U Weekly. Serving The Ohio State University in Columbus Ohio

A tale of two drafts

By Andrew Joseph

Last week gave pundits, bloggers and tweeters ample opportunity to speculate over the future of the lives of a few hundred young men. It wasn't about pulling troops out of Iraq, or the unrest in Iran, but something much bigger - the NBA and NHL drafts.

The drafts might seem to be the same story, different sports, but in actuality the NBA could stand to learn a lot from their less popular, more Canadian oriented counterpart. The NHL doesn't draft a player, but rather the rights to a player. This allows a team to get a stake in a player before he has reached the level to compete in the NHL. At the same time, it allows the player the freedom to choose his route to the pros - he can stay in college if he wants.

If you stayed clear of sports radio and Internet message boards last week - a practice that I believe has some merit - you would have heard the concern mixed with contempt for the old boy from Canal Winchester. B.J., who was an 8.8 points per game disappointment for OSU, had some significant draft stock based strictly on his potential.

B.J. did what any other 20-year-old kid who saw his name on ESPN constantly would do: he signed with an agent and left OSU for good. There is no doubt that he could learn more from Thad Matta and competing in the NCAA. Instead he will have to learn in the NBA, where he will probably get less playing time in OKC than he did for OSU. I hope he does well, mostly. I can't wait to see Greg Oden destroy him if they ever meet.

All that being said, the small fortune that he will make next year doesn't ensure that he will make a very good basketball player. He could very well be a bust, and then what will he do? If the NBA followed the NHL, he might have been more prepared to make the move to the pros.

B.J. could have been drafted this season and continued to play in the NCAA. He wouldn't be making any money, but that's why we invented credit cards. Schools wouldn't suffer year after year of one-and-done players, and the NBA would have a farm system that was relevant.

The argument could be made that there is a conflict of interest between what the NBA club wants and what the college would want. In the end, everyone involved wants an athlete to do well. In the event that a player has a career ending injury, being in college is a better place to have it than the pros - someone has to pay the mortgage on the McMansion after you blow your ACL and are unemployed.

When it is all said and done, there isn't a perfect scenario. If B.J. wants to enter the draft before he should, then he has that right. However, a little cooperation between the NBA and the NCAA could go a long way in making both leagues, and their players, better.

Originally Published: July 1, 2009

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