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NBA | Jun 27

International Players Took Over the First Round of the 2024 NBA Draft

Zaccharie Risacher and Alex Sarr Made History as the First French Duo to Be Drafted in the First Round of the NBA Draft

The First Two Picks of the 2024 NBA Draft Were French Players
NBA commissioner Adam Silver during 2024 NBA Draft/Sarah Stier/Getty Images/AFP

Vive La France Proved the Theme For Night One 🗼

International players going to the NBA and starring is nothing new…

College basketball in the United States has dipped – dropped precipitously? – for many years. Another example of how the game on that level has plummeted was the first round of Thursday’s NBA Draft.

Entering the draft, all the NBA news and rumors suggested this was a weak class. But analysts gushed as each selection was made, the story was the opposite.


Don’t be fooled. The names NBA Commissioner Adam Silver called were household names if you were either a hardcore fan of the international game or spent your life in the USA buried in YouTube videos of overseas action.

Four players from France went in the first round, including three of the first six. The Bulls drafted a player from Chicago – hooray – with all sorts of Lithuanian roots. Matas Buzelis committed to play for the Lithuanian National Team in 2022.

Zaccharie Risacher became the second straight Frenchman to go first overall, chosen by the Atlanta Hawks. He followed the phenomenal Victor Wembanyama as the top pick. Risacher has a chance to avoid being added to the list of first-overall picks who have been busts because the Hawks already have a couple of quality players.


Alex Sarr went to the Wizards second overall. He will have to be a wizard to help turn around a team that went 15-67 in 2023-24. That’s a recipe for a player to join the list of high draft picks who have flopped.

 

Bronny James’ Wasn’t Called on Night One

What does it mean that the player most discussed from American college basketball heading into the draft averaged 4.8 points per game last season? Bronny James. The son of LeBron James and former USC player wasn’t called on Night One and the chatter hasn’t stopped about when – if? – he will be chosen in the second round.


Kyle Filipowski from the vaunted Duke program suffered through the first round without hearing his name. A player from one of the top programs in college hoops wasn’t good enough to be a top-30 selection. Someone must have given him bad advice about his basketball prowess and NBA potential.

Experienced Versus Older Players

The European players are better equipped for the transition to the NBA games because they have been playing professionally as teens against seasoned players. Combine that with college basketball becoming a morass of parity and you set American players up for draft disappointment.


International players going to the NBA and starring is nothing new. Names like Dirk, Giannis and Luka have changed the game for decades. What will it take for there to be an understanding of how dynamically basketball has changed for the mainstream? Probably when a U.S. Olympic team is schooled by another country at the Games. That won’t happen in Paris but imagine if it does in Los Angeles in 2028. That could cause a different kind of earthquake for Angelinos and the rest of the USA.

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