Ace Bailey, the No. 5 decide in Wednesday’s NBA Draft, plans to report back to the Utah Jazz as anticipated Saturday, a crew consultant informed ESPN on Friday.
“We have had good communication with Ace Bailey and his representatives,” a Jazz consultant informed ESPN. “We be ok with the whole lot. Ace and his household are coming to Utah tomorrow. We’ll have a press convention Sunday, and a observe Monday.”
“This has at all times been the plan, together with for our different rookies, Walter Clayton and John Tonje — to allow them to go house and accumulate their belongings, after which fly proper to summer season league from Salt Lake Metropolis.”
Bailey’s predraft technique had been one of many largest storylines getting into this 12 months’s draft, after canceling a visit to the Philadelphia 76ers, who held the No. 3 decide within the draft. He was the one American participant who, getting into draft evening, hadn’t carried out a single go to to work out for an NBA crew.
He additionally declined invites from the Charlotte Hornets and Jazz, choosing 4th and fifth within the draft. Sources from Bailey’s camp informed ESPN within the leadup to the draft that these groups weren’t amongst his most popular locations, believed to be Washington, which held the No. 6 decide and had been aggressive seeking to transfer up within the draft, in accordance with groups choosing within the high 5.
For his half, Omar Cooper, Bailey’s agent, pushed again on the notion that something they did in the course of the course of was outdoors of the traditional course of enterprise.
“Each NBA crew watched him work out in Chicago,” Cooper informed ESPN. “He did 18 interviews. Everybody bought his medical. They watched him run and leap. They bought his measurements. They watched him shoot in drills.
“Nobody mentioned something when Davion Mitchell canceled a exercise with the Toronto Raptors for the No. 4 decide. Nobody criticized Evan Mobley when he did not work out for Cleveland, and so they drafted him anyway.
“There’s nothing unusual about how Ace Bailey’s pre-draft course of was dealt with.”
Bailey, the No. 3 prospect on ESPN’s huge board, was a hotly debated prospect amongst NBA groups all season. At 6-foot-9 in sneakers with tantalizing shot-making skill, he has the dimensions to be a go-to scoring wing, essentially the most beneficial positional archetype within the league. However Bailey was not a very environment friendly scorer, and has important room to enhance as a ball handler and passer.
“He is nice,” Utah Jazz president of basketball operations Austin Ainge informed reporters in Salt Lake Metropolis on Wednesday evening after drafting Bailey. “We had been in a position to converse with him. He was tremendous excited. We’re tremendous excited. We’re anticipating a really vivid future.
“His scoring will get lots of consideration, [and] deservedly so. He is very expert for his dimension. However watching lots of movie on him, I used to be impressed together with his defensive effort and notably his rebounding. Lot of weakside block pictures, and his pleasure and vitality for the sport.
“We do lots of background calls and work on guys, and everybody loves being round Ace.”
ESPN’s Tim Bontemps contributed to this report.