The winner of the 2023 Dub Nation Draft Tourney: Dereck Lively II

no surprise, but he might be out of our league

Overall results and how we chose the field at 2023 Dub Nation HQ Draft Tournament. Past Draft Tourneys archived here.

Why we have the Tourney

The tournament is designed for people who are not draft experts to catch up on prospects in the Warriors range at a casual pace. This is the reason it is sliced up into one on one votes instead of a massive 16 person scouting report.

The ultimate goal is for you to develop opinions and attachments about the different prospects, so you can argue with others, dream about the future, enjoy the draft with more suspense and emotional investment, and then in the future tell everyone how you had it right and the drafters were a bunch of idiots.

Why we do not have a “Trade The Pick” option

Because it’s a cop out. This series is about learning the prospects. If you give everyone a chance to choose a “trade the pick for something wonderful” then everyone will select that. The only interesting part about “trade the pick” is in the details. You are free to discuss in the comments (but PLEASE try to give specific trade ideas). But I don’t want to endorse in the official poll the option of staying ignorant of the draft.

Why don’t you just have a big board where we can rate everyone?

We do. Super commenter void has made (again) a web app where you can record your Big Board for our limited pool of “Might Fall To #19” Tourney participants.

• void’s DNHQ Big Board Vote Site

• You can also see my preferences for previous years, poor misguided soul

But it makes no sense to put this up until after the first round of the Tourney. Most of us are paying real attention to the prospects for the first time.

Tourney Results

The results combine the article poll votes plus the 10x weighted comment votes.

Final Round Winner

• Dereck Lively II 49%.

• Jordan Hawkins 24%

• Jett Howard 23%

• Colby Jones 4%

• Dereck Lively II is the winner of our little Tourney! What’s to dislike about an athletic center who is a defensive wizard, dunk finisher and in the future potentially a stretch 5? Yes there are the questions of a lack of motor and the small issue of his hype being so enormous that he’ll likely be taken in the lottery well before #19. But that just shows that we have good taste.

Bonus Rounds

The Tourney field is set about a month ahead of time. In that month, prospect reputations go up and down. It would be difficult to adjust the tournament field as you go, and that would also be taking too seriously what is a super unscientific process.

This bonus round is its own separate mini-tournament to allow us to scout and vote on some key prospects who didn’t make it into our tournament.

• Bonus Group A: Ben Sheppard, Kobe Bufkin, James Nnaji, Maxwell Lewis

  • Ben Sheppard 10%

  • Kobe Bufkin 70%. The poll was close but Kobe is the runaway winner in the comments for his two way play and promise.

  • James Nnaji 5%

  • Maxwell Lewis 16%

• Bonus Group B: Jaime Jaquez, Jalen Wilson, Julian Strawther, Terquavion Smith

  • Jaime Jaquez 93%. Even more of a runaway victor in both the poll and the comments.

  • Jalen Wilson 4%

  • Julian Strawther 3%

  • Terquavion Smith 0%