TUALATIN, Ore. — Six more aspiring players looking for one of the 400-some jobs in the NBA came through the doors of the Portland Trail Blazers’ practice facility Friday.
This group had a considerably lower NBA Draft profile than others, featuring mostly second round talent and local players getting a look from the local pro team.
Kentucky’s Dakari Johnson was the biggest name among the six — a 7-foot center who played just two seasons for the Wildcats — projected by Draft Express and ESPN to be a second round pick.
At a program like Kentucky rich in NBA talent, it’s harder for a player like Johnson to show everything he can do. In workouts, he says he has showcased other skills.
“They didn’t know I could shoot as well as I can so I just showed them that,” Johnson said of his workouts. “Just showing how mobility wise I’m better. I am in shape now, just coming out here and showing that.”
Johnson also said that he could potentially play power forward.
The Blazers do not have a second round pick. They have the No. 23 pick in the first round but they traded their 2015 second round pick to the Cavaliers for the draft rights to Allen Crabbe. To get a second round pick they would have to get one from another team in some kind of deal.
Gonzaga guard and four-time All-West Coast Conference selection Kevin Pangos and teammate Gary Bell Jr. also participated. Georgia Southern guard Jelani Hewitt — first team All-Sun Belt and the conference’s Defensive Player of the Year last season — participated as well as two players with local ties.
University of Portland center Thomas Van Der Mars and Rice forward Seth Gearhart, a graduate of Wilsonville High School, both got their first NBA pre-draft workout Friday morning with the Blazers.
Both players were working out in the area and aren’t considered likely to be drafted but relished the opportunity.
“It’s a dream come true,” said Gearhart. “I grew up a huge Blazers fan, I followed them my whole life. So just to be able to come in here and workout is pretty cool for me.”
“I’m just enjoying it,” Van Der Mars said. “I’m just trying to play in the right spot for me. Trying to find the right team, the right fit. Trying to help out.”
It was also a Canadian reunion on Friday afternoon between Pangos and Blazers assistant coach Jay Triano, who is also the Head Coach of the Canadian National Team.
“That was cool too,” Pangos said after his 11th pre-draft workout with one more to go. “I’ve been working with him since I was younger. I know him really well and stuff. Doing it in an NBA workout was just another cool opportunity. A different setting but it was really neat.”
Blazers assistant David Vanterpool will be on Triano’s staff for the Canadian National team this summer as they look to qualify for the Olympics at the FIBA Americas tournament in Mexico.
