Vernon Macklin – Power Forward/Center from the University of Florida Gators.
Going with the same theme of the Singler post – my 2 word descriptor for Macklin is “hard worker”. If I had to describe his style of play I’d say he’s a “bigger Jason Maxiell, without the shot blocking”. His body reminds me of former Minnesota Timberwolf and Chicago Bulls PF/C, also from Florida, Chris Richard.
Macklin, is a 24 year old 5th year Senior from UF. He had a hard time finding playing time with the Georgetown Hoyas behind Roy Hibbert and then with top big man prospect (and current Piston forward) Greg Monroe signing with the Hoyas, Macklin transferred to Florida and had to sit out a year as part of the rules about transferring in the NCAA.
Macklin is 6’9 245 pounds. He’s very solid, he has a 7’3 wingspan, and a 9’1 standing reach. For a player of his size, he has struggled on the defensive glass. His go to move in the post is a righty (or lefty) jump hook, and really that’s about it for him on the offensive end.
Much like Singler, Macklin is a “lunch pail” guy. I remember watching Macklin play at Georgetown with Hibbert and current Piston DaJuan Summers. I can’t see him sticking with the team out of training camp, but he’s definitely a candidate for the D League and I think he could almost find instant success there. He’s older than any other drafted rookie because he had sit out a year because he transferred. He’s definitely rated as one of the more mature guys in the draft who will give Charlie Villanueva and Greg Monroe a big body to match up against in training camp, should he make it that far.
Macklin has the raw tools to improve, it’s just that his ceiling might already be reached. If he can come in and make an impact, I can see him being another steal at #52 in the draft. Do I expect it? No.
I really liked this guy in college think he will b a good fit
Shouldn’t have slid this far down great pick up at 52.
Knight is a great pick for the Pistons are you kidding me. Look at John Calipari point guards in the NBA (Derrick Rose, Tyreke Evans and John Wall). He is a great coach and gets these kids NBA ready within a year. You think he would of started a freshman if he wasn’t that good which he was spectacular for them. Another thing he is a smart kid, note that a kid. At 19 he can be molded into a very good point guard for the future. I hope the Pistons roster looks like: starting PG Tony Parker, SG Gordan, SF Prince, PF J.J., and C Monroe, and the Bench PG Knight, SG Bynum, SF Daye, PF ????(hopefully not CV31), C Wilcox. This I am hoping to come true what do you think Nat or Danny or the Need4Sheed community?
…….
Knight is a great pick for the Pistons are you kidding me. Look at John Calipari point guards in the NBA (Derrick Rose, Tyreke Evans and John Wall). He is a great coach and gets these kids NBA ready within a year. You think he would of started a freshman if he wasn’t that good which he was spectacular for them. Another thing he is a smart kid, note that a kid. At 19 he can be molded into a very good point guard for the future. I hope the Pistons roster looks like: starting PG Tony Parker, SG Gordan, SF Prince, PF J.J., and C Monroe, and the Bench PG Knight, SG Bynum, SF Daye, PF ????(hopefully not CV31), C Wilcox. This I am hoping to come true what do you think Nat or Danny or the Need4Sheed community?
Knight
Gordon (come on man)
Prince
Jerebko
Monroe
Bynum
Stuckey
Daye
Villanueva
big man (for Hamilton)
White
Singer
Mackin
Maxiell / Wallace
Bye bye, McGrady, Summers & Wilcox.
Lol what? Tay won’t be resigned. Gordon just plain sucks, 10 mill a year for 11 ppg isn’t cutting it.
Jerebko, given we didn’t draft a PF or C, seems likely he should be the starting 4 if healthy.
Stuck goes to SG, and complements Knight well given that he can run the offense a bit, while Knight learns the ropes.
Would like daye to make strides and compete for SF not sure it’ll happen though.
Well, we should resign Prince. We can’t find better SF out there.
And he’s our man, we drafted him. I’m all 4 that.
As for Gordon, can’t stand the man but since we’re looking to move Rip, I’m quite sure Gordon stays.
Hell I would like a lot of changes myself, but it looks to me we’ll only move Rip for a potential big man. Anyways the team looks qiuite good to me, even thoug some of you will make your fantasy trades adding us Howard & Kobe for Rip & Maxiell… Be realistic, we have no trade value.
A good coach is a nuisance.
Well, we got a lot of bench big options brewing. Now what can we flip to get ourselves a solid starting nba big?
No offense but this article is poorly written.
” His go to move in the post is a righty (or lefty) jump hook, and really that’s about it for him on the offensive end.”
If you claim to watch him as much you did in that article you would know that he actually has a small arsenal of post moves. Actually one of the few in the draft that does have a post game.
He doesnt have a small arsenal of post moves. I’ve seen him play numerous times in person at Georgetown and at the McDonald’s All American game. His offensive game is a jump hook and putbacks.
IMO if he had a reliable post move, or a small arsenal like youre saying, he wouldnt have been there at 52, and he wouldnt have been slotted as “undrafted”.
Thanks for reading!
Get him boney, take that.
Height wise he is undersized. He has the body. If he didn’t have a respectable post game (ie… more than just this left and right hook you talk about) he wouldn’t have been drafted at all. Despite how sluggish he may move up and down the court he has excellent footwork facing his defender or with his back to the basket. But then again I’m just a Pistons fan that lives in Florida so what do I know?
this article is not poorly written. It is written very well. don’t you mean factually incorrect?
i have no opinion on Macklin haven’t watched him play or done any research.
so boney doesn’t like him but you think he has the skills? Interesting. Well jason I think it goes without saying we all hope you’re right, but I don’t expect much from him.
I would have taken David Lighty with this pick, wonder what the Pistons saw that they didn’t like when he worked out for him?
Oh and can we stop comparing every potential Pistons PG to Chauncey? I would love to have a young Chauncey, but can we just let these players be themselves, and not have to fit the mold of our pointguard that won a championship for us 7 years ago?
Being picked late in the draft is definetly a super long shot to make the team. However there is hope. I began thinking about players who were picked late in the second round and became stars, impact players and those who may have played sparingly or not at all. Some of them did have D-League stints but they were all eventually signed. I started at 1980 and moved up to 2010:
Steve Kerr – Anthony Mason – Manu Ginobli – Luis Scola – Kyle Korver – Amir Johnson – Ryan Gomes – Ryan Hollins – Ramon Sessions – Patty Mills – AJ Price – Derrick Caracter – Luke Harangody – Magnum Rolle – Pape Sy
Ryan Hollins? Haha. I think Charlie would have something to say about that.
Even though i began at 1980 i didn’t find anyone with real name recognition until 1988 starting with Steve Kerr.
Tayshaun Prince is our trade bait to get us Chris Kaman in a sign and trade.
knight stuckey jerebko monroe and milsap if we trade away rip
knight rip jerebko monroe and milsap if we trade stuckey
ben gordon should not be starting given his defensive liabilities
Tayshaun is gonna walk, daye is still 1 year away from starting in the nba, charlie v has been giving decent value from the bench but will never develop a defensive game, wilcox will walk, he only plays decently for 3 games a year, t-mac will walk, summers will leave the nba maybe play for the d league. maxiell, bynum, ben wallace, will give us decent minutes off the bench. Our bench has not been a problem all last year, it was always the fact we didn’t have good enough starters.
Stuckey, Ben Gordon, and rip hamilton are all question marks. Only Joe Dumars knows where and how these guys will or won’t move.
rip hamilton has a certain kind of game where he ages extremely well, he does not go up for high flying dunks, he has a finesse game that involves running and screens, has adequate defense and should give good minutes for another 5 years in the nba. I have no problem keeping rip, and starting him a the 2. It’s not rip’s fault that he has been put in a no win situation (I’m looking at you joe dumars). His attitude could have been better in the locker room, but if we start winning games, everyone’s attitude will get better. his contract has been awful for us, and that is joe d’s fault.
stuckey gets blamed for all the ills of this team. The problem with stuckey is that even though he has put up good stats, he never gave us a derrick rose or d wade impersonation, but what is wrong with that? He is a legit starter with a better defensive game than he gets credit for. He does not have a good jump shot, but is excellent at putting his head down and getting to the line. He does not get the calls that a d wade gets, but then he is not the athlete that d wade is so it’s all fair. If paired with knight he will of course show definite improvement but then so will anyone else at the two. joe d has remained committed to stuckey but he is our best trade asset.
Ben Gordon has been absolutely terrible. One of the worst problems offensively with ben gordon these last two years is that when the shot clock is ticking down, he will not make a move and take a contested shot, instead he will pass it to another perimeter player and force them to jack up a last second off balance shot. We are paying ben gordon money to make these difficult shots, you can’t expect to make $11 million dollars a year, and only take shots when nobody is guarding you and you set your feet and release a shot like it’s in the gym. It’s clear that if Ben Gordon is unguarded, no hand in the face, not under pressure, well he can certainly sink a shot. But give him any kind of pressure and he folds like a wet napkin, you run at him, put a hand in his face, he can’t make the shot. I wasn’t a big bulls fan during ben gordon’s years over at chicago so i can’t say for sure how long he has been like this, but we have had ben gordon for long enough to say, yes this is a pattern, ben gordon can’t get his shot off if you pester him. For $11 million a year, you don’t want someone who is easy to neutralize and has no defense. He’s worthless right now, but hey lots of people like ben gordon’s game from his chicago years and think it’s just the coaching that is bad, they want to pair him with knight and see him go off. Who knows. Ben Gordon used to be able to make these kinds of shots, he used to be able to take a hand in the face throw it under pressure, drive to the land, and release a floater. He’s gotten the touches, he just has not shot the ball for us. If he ever got the game back he had in chicago he would be pretty good, but he doesn’t have that game anymore, and I don’t think anyone knows for sure, certainly not ben gordon himself, or he would fix it. his contract makes him difficult to move and that’s joe d’s fault.
Next move is Joe’s he’s gonna get us a big and trade a guard, everyone knows that’s what is coming next.
I wouldn’t mind a little elaboration on why Daye’s not ready to start, but rookie B. Knight is.
well this is just my opinion but knight is just that much better than Daye. Knight is gonna be one of those NBA pros like jason kidd that is in the league as a starter for 15+ years. Daye is gonna be ready in a year to start, and then play NBA for about 5 years and then start fading. So sure, Knight is gonna peak at the same time that daye does, 5 or so years into his pro career, and then start fading but when you start out being so much better, you get to start earlier and continue a lot later.
I don’t think it’s fair to to knight to compare him to Daye. Compare him to Monroe if you like, that’s more fair.
Very well said EDT. My thoughts exactly. I believe we should move Gordon for a big or true point. Start Hamilton with Stuckey until Knight is ready to take over, then move Stukey to the 6th man backing up the point thriving as a combo guard. Days and J.J. Are the forwards with Monroe. I hope we can keep Wilcox as well, he came on strong last season next to monroe. Feel like we should have went with Walker though, more potential as a pointguard.
i watched wilcox all year and it kills me to think that we will give him a contract based on him showing hustle for the last 3 games he played.
He’s one of these players that the longer the contract you give him the worse he plays. Really hope we let him go.
Or maybe sign him for one year.
I am firmly convinced if you signed Wilcox to a 24 hour contract, he would only work hard for the last 3 minutes of that 24 hours, lol
one year contract = one year of loafing and 3 days of hard work at the very end so someone will resign him
Truth of the matter that’s how it works in the NBA, you work hard right before your contract expires, you’ll get resigned somewhere.
Someone will pick up Wilcox I just hope it’s not the pistons.
thats too bad cuase he could be a solid player. he has the size and the athleticism. what a waste.
When he plays he looks like a deer caught in headlights. I’d of rather have summers.
did u watch basketball last season? wilcox at the end of the year when he was paired with monroe was at times our best frontcourt player. get a clue.
Agreed with Junior. Wilcox and Monroe made a pretty solid combo the last half of last season. To say he only played hard the last three games is distortion. Now I’m just hoping for someone a couple levels above Wilcox that will make for an even better combo with Monroe.
http://www.insidehoops.com/blog/?p=7911
Lakers hire John Kuester as assistant coach = Right back where he belongs
The Free Press has learned that former Atlanta Hawks coach Mike Woodson will be in town Thursday for his second interview with the Detroit Pistons.
[ Not sure I’m sold of him… Is this the best we can do?
Piston Fans have a safe and fun 4th of July
Hey edt, great analysis. Thanks!
I’m with Mike on a sign and trade with Tay for Kaman. Though I don’t know how his skill set will work with Monroe’s. I read in some posts before that we’re looking for an athletic big to match Monroe’s game.
Looking at it right now, I see JJ filling that need, though he isn’t a traditional 4.
So Tay, Rip, or Gordon, or any combination of the three, should be trade bait to bring in the ideal big.
I don’t see how Rip or Gordon can be the primary bait though, since their contracts are bad. So a sign and Trade for Tay and attach Rip or Gordon if we can would be my idea.
The problem with Wilcox is he hasn’t been given consistant playing time for the last two years that we’ve had him until mid season where he started to get comfortable and find his rythme. I beleive when a player knows his role, and is secure in it, they can loosen up and play their game. Imagine if we had our same team including Rip and Prince in addition to a experienced coach a true pointguard, and a removal of super streaky, no defense, even worse contract of Ben Gordon, and we would be a play-off team maybe 5th or 6th in the East. What about Deandre Jordan of the Clippers? They will have to part with him or Kaymen. I like Kaymen but I think he is pretty close to reaching his ceiling. Jordan is more athletic with a defensive mindset. Here’s another Idea, a sign and trade with Dallas using Prince envolving Berra. Then moving Gordon to Orlando for Brandon Bass who will be an unresticted free agent next year. Just throwing some ideas around guys so don’t come down too hard on me.