We have reached the point of the pre-NBA Draft hysteria when I find myself wondering if I spent last winter in an alternate universe.
I did see Ace Bailey drop 39 and 37 points in a pair of Big Ten road games, didn’t I? I did watch him make some of the most ridiculous shots I’ve ever seen on a college basketball court last season, right?
I did cover a teenager whose ceiling as a player might be only matched by his jumping ability and unbridled joy for the game ... or did I imagine all that, too?
No, I’m pretty sure that happened, and I wasn’t the only one who witnessed it. About 8,000 Rutgers fans were there every night he laced up his Nikes in Piscataway, too, and the games were even on this new-fangled contraption called “television.” The clips of his highlight-reel dunks are not AI-generated, even if some of them look too good to be true.
Based on the headlines over the past few weeks, you’d think we were all crazy. Bailey is “polarizing.” Bailey is “dangerous.” Bailey “has seemed to bear the brunt of the blame from NBA personnel for Rutgers’ poor season,” according to Sam Vecenie, the respected hoops writer for The Athletic.
That is a real sentence that appeared in a story about Bailey’s draft prospects. If I had to list the reasons Rutgers went 15-17 despite having two lottery picks in the lineup, I’m sure I’d eventually get to one that included Bailey. But, in this blame game, he wouldn’t rank too far ahead of the dance team and the kid with the sweat mop.
Bailey was fun to watch, and for those of us who write stuff for a living, a joy to cover. The unpolished, goofy kid that NJ.com writer Kevin Armstrong captured so vividly in this week’s must-read profile won over just about everyone who encountered him during his wild seven months in Piscataway. He navigated the difficult situation of facing massive expectations without a competent supporting cast with poise and without complaint.
No one can say for sure if Bailey — or any of the other players who will walk onto the stage at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn — will live up to his potential. If I had to bet, though, I put my chips on the kid from Chattanooga making the NBA executives who pass on him on Wednesday night look like dopes.
So does the guy who coached him.
“I don’t understand it,” Rutgers coach Steve Pikiell said when asked about the pre-draft narratives. “I talk to everybody. There’s never been an issue with a GM — they love him. Half of these things that are out there, I’m like, ‘What are they even talking about?’
“I do think it’s a boring draft, too, so you’ve got to generate something. I guess you can’t write about Cooper (Flagg), you can’t write about Dylan (Harper), and no one knows the names of (picks) seven through 17.”
Pikiell even wondered if teams later in the lottery were generating some of the bad press in hopes that they could get Bailey if he tumbles. While this is a fun conspiracy theory, most of the pre-draft negativity is the direct result of his missteps from Bailey’s overmatched team — and, for once, we’re not talking about the players on the receiving end of his occasional passes in Piscataway.
It is hard to understand what Bailey gained when his representative, Omar Cooper, canceled a private workout with the Philadelphia 76ers. If Cooper is trying to force his client to a specific landing spot, the East Orange native might ask himself how, exactly, he’d be better off sacrificing $10-15 million to play in Washington, Brooklyn or New Orleans.
Yes, Bailey will get more shots on a team that doesn’t have Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey on its roster. But that much-coveted second contract with the super-max dollars is no guarantee.
Even so, this isn’t the first time an NBA prospect has ditched a workout. So when Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro insisted that Bailey had “something wrong” in his head for sitting it out, it felt like we were living on the dumbest timeline. Maybe Shapiro should have consulted with another Democratic governor, Phil Murphy, who watched Bailey from courtside seats much of last season before sounding off.
“He’s the most talented guy in the draft,” Pikiell said, and yes, that includes Flagg and Harper, who Pikiell also coached last season. “He can play all five positions. I don’t know if anyone else can do that in the draft. Cooper Flagg is very good. I’m not knocking him. But Ace Bailey’s release is as quick as anyone I’ve seen.”
Look, by 9 p.m. on Wednesday, all of this chatter might seem very silly. Even if Bailey falls, he is not going to become basketball’s Shedeur Sanders and fall off the map completely. He’ll walk onto that stage, and with a wide smile familiar to everyone who got to know him at Rutgers, slip on the cap of his new team.
The fans of that lucky NBA franchise will witness his above-the-rim game and ridiculous shotmaking for themselves, and they’ll be left wondering what, exactly, the hysteria was all about.
MORE FROM STEVE POLITI:
N.J. gymnast Livvy Dunne is leading a revolution in college sports
How an ex-Rutgers athlete ended up charged with murder in Tijuana
I was a bird-flipping Little League menace — and it’s time to come clean
The search for Luther Wright, once N.J.’s greatest hoops talent
I played Augusta National and had my own Masters meltdown
Thank you for relying on us to provide the journalism you can trust. Please consider supporting us with a subscription.
Steve Politi may be reached atspoliti@njadvancemedia.com.