It’s a information shared by ESPNand this comes from a memo sent by the NBA to the thirty franchises: from mid-December, the boy scouts will be allowed to attend high school games.
Until now, only certain major events of the high school circuit were open to boy scouts league franchises: the McDonalds All American and the Jordan Brand Classicthe two annual All-Star Games for high school students, the tournament Nike EYBL Peach Jam on the AAU circuit, and the youth selection camps of Team USA.
From now on, the league therefore chooses to loosen the screw even more since the boy scouts will be able to attend “normal” regular season matches, and no longer only within the framework of a specific sponsored event, such as those mentioned above.
Our colleagues specify, however, that for the time being, the boy scouts NBA can only be accredited to three tournaments, specifically designated by the league: the Tarkanian Classic in Las Vegas starting next week, the Spalding HoopHall Classic in Springfield, Massachusetts in mid-January, and finally the Geico Nationals in Fort Myers in Florida at the end of March.
Three high-end tournaments, which bring together some of the best academies and teams in the country, and therefore the best high school students, for some of the future NBA players that the boy scouts will therefore observe closely.
The Shaedon Sharpe Jurisprudence
What prompted the league to make this choice? Two reasons for this. In the medium term, it should be remembered that the NBA plans to reopen the doors of the Draft to high school students. In the short term, this is the episode Shaedon Sharpe which pushes the NBA to let scouts prospect in “high school”.
Remember, after a successful 2020/21 season in the side of the Dream City Christian School, a renowned high school academy in Arizona, the Canadian had signed up with Kentucky… but had never played for the Wildcats. So as not to risk scratching his rating, when he was expected in the Top 10 of the Draft. A successful bet since he had been chosen in 7th position by the Blazers, despite the mystery that surrounded him.
Mystery and therefore uncertainty is precisely what the NBA wants to avoid for its franchises when making their choices in the Draft. Shaedon Sharpe’s case was specific and isolated, and turns out to be quite interesting for the Blazers, but it shouldn’t become a standard from a league perspective.
This decision therefore offers the opportunity for franchises to evaluate some of the very best leads of the country before they leave high school, to face two eventualities. First there are the cases, like Sharpe, of players who don’t want to play in the year before entering the Draft. Then there are the examples of Darius Garland and of James Wiseman recently forced to give up almost an entire college season due to a serious injury or suspension. By allowing scouts to follow them from high school, the sample of games will be larger than a handful of NCAA games.
One-and-done : Said of a player who does only one university season to join the NBA. Since 2010, all the first choices of the draft have been “one-and-done”, like Kyrie Irving, Ben Simmons or Anthony Davis.
