Key takeaways from 2019 NBA Draft Combine including OKC Thunder draft promise

One major combine trend which seems to be increasing each season is the number of draft night promises being extended during this event. Although teams don’t publicly come out and say “we’ve issued a promise’ there is the combination of players telling which teams they met with plus news tends to leak out.

This became the case for the OKC Thunder who are being linked to Matisse Thybulle. Part of the reason this could be pure speculation is simply that Thybulle is the prototypical stereotype Sam Presti tends to select.  We covered the speculation on this promise here and Rylan Stiles served up the draft prospect profile as per the bar below:

Other rumored commitments:

Rumors of other draft night promises popped up on social media here’s a sampling:

Rui Hachimura to the Wolves:

Darius Garland to the Suns:

Other prospects presumed to have promises (teams uncertain):

As per Jonathan Givony each of DeAndre Hunter, Chuma Okeke, and Killan Tillie left the Combine early and teams were informed they were unavailable for interviews.

Coby White – team uncertain:

The point guard news was front and center with Darius Garland and Coby White both drawing massive speculation on which teams made promises to them. And, while Jonathan Givony seemed to believe the Garland promise was with the Suns there was also speculation it was the Lakers.

Albeit, the Lakers rumor are easier to dismiss because they weren’t attached to a credible source. Granted anything that leaks out from the Lakers recently feels like it might be attached to a burner account given their actions of late.