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PG Mike Conley (1st Team All BIG, NBA All-Star, Oscar Winner, Minnesota Timberwolves)

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FWIW -- I heard Conley Sr. on ESPN Radio Friday with Doug Gottlieb -- Gottlieb asked what Mike Jr. needed to hear to stay in the draft (top 10, 15, etc). Mike Sr. said he really was not looking for a specific place in the draft and said flat out "He's going." Not much chance he will withdraw the way his dad sounded.
 
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BuckeyeTillIDie;819281; said:
yea, and dad will be cashing in on this crop

that's neither here nor there..

thanks for the great year, Mike!
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? Mike Conley Jr., 6-1, guard, Ohio State: No player, not even Horford, has benefited more from his performance during the NCAA tournament. A paper-thin point guard crop in this draft class is another reason the mature-beyond-his-years Conley had no choice but to toss his name into the pool. He should be the first point guard off the board and could go in the top eight of the draft.
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Five who got it right
Mike Conley Jr: There was no better point guard in the NCAA Tournament. Conley beat every defender he faced off the dribble, hit a barrage of floaters, ran the pick-and-roll like a pro and made one great decision after another. At 6-1 he is never going to be a top five pick, but his stock can't get much higher, either. Considering that it's such a weak draft for point guards, the pros of leaving now versus later heavily outweigh the cons.
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Mike Conley

Conley proved in his first year of college ball that he has the speed, court vision, athleticism and decision-making skills to be an excellent NBA point guard. His poise in the NCAA tournament raised his stock to the point that every NBA executive I've spoken with has him ranked as the No. 1 point guard in the draft.

The workouts are, for the most part, geared to Conley's strong points.

Conley possesses amazing hand speed and has terrific control of the basketball. You rarely see him mishandle the ball, even when he's flying up and down the court or handling two basketballs at once. He gets low to the floor and goes.

Despite being just 6-foot-1 (according to Reiff's measurements) and 170 pounds, Conley is very strong for a point guard. He can lift the 185-pound bench press bar for 13 reps, and he showed this year at Ohio State that he can be a physical defender who isn't afraid to get in his defender's grille. He has a thick shoulders and legs and shouldn't suffer some of the injury problems that other diminutive point guards have in the past. He also has great length, with an impressive 6-foot-7 wingspan.

Conley is also a tremendous athlete with great explosiveness off the floor. He measured a 39-inch vertical jump off three steps at the St. Vincent Sports Performance Center on his first day of workouts and is expected to improve that score by the predraft camp combine.

Conley's one major area of weakness is shooting, and the results on Sunday were mixed. His shooting form looks good, but it's a bit uneven and the results were the same. He has shooting range out to the NBA 3-point line, but he's pretty streaky. At times during the workout he'd get on a roll and hit 10 or 12 shots in a row. At other times, just about everything was going off the back of the rim.

Conley's trainer Schilling said he believes that it's just a matter of time before Conley figures it out.

"His form is good when he's set, but he gets a little off when he takes shots off the dribble," Schilling said. "He's so quick he doesn't always get in the right position before he lets it go. If he's going to be a star he's got to hit that shot consistently. He knows that and he's the type of kid who'll be determined to do it."

From everything I saw, it's hard to disagree with that assessment. Conley isn't the kind of bad shooter Rajon Rondo was last year. He just needs more consistency.

And like Rondo, he really has the rest of the package and has the ability to play a more controlled game.

I don't see any way he falls below No. 11 to the Hawks. I think he could go as high as No. 3 in certain scenarios. The Timberwolves at No. 7 and the Kings at No. 10 are also possibilities for Conley.
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http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=2877425&name=ford_chad
 
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