This is our semi-occasional tradition of taking a What’s a Billiken look at the draft prospects for this year’s NBA draft. The 2025 edition is a WAB-friendly one, with NCAA Division I stars expected in most of the top picks, and potentially filling the entire lottery for the first time since…checks ChatGPT…2000. Last year the top two picks — and four of the first six — were not from D1. And as much as we love all these avenues to the pros and salute Zaccharie Richaser and Ron Holland and the like, we don’t have any data for those players thus can’t compare them in the WAB way we prefer – in the context of their college team using Game Score Per 40 Minutes.

We are not looking at every player — and we are not watching any tape — in preparation for these rankings. We have seen some of these players play, so the Eye Test is certain to inform and lightly skew despite our best efforts. These rankings are not intended to be predictive of who goes where. We are listing them in the order of expected career success, in other words who we like best. Behold! The WAB Draft Rankings for 2025. Enjoy the draft.

1 – Cooper Flagg – Duke

2 – Dylan Harper – Rutgers

3 – Collin Murray-Boyles – South Carolina

4 – Jeremiah Frears – Oklahoma

5 – Tre Johnson – Texas

6 – Derik Queen – Maryland

7 – Ace Bailey – Rutgers

<See Dylan Harper chart above>
I just learned that Ace’s given name is “Airious”. That is a cool name. Ace is a cooler name. Well done, Ace.

Also considered:

Kon Knueppel & Khaman Maluach – Duke – So difficult to choose who will be better that we ended up dropping both. If we were going to bet on it, we’d say Knueppel has a better rookie year and in five years time Maluach ends up ahead.

VJ Edgecombe – Baylor – Omier was decidedly better, and if VJ is supposed to make his teammates better, by this chart he didn’t

Carter Bryant – Arizona – Not understanding this one at all. Caleb Love and many many other teammates were way way better. Maybe he’s so selfless it’s completely unmeasurable? The anti-VJ? The JV?

Jase Richardson – Michigan State – good season and good player but not enough separation from the Adreian Payne and Gary Harris tier to project success

Kasparas Jakucionis – Illinois – significant jump from him up to Terrence Shannon

Cedric Coward – Washington State – smallest sample size since Michael Porter Jr

Liam McNeeley – Connecticut – miles away from Donovan Clingan, Kemba Walker, and even Cam Spencer

Congrats to the winners, condolences to the non-winners, and apologies for the tempo bias.

For fun, see how many guys who just played in the NBA Finals you can spot in these charts. For even more fun, see how many guys appear on multiple of these charts.

Data courtesy Basketball Reference
Game Score metric created by John Hollinger detailed here
Plot format by Aaron Baggett
Inspiration from Ken Pomeroy
Inspiration from Rock M Nation

Team colors courtesy:
Benjamin S. Baumer and Gregory J. Matthews (2020). teamcolors: Color Palettes for Pro Sports Teams. R package version 0.0.4