Michigan Basketball: Caris LeVert’s NBA Draft Stock Hurting?
Michigan basketball had a special player in Caris LeVert, but not for very long. Are injuries and uncertainty casting doubt on his NBA future?
Back in late December and early January, when Caris LeVert was first being sidelined with a lower left leg injury, there weren’t too many people who thought his Michigan basketball playing days were over.
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But after weeks passing with no sign of his return, hopes of LeVert donning a Michigan uniform were in serious doubt.
Most of us stuck by him through those times: I pleaded with fans to stop trashing the poor player, and Chris Gibbons asked that we celebrate LeVert’s career instead of lashing out at him for something he couldn’t control.
But now that the Wolverines are in his rearview mirror, LeVert moves onto the different, more difficult challenge of convincing NBA teams that he’s going to be ready to play next season, and that he won’t be experiencing any long-term injury effects.
MLive spoke with three NBA scouts, who remained anonymous, about what they saw in LeVert. Some of it was positive, some of it wasn’t.
“If he’s proven healthy, the air of mystery (around LeVert) could be a positive,” said a scout for a playoff-bound Eastern Conference Central Division team. “Right now, the air of mystery is negative.”
According to all three scouts who spoke, LeVert was trending toward being a mid-to-late-first-round pick in this year’s NBA Draft before sustaining his lower left leg injury against Illinois in the first game of the conference season. He was leading the Wolverines with 17.6 points, 5.4 rebounds and 5.2 assists to that point.
“I wouldn’t say the upside is great,” said a Western Conference scout. “But I think what he does is really impressive. I think he’s a pretty talented player. Obviously, he has to get stronger, but I personally do like his upside. I think he could be a talented player. Would be a star? No, not really. But he could certainly be a role player.”
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None of the scouts believe LeVert will be taken in the first round of the draft.
“Some team in the late first round could say, screw it, we don’t like anyone else at this point and he’s the most talented player,” said a second Eastern Conference scout. “But really, I think it’s 100 percent going to come down to what the doctors say.”
With so much uncertainty in these quotes from scouts, it’s difficult to imagine LeVert is going to go in the first round; they all believe he’s more of a mid-second-round pick.
This quote pretty much sums up what NBA teams must be feeling right now:
“In my opinion, he’s not a guy who you’re going to say, he’s so talented that we’re willing to risk a first-round draft choice on him. If he were healthy, he had a chance to be a late first-round pick. The injury, to me, knocks him out of the first round. To be a second-round pick or a high second-round pick, he’ll still have to show that he’s physically fit and that cleared to play.”
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Is the potential there for LeVert? Certainly. But if the doctors don’t give him much favorability, that’ll be a hard sell to NBA teams ahead of the draft.