NBA Draft Results Validate Hunter Dickinson's Decision

Hunter Dickinson lost a lot of fans by transferring away from Michigan, but can you blame him?

It's becoming more and more clear with each passing NBA Draft — the true center is a dying breed.

Former Michigan big man shocked a lot of people and lost a lot of fans by transferring to Kansas, but at the end of the day, it was kind of a no-brainer for him. At Kansas, he's going to be able to secure much more money by way of NIL while also playing for a team that might be a Final Four favorite. Had he stayed at Michigan, NIL money would've been much less significant and the Wolverines are expected to struggle a bit on the court. Of course, his other option was to test the NBA waters, but that's looking more and more like a pipe dream, even for an All-American, 7-footer.

Thursday's draft gave us all more evidence supporting something we probably already knew, which is that the center position is slowly fading out of existence. Even No. 1 overall pick Victor Wembanyama, who is a towering 7-5, isn't really viewed as a true center because of his ability to handle the ball and shoot from the outside. Unless you can do a little bit of both as a 7-footer, you might not have a place in today's NBA, which is crazy to think about.

As a matter of fact, Thursday's draft is much more about who wasn't picked versus where guys like Wembanyama and other stretch post players were picked. Look no further than UConn's Adama Sonogo, Kentucky's Oscar Tshiebwe and Gonzaga's Drew Timme. Sonogo is a 6-9, 245-pound banger who brought home the 2023 Final Four Most Outstanding Player award during UConn's title run. He had 17 points and 10 rebounds in the national title game. Even bigger at 6-9, 260 pounds, Tshiebwe was the 2022 National Player of the Year and led college basketball in rebounding at different points during the season over the last two years. Finally, Timme, who has been at Gonzaga for ages, was a 1st Team All-American and helped the Zags achieve high levels of success year in and year out. 

None of them were drafted.

"No Country For College Big Men"

Because of the way the NBA has changed, 3 of the best players in college basketball went unpicked in the 2023 NBA Draft. 😢

- Adama Sanogo (UConn): 2023 F4 MOP
- Oscar Tshiebwe (Kentucky): 2022 NPOY
- Drew Timme (Gonzaga): 1st Team All-American pic.twitter.com/ZCIA3iaf6L

— College Sports Only (@CollegeSportsO) June 23, 2023

If those three can dominate at the college level consistently like they did and then go undrafted, Dickinson might be next. Of course, Dickinson does have a bit more of an outside game than the three players mentioned above, but it's not a strength of his and no one is going to call him a true stretch-5. Tshiebwe never made a three-pointer in college, while Sanogo and Timme made just 19 apiece. Dickinson has already made 45 treys and he still has a year to go. 

It's going to be really interesting to see what Dickinson does at Kansas. If he continues to shoot threes and does so at a high clip, maybe he'll get enough attention to get drafted as a big who can stretch the floor. If not, he'll have to battle it out as an undrafted free agent before making a decision on what he wants his basketball future to look like. However it plays out, it is a bit crazy to think of an All-American, 7-footer, who did so well at times in college, not playing in the league. But if that happens, Dickinson certainly won't be alone.