Article:Kids coming out to the NBA, are they ready?

''This article is going to really piss off a lot of people. It is a subject that I have seen happen for almost 40 years now when Chocolate Thunder Dawkins came out of highschool for the NBA and all kinds of hell was breaking loose that the NCAA tried to keep undercontrol, but as you see today they didn't do a very good job of it.There has only been a few kids coming out of high school that really turned peoples heads around and contributed to the NBA image and preformed on the court at a extremely high level. Dawkins did after his first year, but I contribute that to the fact that he played along side Wilt Chamberlain and his talents were allowed to really come to the forefront. Bryant took 4 or 5 years to really establish himself. And my question here is if he had gone to college and played at a very high level with the right coach and team what could he have done the first year in the NBA under these guidelines. Surely, his game would have improved at a much faster rate, playing 30-36 games a year and really establishing himself on the court. Yet, people will say he learned under Shag and if you believe that then I have some swampland to sell you in Arizona real cheap. Lew Alcindor, played 4 years under Wooden at UCLA and only lost 2 games and won all three of the NCAA National Championships that he could because he was not allowed to play on the varsity as a freshman. The freshman team that year, 1966 would have gone 30-0 and won that year as well. He was and is a completely unstoppable force in the paint. He learned to play team, UCLA, basketball in his four years in college and believe me when I say he learned more in those 4 years then he did in his 20+ years in the NBA. Of course, Coach is one of the reasons, but the main issue here is it was in college he sharpen up his skills and abilities not sitting on a bench in the NBA collecting dust on his bottom.''

''   It has always been my opinion that the players coming out of college are better prepared than the ones coming out of high school. Maybe I am wrong here, but I think not. Since Bryant and Garrett there is no real great player coming out early. Most have to do their time on the NBA bench before they get there chance to become what they dreamed of becoming.I have always been old school on this issue and it will most likely never change. 17 and 18 and 19 year olds have no business trying to compete with the established players. The dream team showed the rest of the world what a really great team and great players could do when put together as a team and allowed to do what it is that they do. Kareem could have come out after high school and played and done extremely well but would he have put up the numbers he did without his experience at UCLA. A realist would say it would be very doubtful that he would have gotten the same effect and done the same things. In 1969 Kareem's last year, during the summer of that year he was playiing basketball in the El Camino Jr College Gym with the likes of Russell, Frazier, Bing,West, Baylor, Upseld and a lot of others to many to name and he dominated the courts for days with 3 on 3 and 5 on 5 games. Bill Russell was completely and without any doubts dominated to a point that I am sure he didn't know what to do to stop him. He would drive to the left and sweep a small skyhook over Russell and score with ease. Chamberlain and Thurmond were in the same boat. He had played the year before  in pickup games and did the same thing to many NBA stars.But I can't think of one individual that made it to the level Kareem did after coming out from high shool. These kids of todays' game are not really to compete with 25 and 26 year old players. They aren't strong enough and with the exception of Love from UCLA, don't have high enough basketball IQ's to contribute to the NBA game. I don't think there is any individual in this years draft that is going to make any kind of large impact on the NBA courts. ''

''  We can always find a couple of cases that made it but by and large most of the kids, and I say  Kids, are not really to play the NBA game, or its schedule and type of rough play and muscle game inside and out really. Yes todays' players are bigger, by and large, faster maybe, quicker and stronger than yesterdays' players so where does that leave the kids of high school. That's right, out in the open and without any place to go. I have never been opposed to change and in some of the cases the change has been for the good. But in ending this article, I believe strongly, that the league should not allow the high school players to compete in the NBA until they are either 21 or once in college 4 years of NCAA play. All these kids will be better for it and besides the experience they gain something that they wouldn't have and that is the education so badly needed to make it easlier in todays world.''