NBA’s All-Rookie Team: 2007 vs. 2008

I’m supremely late (by web time) on this one, but I probably need to have an opinion on the Rookie/Sophomore rosters. Big names like Kevin Love and Jason Thompson feel snubbed, but really, when you get toward the bottom of these roll-calls, it’s kind of arbitrary. Like getting named second or third team All-Rookie. Who remembers that crap?↵
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↵But what I’m fascinated by is the inclusion of Greg Oden on the rookie team. Not because Oden doesn’t deserve a spot, or isn’t a rookie. No, I think he needs to play on the Sophomore team to preserve the unity of that once-legendary 2007 Draft. Over the last few weeks, I’ve had several conversations with friends trying to remember why that class was, at the time, faintly compared to 2003 or even 1984. In most cases, we’ve come to the conclusion that as the hype mounted around Durant and Oden, other players started to look better by association. Like, if you’re going two spots after a future All-Star, you must be good, right? There was also the sense that, because the 2006 Draft had been ravaged by the age limit, here we’d see talent turned forth with an added year of seasoning, and better proof of what they could do.↵
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↵I’m not sure if I’m entirely convinced by either.
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I do know this, though: Outside of Durant, who belongs in the regular ASG, only Horford and Stuckey have FUTURE STAR written all over them, and Stuckey was a sleeper. Jeff Green is a tremendous role player. Now, with 2008, there wasn’t nearly the amount of buzz, despite the same kind of hand-wringing over the top two picks. It was regarded as Rose/Beasley, then a deep draft whose order could go any which way out of a combination of need and indifference. Except now, in addition to super-stud Rose, and Beasley, who in due time will put it all together, there’s O.J. Mayo, Eric Gordon, Brook Lopez, Russell Westbrook. All starting and putting up impressive numbers, all looking like they’ll eventually be their team’s most important (or second most important) player—if they aren’t already.↵
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↵The Rookies don’t beat the Sophomores. It just doesn’t happen. Rookies are worn out, not altogether familiar with the ways of the league, and often not fully-formed enough for us to know if they belong there or not. Does any of that describe this year’s Rooks to you? I think they’ve got a decent chance of pulling off the upset, with or without Oden. To make the revenge double-edged, I think they need the big guy to play with his draft class. For one, Oden’s work-in-progress status is more in keeping with the Sophomores, strangely enough. Only Beasley and Rudy Fernandez have yet to clearly define themselves as players, while we’ve yet to figure out exactly how several of the Sophs wlll fit into the league (for years to come). ↵
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↵Let’s give 2008 a chance to once and for all prove its supremacy over 2007. That’s what the fans, and the players, need. And to make this really count, give 2007 back one of the two players who were supposed to make its class one for the ages.↵