With the No. 28 pick in the SB Nation 2011 NBA Mock Draft, the Chicago Bulls, as represented by Blog A Bull, pick Hofstra guard Charles Jenkins. Kevin Ferrigan, better known at Blog A Bull as fundamentallysound, explains the pick.
NBA Mock Draft 2011: Bulls Take Charles Jenkins At No. 28
I first became intrigued with Jenkins because he put up crazy efficiency numbers just about anyway you could measure it. According to the always great Ken Pomeroy’s statistical database, among players who used 28 percent of their team’s possessions or more, Jenkins was tops in the country with a sparkling 123.5 ORtg. That sparked my interest and after that, it was to DraftExpress to examine what their always excellent staff had to say about him. The reviews were sparkling. Statistically, Jenkins looks great, posting a 31.0 PER. Additionally, his situational statistics (courtesy of Synergy Sports and DraftExpress) are pretty breathtaking. He can score in isolation or out of the catch and shoot. He’s elite in both categories. Luke Winn of Sports Illustrated broke this down in great detail.
Jenkins also has a great NBA body. He’s not terribly tall at 6’1.5” without shoes according to DX’s combine measurements, but he’s got a 6’7.5” wingspan which allows him to play much bigger than his size would suggest. He’s also incredibly strong. All of this is not to say that Jenkins doesn’t come without questions. He played in a small conference, so it’s unclear to what extent his numbers were helped by that (though it’s worth noting that the CAA did place three teams in the tournament and Jenkins’ Hofstra squad won 21 games with Charles not having a whole lot of help). Against North Carolina, early in the season, he scored 24 points, had four assists and three steals.
The second red flag for Jenkins is his age. He’s 22 and really didn’t quite dominate at this level until this year. Generally speaking true NBA talent shines earlier than that.
But enough about what's wrong with Charles Jenkins. What's right with him is that he's an exceptional isolation player, shot creator and ball-handler. These are all things the Bulls need, desperately, as was made abundantly clear by the Eastern Conference Finals where the Bulls' lack of ball handlers and creators outside of Derrick Rose was glaring. This flaw allowed the Heat to totally bottle up the Bulls' offense in crutch time, particularly by placing LeBron on Rose. Charles Jenkins would help fix that.
I think Mr. Jenkins can be a solid addition to the Bulls' backcourt rotation and given his wingspan, strength and his ability to work to improve, I have full faith that he can defend the guard positions at an NBA level, particularly under Tom Thibodeau's expert tutelage.
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