Alabi/Sanders/Varnado

great discussion….

In terms of all-star potential, i think you gotta go with Alabi, for one..the center position in the NBA is pretty thin, but Alabi has all the potential in the world, he has a developing offensive game, he can hit a 10 foot turnaround jumper…occasionally, but he also has the length the block everyone that comes his way…all he has to do is continue to develop, and he can be something big in the NBA

I would take Varnado over the other 2 considering ive never seen the other 2 play, Varnado has alot of potential on O and is already great on D, Alabi was compared to Thabeet right? Or does he have more skill on O?

I’ll go with Varvando. I think he is a better defensive player than Sanders and also slightly better offensively. I don’t really like Alabi. He is already the same age as most seniors and he is physically very weak and he will have a tough time against the bigger centers in the league.

Varnando, on the other hand will be playing against PF’s. I think he will match up nicely with today’s PF’s who like to take people off the dribble and shoot jumpers. However, I am a little concerned about Varnando’s offense. This way supposed to be his year to showcase his offensive skills, but with Sidney coming this likely isn’t going to happen.

I didn’t include Sanders at all in here because he seems like a center to me and is too short and not strong enough to start in the league.

Alabi has more of a chance to be an all-star because of potential, personally, I’m one of the skeptics when it comes to Solomon, but I’ll give it to him because I do recognize his potential. Sanders and Varnado have the potential to be great rebounders /defenders like Ben Wallace or Theo Ratliff, but I don’t see either one becoming an all-star.

I did a year at FSU last year, and saw him play 5 times. I wouldn’t reallly say Im a big nole fan, so Im fairly objective on the matter. Its a little bit long, but bear with me I kind of like to lay out my scouting reports.

First things first, he is really tall and long. He is every inch of what is listed, and he isn’t the skinniest guy I’ve ever seen although he is on the thin side. He can put a few more pounds on himself and not lose any speed. He is really fast, not super coordinated or fluid, but he is very tall and has awesome straight line speed with his long stride. Offensively, Id like to see him dunk more. His arms and height should make it easy for him to flush some shots, but he puts the ball down and gets stripped alot. He has AWFUL hands, he almost never catches the ball fluidly and at times, it can disrupt the whole offenses flow. Offensively, he has a few crude moves that he has developed that show some potential. He is better than Thabeet was offensively as a Sophmore, but he is also older i believe.

Defensively, obviously, is where he really excells. I saw him in person hold Tyler Hansbrough to 9 points. He is scrappy as hell, and doesn’t get pushed around despite bieng thin. His thin frame hurts him on offense, trying to back down defenders, but on defense he more than holds his own. He causes alot of chaos in the middle and on the boards, and was very quietly the anchor to the best defensive team in the ACC, and it wasn’t even close. He is really impressive as a game changing player, is a very big presence. He is a good, but not amazing shotblocker, and sometimes bites for fakes and gets beat or commits an easy foul. He can be a great shotblocker down the road, but just seems to lack some hand eye coordination.

All in all, I could see how Alabi could flame out, but I also see the potential to be a defensive anchor. I think he is the ideal style center for an uptempo, scrappy team. He won’t ever be a prolific scorer, but I think that he could be a bigger and longer version of Samuel Dalembert. If he shows that he can impact the game on a greater scale this year, I would say he is a no brainer lottery pick and maybe sneaks into the top 10, but I think his flameout potential is too high to consider in the top 5 area.

If I had to choose, (I think all will be below average NBA players) I’d go with Alabi. He’s long and tall with size and pretty good physical ability. Varnado and Sandrs are just too poor offensively for my likings, and even though Alabi wont be more than a 4th option or (most likely) 5th option, Varnado and Sanders should rarely ever touch the ball. Not options at all honestly…and they show no potential on offense, especially Varnado. Abali due to his potential and size.

hes birthday is the day before mine and he is huge