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By Chad Ford
There are 48 days until the NBA Draft. With the millions of dollars NBA teams spend on scouting each year it's hard to believe that, in early May, there are still potential NBA prospects whom the majority of NBA scouts and GM's haven't seen.
Last season, Pavel Podkolzine, Maciej Lampe and Leandro Barbosa took NBA scouting departments by storm around this time. The year before, players like Nene Hilario and Nikoloz Tskitishvili still were flying under the radar around this time.
This year? Say hello to Croatia's Damir Omerhodzic and Brazil's Cleiton Sebastiao. Omerhodzic is an 19-year-old phenom who owns just about every basketball skill imaginable. Sebastiao is a 25-year-old former construction worker who just started playing organized basketball two and a half years ago.
The common denominator? Both left their native countries about a month ago and are working out with trainer Eric Lichter preparing for the NBA draft. Insider watched exclusive workouts of both players Thursday.
Lichter, who along with partner Tim Robertson runs a company called Speed Strebgth Systems in Cleveland, is the training force behind players such as LeBron James, Nene, Barbosa and another physical freak you may remembr, J.R. Bremer.
His challenge for each player has been totally different.
The Croatian Sensation
Omerhodzic showed up in Cleveland a month ago standing 6-foot-11, but weighing just 222 pounds. One NBA executive who had seen him play in a junior tournament a year ago called him "Ethiopian skinny."
The scouting report on him was equally thin. He had spent the last four years playing in Zagreb fro Cibona, a Euroleague team that produced Nets' first-round pick Zoran Planinic last year. For the past two years, Omerhodzic has been sitting at the end of the bench getting very little playing time.
The few scouts who had seen him play caught him in junior tournaments. Finding tape on him has been almost impossible. He was described as a sharp-shooting Dirk Notwitzki-type, but there was scant evidence to back it up. When his agent, Marc Cornstein, declard him for the draft, most scouts were stunned. How can a skinny kid with little playing experience be ready for the NBA?
For starters, he has erased the "Ethiopian skinny" description. In the space of just under four weeks, Omerhodzic has bulked up to 240. He now owns buldging biceps, ripped abs and thick legs.
"I'd say he's about 150 percent stronger than when he came in here," Lichter told Insider. "The kid has never lifted a weight in his life. In just four weeks, he's shown huge improvement, especially in his arms, chest and shoulders. He could easily get up to 250 pounds with a few more weeks of work. But weight can be overrated. The key to this kid is that he's very strong."
Next, drop the "unathletic" tag line that gets pinned on almost every prospect from Europe. Omerhodzic is a great athlete for a 6-foot-11 kid. He already posseses a 351/2-inch vertical (LeBron has a 38-inch, for comparison) and loves to play above the rim. The key to Omerhodzic is that he's explosive. He gets off the floor very quickly and can do it again, and again when he needs to. He also has good lateral quickness and is pretty fast getting up and down the court. He's no stiff.
Again, the training over the past few weeks has helped his cause.
"The training they do in Europe is all about conditioning," Lichter said. "It drains the explosiveness out of players. He was already a good athlete when he came here, but his vertical jump has already increased three inches."
What about the basketball part?
Omerhodzic is a smooth player who owns a killer jumper with deep, NBA 3-point range. During several shooting drills, Omerhodzic easily knocked down 10 consecutive NBA 3s at a time. His skills down in the block are emerging, as well. He has great footwork and knows how to back his man down in the paint. He's got a nice hook shot that he can hit with either his left or his right. His leaping ability makes him a natural rebounder, and he showed in the workout during several drills that he isn't afraid of contact.
NBA teams have been searching for a Dirk Nowitzki clone ever since Dirk started busting out in Dallas. Omerhodzic comes as close as any young player I've seen from Europe. Darko Milicic, Nene, Jiri Welsch, Aleksandar Pavlovic, Maciej Lampe, Andris Biedrins, Pavel Podkolzine, Tiago Splitter and Kosta Perovic are all interesting and talented NBA prospects, but none of their games were really similar to Nowitzki's.
Omerhodzic is close, but not exactly there. He isn't the ball-handler Dirk is by any stretch of the imagination. While he certainly can dribble efficiently, he's not cut out of the same point-forward mold. He's not as versatile, either. At this point, he'd be a small forward in the NBA. As he continues to bulk up, he could spend some time at the four. He also possesses small hands, which could come back to haunt him with some NBA teams. Despite being 6-foot-11, he can't comfortably palm the ball.
One negative he has in common with Nowitzki? The few scouting reports that exist on him from Europe claim that he is a terrible defender. That was impossible to judge from the workout I attended. His length, athleticism and lateral quickness suggest that he's capable of becoming a good defender. He told me his job in practice each day was to guard former Ohio State star Scoonie Penn. Penn is much quicker than your average NBA three, so if Omerhodzic can pull that off, he should be fine.
One negative he has in common with Nowitzki? The few scouting reports that exist on him from Europe claim Omerhodzic is a terrible defender. That was impossible to judge from the workout I attended. His length, athleticism and lateral quickness suggest he's capable of being a good defender. He told me his job in practice each day was to guard former Ohio State star Scoonie Penn. Penn is much quicker than your average NBA three, so if Omerhodzic can pull that off, he should be fine.
Some scouts also have expressed concern about a negative reputation Omerhodzic picked up in Croatia. Depending on who you talk to, he's everything from a party guy to a player who's had difficulty getting along with his coach.
Again, an afternoon spent with the kid isn't enough to make those type of assessments. However, when you hear him tell his story, it's easy to see why he might still be a little rough around the edges.
Omerhodzic's family fled Croatia just after the war started, and he spent most of his formative years living in Sweden along with other refugees. In Sweden, at the age of eight, he befriended one of Sweden's best young hockey players, the Suns' Maciej Lampe.
Both were poor and spent most of their time playing and watching sports. When Omerhodzic saw a flier advertising a basketball clinic, he convinced Lampe to put down the hockey puck and pick up a ball.
"I told him, 'You're too tall to play hockey, but you'd be a great basketball player,' " Omerhodzic told Insider. "We both went to the camp, fell in love with the game and started playing for a young club in Sweden."
The basketball scene in Sweden left a lot to be desired, so both players began looking for other opportunities. Lampe, who was a year older, was discovered by a Spanish scout and left Sweden to play on Real Madrid's cadet team. Omerhodzic didn't receive a similar offer, so he began looking for something on his own. He started looking up basketball teams on the Internet, and when he ran across Cibona's cadet program, he made a risky decision.
A 14-year-old Omerhodzic traveled to Croatia by himself. He knew no one and spoke just a little Croatian. However, he was determined to be a basketball player. After much persuasion and a few workouts, Cibona signed him, and he quickly began making a name for himself in cadet tournaments.
This year, after a second frustrating year sitting on the bench with Cibona's first team, he decided to leave. With the help of Cornstein, he negotiated a buyout and flew to the United States to pursue his dream of becoming an NBA player.
Cornstein knew Omerhodzic needed to hit the weights and thought he'd be a perfect fit with Lichter. The two begin working out a 7:30 each morning, and his sessions often don't end until 7:30 each evening.
"It's been a lot of hard work," Omerhodzic says in almost perfect English (he learned it from teammates in Croatia). "The first three or four days I was like 'What have I done?' I've never lifted weights before, and my body was so sore. But now that I see the results, I think that I will always do this. My game has really improved. That's why I came here."
Inevitably, questions about the NBA will still hang over this kid. Like several other international players in this draft, he has precious little game experience. After the Nuggets drafted Skita so high and he struggled, NBA teams are reluctant to take young phenoms with no practical experience. Wherever Omerhodzic goes, it's going to be a few years before he can be a real contributor to an NBA team.
Still, the NBA loves tall, athletic sharpshooters, and his upside, honestly, is just as high as that of Biedrins, Splitter and Perovic (all have more experience, however).
What does that translate into draft stock? Late lottery? Late first round? Second round? It's really too early to tell, but expect the buzz on him to go through the roof when he works out. I'm moving him up Insider's draft board. My guess is NBA scouts will be doing the same when they get their first look at the new and improved Damir Omerhodzic next week.
Used courtesy of: ESPN.com |
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