NBA Draft: Rising Above Snubs, Cameron Payne Is Now a Possible Top Pick – New York Times
In the age of analytics and scouting services that leave no rock unturned, flying under the radar is difficult.
Somehow Cameron Payne found a way.
On Wednesday, in a room filled with N.B.A. lottery picks and all-Americans from major college programs, Payne, a spindly point guard from Murray State, lit up the room with tales from the periphery.
Each of the players invited to New York to meet with members of the news media was excited at the prospect of realizing a dream come true. Most, however, are already veterans of the professional interview. They have been well-coached on what to say, on how much emotion to show. All are schooled in the art of restrained enthusiasm.
Payne might have been the only player in the room who was truly stunned to be there. “These guys were top 100,” he said, “not me.”
A few short years ago, Payne was still coming off the bench for his A.A.U. team back home in Tennessee; his higher-profile teammates from back then, he pointed out, were better friends than he was with many of the players who on Wednesday shared the big ballroom with him.
I asked Payne to name his oldest friend on the A.A.U. circuit. “I don’t have one,” he said. “That’s what so crazy. I don’t have one. My teammates who I played A.A.U. with, these are their friends.
“And I’m the one here.”
There is a great likelihood that Payne will be selected higher in Thursday’s draft than many players who were once rated far above him on scouting lists and mock drafts.
He conceded that the source of his motivation has been those snubs, first from the college recruiters. Even when he began to prove himself as a freshman and sophomore, he was still at Murray State while other point guards were getting exposure in higher-profile conferences.
When those teams went on to the N.C.A.A. tournament in March, Payne’s Racers were snubbed by the selection committee. Still, he said, “I’m glad that it happened the way it did.”
Once he started out on the predraft circuit, Payne worked out for several teams and met with representatives from others. After a workout with the Los Angeles Lakers, his stock began to soar — from late first-round status to a possible place in the top 10.
What was so impressive about his game? With disarming innocence, Payne replied: “I put people in the perfect position to score. I mean, perfect. People like playing with me because I can do that.”
Apparently, N.B.A. teams agree. He is projected to be among the first three point guards chosen. One of the players who will likely remain on the board behind him is Kentucky’s Andrew Harrison, who, like Payne, left college after his sophomore season.
Two years ago, Harrison and his twin brother, Aaron, were the hot commodities as John Calipari’s new glamour freshmen at Kentucky. The Harrisons were crucial components of Kentucky’s back-to-back Final Four teams.
Now both are merely hoping to be drafted, and Payne has become a possible lottery pick.
Just as being snubbed may have provided Payne with motivation, seeing his star fall could be the jolt Andrew Harrison needed.
“Me and my brother are going through the same thing right now in terms of what people are saying,” he said. “At the same time, to me in my heart, in my position I felt that I’m the best player in the draft at my position.”
On Thursday, three other Kentucky freshman are projected to be lottery picks. None of them — Trey Lyles, Karl-Anthony Towns and Devon Booker — averaged more than 25 minutes a game last season. Payne averaged more than 32.8 minutes — and 20.3 points — at Murray State.
But after Thursday, none of that will matter. Not the college, not the conference, not the statistics.
Nets Coach Lionel Hollins said that has made it harder for teams to balance potential against production. “You’ve really got to talk to them and see if they have it inside mentally, to be able to make the transition,” he said. “It’s a harder process because the kids are so young, you don’t know who has the heart and the mental toughness to go through all this work.
“You’ve got to impose your will on the game and the opponents, and some people just say, ‘This isn’t for me anymore.’ ”
Payne’s one-loss team was relegated to the N.I.T. this spring, and that meant he spent most of March watching players with bigger names and bigger reputations on television.
He acknowledged that he gained a measure of satisfaction knowing that, in all likelihood, he has worked himself into becoming the lottery pick few people will know.
“It feels good to go in front of some people who were in the Final Four,” he said. “They’re in the Final Four and Cameron Payne didn’t even get to Madison Square Garden in the N.I.T.”
Still, for every player, Thursday is just the beginning.
“The guys who get drafted highly, some of them tend to think they’ve arrived,” Hollins said.
Nothing Payne said Wednesday suggests that he thinks he has made it. He is, however, enjoying the journey. Immensely.
This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service – if this is your content and you’re reading it on someone else’s site, please read the FAQ at fivefilters.org/content-only/faq.php#publishers.
