Will Zion be a top-50 player his rookie year? Our #NBARank experts think so.
— ESPN (@espn) September 24, 2019
Players 50-31: https://t.co/yVkZRwoNkg pic.twitter.com/YetdWbYXfo
We're at that time of the year where all the of news outlets are rolling out their top 100 players lists. Some places, like SI, simply don't include rookies in their evaluations, and as a result people like Zion are left off.
ESPN, however, has included rookies, and they've made an interesting projection for the year: Zion as a top 50 player, falling at 42nd in the NBA.
This ranking places him above noted veterans such as Klay Thompson, Demar Derozan, and Kevin Love. Only one spot behind Lamarcus Aldridge and 2 spots behind 2018 All-Star, Nikola Vucevic.
Here's their paragraph on him: ''Our NBArank panel placed the No. 1 overall pick of this year's draft 42nd, the highest ever for a first-year player in the nine seasons we've been doing NBArank. That's understandable given that Zion is one of the most promising players to enter the league in recent memory.''
What do you think? Is this too high, in your view? Maybe you think Zion's going to hit the league like a freight train and you don't think it's high enough. Personally, I think that while this is a generous estimation, it's also not an impossible one. I would not be surprised if, by the end of the year, Zion has the advanced stats and the impact metrics of a top 50 player, even if his counting stats aren't quite as shiny as someone like Derozan's.
To me, this just tells me that the media is finally catching up to something that a lot of people have known for a long time. Rookies can be good at basketball. Any doubt that surrounded that was destroyed when, last season, Trae Young and Luka Doncic both had monstrous rookie years, providing huge value to their teams and undeniably carving out spots as high calibre players in their first years.
Other Pelicans on ESPN's list:
Derrick Favors: #96 (too low)
JJ Redick: #73
Lonzo Ball: #68
Ingram: #56 (too high)
Jrue: #31 (way too low)