The humid Manila air clung to my skin as I scrolled through my phone, the glow of the screen illuminating my face in the dim light of a local café. I was supposed to be decompressing after a long season of covering collegiate basketball, but my mind, as it often does, was drifting thousands of miles away to the bright lights of the Barclays Center. I was already deep in the rabbit hole of my 2024 NBA Mock Draft analysis. It’s a sickness, I tell you. Just then, a notification popped up from a local sports talk show clip. A heated debate was unfolding, and one voice cut through the noise with conviction: "No way. Hindi mangyayari 'yan [trading Alec Stockton]," said Coach Aldin Ayo’s trusted assistant, Chris Cayabyab. That single, firm declaration, rooted in a specific team's loyalty and long-term vision, suddenly framed everything I was thinking about. It’s that time of year where speculation runs wild, but it’s the unwavering stances, the "untouchable" prospects, that truly shape the future of franchises.
You see, building a mock draft isn't just about listing names by talent. It's a giant, chaotic puzzle of team needs, personality fits, and behind-the-scenes whispers that sometimes feel more like gossip than analysis. I remember last year, I was so certain about one particular top-3 pick, I’d have bet my favorite coffee mug on it. I was wrong, of course. The team went in a completely different direction, prioritizing a specific defensive archetype over pure scoring. That mug is now a reminder to hold my predictions a little more loosely. This year, the conversation seems to start and end with two names: Alexandre Sarr and Zaccharie Risacher. Sarr, the 7'1" French big with a wingspan that seems to go on forever—I’ve clocked it at a ridiculous 7'4"—has this fluidity that is just unnatural for a player his size. He moves like a guard trapped in a center's body, and his defensive potential is the kind that gets general managers genuinely excited.
But let me tell you, my personal favorite, the guy I’m irrationally high on, is Nikola Topić from Serbia. I know, I know, the "next great European guard" label gets thrown around too often, but watching his film feels different. His court vision is elite, like he's playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers. He averaged a cool 18.5 points and 6.9 assists in the Adriatic League, and while his three-point shooting is a work in progress at around 32%, his ability to get to the rim and create for others is what sells me. He’s the kind of player you build an offense around, a true floor general. This is where that quote from Coach Cayabyab really hits home for me. When a team believes they have their guy, their foundational piece, it changes their entire draft strategy. Declaring someone "untouchable" means you’re building your future with them, not around the fleeting hope of a draft pick. For teams picking in the top five, finding that "untouchable" talent is the entire goal of this exhausting process.
Of course, the draft is never that straightforward. There’s always a wild card, a player who shoots up the boards after the combine or a team that falls in love with an under-the-radar prospect. Last week, I was on a call with a scout who swore that Reed Sheppard, despite questions about his size, is the best pure shooter in this class, pointing to his insane 52% from three-point range at Kentucky. I can’t argue with the numbers, but it’s that gut feeling, that conviction, that separates a good pick from a franchise-altering one. As I finally closed my phone and took a sip of my now-lukewarm coffee, I thought about the whirlwind of rumors and analysis that makes up my annual deep dive into the top prospects and predictions in the 2024 NBA mock draft analysis. In a few weeks, the speculation will end, and real careers will begin. But for now, in this beautiful, frustrating period of uncertainty, every strong opinion, every "no way," shapes the narrative of what’s to come.
