Baylor NBA Draft Profile: Kendall Brown A First Round Steal?
Before the 2021-22 season, Baylor Bears basketball fans knew they would be watching a lottery pick in the green and gold, but it was hard to imagine any of them would have expected it to be someone not named Kendall Brown.
That said, Brown represents the parity of the talent outside the top five or so picks in the draft, meaning he could well be a low, risk high reward player.
Brown came to Baylor as a top-tier recruit with the prototypical high school mixtape coming out of Sunrise Christian Academy in Kansas. The 6’7” wing was everywhere on the court in high school, dribbling through the entire midwest with an offensive game played exclusively at or above the rim.
While Brown flashed similar talent in his first several weeks in a Baylor uniform, his physical play and paint presence dipped dramatically once the calendar flipped to January for the Big 12 schedule.
While he was susceptible to the backdoor cut all winter long, his defensive metric measure way better than the eye test. For the season, Brown had a respectable 95.2 defensive rating and was in the top 20 in the Big 12 in both defensive and offensive rebounding percentage in just his freshman season.
What Brown never really developed in Waco was a mature offensive game. He was a great cutter and has excellent basketball IQ at both ends, but he is more of a transition scorer, not someone who is going to create his own shot or catch and shoot, like many of his NBA counterparts with the same build.
At least in college, his offensive skillset was much more akin to Robert Williams III than someone like a Paul George. Once again referring to the eye test, however, he shows some definite potential. He has a jump shot that isn’t all the way there, but isn’t broken either. Basically, we’ve seen worse college shooters become perimeter scorers in the NBA.
In terms of athletic ability, he could’ve been in the Association probably three years ago. His wingspan reaches almost seven feet and he could jump out of most NBA arenas if they didn’t require roofs.
Without the time constraints of a college schedule and with the unlimited resources an NBA team has, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Brown develop into an explosive two way player in a position that seems to be changing every year in the NBA.
Worst Case: Josh Jackson
Many expected Brown might be a lottery pick before the college season began, and his profile reminds me a lot of a couple of guys taken in the top five in years past. Y’all remember Josh Jackson at Kansas? Coming out of high school, it was a toss-up between Jackson and Harry Giles for the top prep player in America.
Jackson had a better college career in terms of the stats than Brown, managing to score over 16 a game without a sliver of a jump shot. The difference is Brown understood his role at Baylor, not trying to be a 20 point guy, whereas nobody told Jackson he needs to be a good shooter to score.
Jackson was basically just an energy guy, with the same explosiveness as Brown, but his game never polished. If Brown is put in a bad situation in the pros and/or doesn’t develop a perimeter game, he could end up like Jackson, who now rots in the NBA graveyard in Sacramento, one false move from becoming a legend in Lithuania.
Best Case: Jaylen Brown
Even in a best case scenario, this might be a bit of a stretch.
If you maxed out Kendall Brown’s attributes on 2K, he’d be Jaylen Brown. Watching Jaylen Brown now, it’s easy to forget he was kind of a ‘spit out your drink’ No. 3 overall pick in 2016.
Most mock drafts had this Brown going outside the top five and, in fact, some mock drafts had him going outside the lottery, like Kendall Brown is projected to go this year.
Jaylen Brown was an athletic marvel coming off just one season on a mediocre Cal team, but slid into a great situation with the Celtics where he contributed right away to a team that went to the Conference Finals in his first two seasons.
Jaylen went from a freaky athletic rebounder and occasional shot disrupter to a guy whose ability to score at all three levels and two-way play that is just torching Draymond Green could earn him Finals MVP.
If Kendall Brown can get that kind of jumper, everything else should fall into place with his prowess on the defensive end and in transition.
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Covering Baylor for Inside The Bears and the Locked on Baylor podcast. You can follow me for more Baylor content at @realcamstuart on Twitter. Originally from Rockland, Massachusetts and a Baylor alum, so I might mix the occasional bias and/or Boston sports tweet in there every once in a while.