One possible indicator of who’s in the mix at nine: The NBA released the list of players invited to the green room for draft night. Generally, these are players who have a good shot at going in the lottery and aren’t likely to slide out of the first round. This year’s list: Ben Simmons, Brandon Ingram, Jamal Murray, Kris Dunn, Dragan Bender, Marquese Chriss, Buddy Hield, Jaylen Brown, Dejounte Murray, Domantas Sabonis, Henry Ellenson, Jakob Poeltl, Skal Labissiere, Malachi Richardson, Deyonta Davis, and Wade Baldwin. Some of these names have varying mock draft ranks, but they’re all in Ford’s top 18 (and DraftExpress’ top 37) for rankings.
As for the Raptors, they seem about as certain as all of us that the top eight picks are going to be the eight we’ve all been assuming, with the Raptors essentially leading off the uncertain portion of the draft at No. 9.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG2E8-zS1V9/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG2GNZJxHGx/
Raptors have the first pick in the second class of 2016 | Toronto Star
The Obvious Eight are: forwards Ben Simmons (LSU), Brandon Ingram (Duke), Marquese Chriss (Washington) and Jaylen Brown (California), guards Kris Dunn (Providence), Kitchener’s Jamal Murray (Kentucky) and Buddy Hield (Oklahoma) and Croatian centre-forward Dragan Bender (Maccabi Tel Aviv), who are widely assumed to be going in some order before the Raptors get to make the first of their two first-round selections.
Toronto’s group of possibilities with the ninth pick — the Raptors also have No. 27 selection — would presumably include big men Skal Labissiere (Kentucky), Domantas Sabonis (Gonzaga), Jakob Poeltl (Utah) and Henry Ellenson (Marquette) although Ujiri could go any number of ways in a draft-and-stash or trade scenario.
Ujiri, Tolzman and the rest of the Toronto braintrust got Ellenson and Sabonis in for workouts at the team’s practice facility earlier in the draft process and held a group workout in Buffalo last Friday that included Labissiere, a seven-foot freshman from Haiti, and Poeltl, a seven-foot-one sophomore centre from Austria.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG1_Dj6xHM3/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG2AyRPRHCg/
Notable Number 9 Picks in NBA Draft History | Toronto Raptors
2009 – DeMar DeRozan, Toronto Raptors. There he is. DeRozan was drafted by the Raptors in 2009 out of USC and has been a Raptor ever since. He is a 2 x All-Star and helped lead Toronto to their first ever Eastern Conference Finals this past season. DeRozan has played the 3rd most games and 2nd most minutes in franchise history and currently sits second behind Chris Bosh with 9,436 points.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG2MyleKhsi/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG2vz-PI0UB/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG2CP-gmVNO/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG17DKTKmi5/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG3EuPnmVEZ/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG14ocuS1Xi/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BG1_JIQr-Ns/
Did I miss something? Send me any Raptors-related article/video to rapsfan@raptorsrepublic.com
