As has been the case in previous years when there are two nearly equal candidates for the No. 1 pick, everyone seems to have dug in on their preference between Karl-Anthony Towns and Jahlil Okafor for the 2015 NBA Draft.
Okafor may have provided reason for additional optimism for those in his camp this week. He revealed that his perceived conditioning issues - one of the knocks against him and a potential reason for his defensive shortcomings - were due in part to injuries he played through during the season.
As he told Sports Illustrated:
Going into the season, I was in great shape, and then as the season progressed I kind of lost that shape. (Due to) injuries, I wasn’t able to practice as much so I wasn’t as active. Now I’ve gotten back to what I was doing before I went to school, changed my diet up a little bit, and just working hard. It’ll just make me a better athlete, taking care of my body. That just goes without saying.
Since the end of the college season, Okafor has dropped 12 pounds, - if the weight loss figure is accurate, maybe we should all start exercising with our adorable dogs - a number that's unofficial because he opted to skip the NBA Draft Combine, as did Towns.
His camp can control who he works out for leading up to the draft, but with a top-three pick on the line, it's unlikely they shirk from showing off his improved physique and motor.
Okafor was the consensus No. 1 for most of the college season, with the Duke center punishing opponents with his incredibly well-developed back-to-the-basket game. The 6-foot-11, 275-pound behemoth is advertised as having an NBA-ready postgame, great hands, and smarts, but his lack of quickness and occasional lapses leaves him somewhere south of a high-end defensive prospect.
Where Okafor represents a high floor and an immediate impact, Towns represents a higher ceiling with appropriate patience. A far better defender, Towns' offense came along as the season progressed and it's believed he'll ultimately be a better pro if he continues on his current development path.
Most teams reportedly prefer Towns at this point, but the team with the top pick, the Minnesota Timberwolves, may not be one of them. The general feeling among Wolves fans online is that they'd prefer Towns, but the prospects remain close, and if Flip Saunders likes Okafor, he could surely justify his reasoning.
