to the point where you're not going to be running plays to get him jump shots, but he's become enough of a shooter. He's not a great athlete where teams are going to be fearing him going by them. He needs
a ball screen. If he was a knock-down shooter, he could be a lottery pick because he's a pure point guard,” said one General Manager.
The only confusion about his improved game is that it was over a span of just 6 games, a very small number to make deductions from.
The 30 games in the 2011-2012 season and a full year before that when he was a freshman take precedence over his 6 game performance, and that is what most teams will be looking at. However, it only takes a few games to make an
impact and some of the teams might have been convinced enough to draft him higher than expected.
To be continued.......
Tags: