NIL hasn’t made scouting null, but has raised Heat challenge for NBA draft

MIAMI – If nothing else, there now can be draft clarity for the Miami Heat and the rest of the NBA, with Wednesday standing as the NCAA deadline for players to pull out of the draft and retain 2025-26 collegiate eligibility.

In that regard, NIL has made some of the scouting to this point null, with several returning to campuses for greater guaranteed money under the NCAA policy for Name, Image and Likeness.

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So Boogie Fland and Alex Condon can no longer be found on the big board of Adam Simon, the Heat’s Vice President of Basketball Operations and Assistant General Manager. Instead they will be found next season in Gainesville, playing at the University of Florida for more than if selected in the second round or signing after the draft as a rookie free agent.

And yet even while NIL now annually drains the draft pool by the NCAA’s opt-out deadline (the NBA’s formal early-entry opt-out deadline is not until June 15), Simon said he sees benefits of the policy not only to the draft candidates but also to the NBA.

“It’s a smaller early-entry list this year than the last maybe 10 years, where it’s maybe half as many,” Simon said of the initial list that now has been pared down. “I think players are seeing there’s a lot of benefit to stay in college. It’s helping them. It’s probably better for them than being a second-round pick and getting two-ways at this point.”

In 2021, the early-entry list initially featured 353 players for the 60 draft slots. This year’s list began at a more manageable 106, the lowest figure in a decade.

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“But for every player that goes back,” Simon said, “it gives another opportunity for somebody else. I think it clears it up a little bit. I think there’s going to be less players making that decision at this point.”

While the debate continues within the players’ association of an open draft without an age limit beyond high school, the NIL process largely has helped players who aren’t quite ready at a younger age, by still being able to cash out in college largely in the range of what would be afforded by a two-way contract.

The flip side has been a greater pool of polished prospects, with the Heat benefiting with the changing pool with last year’s second-round selection of Pelle Larsson out of Arizona and then of the post-draft signing of Keshad Johnson, also out of Arizona, both with full college resumes.

With NIL salaries (which essentially is what they are) for basketball prospects ranging beyond the $2 million range for a season (Cooper Flagg earned a reported $4.8 million this past season at Duke), the NBA rookie scale still mostly can top that, with a starting salary of $2.3 million for this year’s 30th and final pick of the first round. Plus, the sooner a player gets into the NBA, the sooner he moves up in the salary hierarchy.

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That, for the most part, has known first-round quantities remaining in the draft. But because draft evaluation is subjective, players projected by some in the 20s could just as easily fall into the second round. As a matter of perspective there, Larsson’s Heat salary this past season after his second-round selection was $1.2 million.

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So for a team drafting at No. 20 such as the Heat, a potential selection could wind up back at school for guaranteed cash. And while some teams will offer a draft “guarantee” for a player to assure a selection somewhere in the first round, that largely has not been the Heat’s approach.

Regardless, NIL, hardly a policy of the NBA’s own making, has reshaped what will be seen in the June 25 first round of the draft and the June 26 second round.

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Against that backdrop, and against the backdrop of Wednesday’s deadline to withdraw and still retain NCAA eligibility, Simon and his scouting staff now know the playing field.

“I think it’s a good draft,” he said. “I think there’s a lot of good talent that’s there. I think you’ll have a lot of good young players. But I think it’s too early to say how good the draft is at this point.

“But I think the players are getting better as they get into the league and I think it will continue to be better because players are staying in college longer at this point.”

The Heat do not hold a pick in the second round this year, which is when NIL could have the greatest impact.

“I personally think it’s going to change the back of the draft and the non-drafted group, because so many players are staying, players that would have been drafted in the second round,” Simon said. “But I think with the players that are going to be staying in, we have a good sense of the most talented of this draft year. I think it will be good throughout the first round.”