As the fall-out over the sloppy end to the season and the Blame Game continues to play itself out in Toronto it’s time to look forward to June and the NBA draft where some of the next breed of Raptors will be found.

Although Toronto has only a 0.6% chance of the first pick (for that read a 0.6% chance of selecting John Wall) a lottery pick is ours for sure in a draft that, while it lacks a lot of LeBron James-esque talent, is fairly deep.

While it seems unlikely that picking 13th, which is where the lottery would put the Raptors if they come out in order, will bring a game-turner it should certainly bring a player worthy of plenty of minutes next season, since the chances of going for a project that early are very (very, very) slim!

There are plenty of mock draft boards out there already, mainly going down the road of picking in the order of the amount of balls that will be going into the lottery machine next month, and a mixed bunch of results for Toronto.

Most of the players around the Raptors selection go firmly into the big man category, apart from the one that seems to fit the team best at the moment, point guard Eric Bledsoe out of Kentucky.

It is not beyond belief that the first two point guards drafted this year will both have been playing for the Wildcats last season since Bledsoe spent most of the season playing second fiddle to Wall, while still putting up some decent numbers himself.

Bledsoe is the pass-first guard the Raptors have lacked for years, and that is not putting down the 2008-9 season Jose Calderon had for one minute, but it is not just his ball-handling – he is a fine defender with a wingspan of a player much bigger than 6ft 1in.

NBA Betting experts suggest that his offense, well some of it anyway, is a work in progress, but for a player criticised for a lack of outside game he showed none of those problems in the NCAA Tournament with an exhibition of three-point shooting that he barely shown before.

The only other thing to note is that Bledsoe, as yet, has not hired an agent so it could be one of those late decisions whether he stays in the draft or goes back to Kentucky for his sophomore season.

Outside Bledsoe, it’s power forwards and centers only. Ekpe Udoh from Baylor, Marshall center Hassan Whiteside, Kentucky’s senior Patrick Patterson and Lithuanian recruit Donatas Motiejunas all seem to be on the radar for picks from 10 onwards.

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