Bojan Bogdanovic

Bojan Bogdanovic
SG/SF, 6’8, 225lbs, 28 years old, 3 years of experience

A much needed bench scorer acquired at the deadline, who provided some efficient outside shooting and some craft around the basket. It was all very streaky, because Bogdanovic is always streaky, yet he provided something off the bench where so many others had provided nothing. Bogdanovic’s defence is always going to be exploitable, but he is in the rare positioning of entering his prime and restricted free agency at the same time. Having traded a first-round pick for him, the team really needs to keep Bojan, for that’s a high price for a part-season rental, more than the salary dump of Nicholson justifies. But it is all cost-permitting, and the cost of Porter ahead of him is more important.

Player Plan: Entering restricted free agency. His namesake Bogdan is seemingly setting the market price at $12 million, but although untested at the NBA level, Bogdan is better than Bojan, who is worth nearer MLE money. Especially given that he is already 28. Both he and Porter are needed, but keeping both would likely result in tax barring significant cost-cutting elsewhere, and Porter is the priority. So it depends on how much there is to spend.

New Jersey sold the #31 pick in last season's draft (Tibor Pleiss) to Oklahoma City for cash. This season, they are buying the #31 pick instead. That right there is the Prokhorov effect. They use the pick to draft Bojan Bogdanovic, an intriguing offensive prospect with versatile and sufficient size, but who signed with Fenerbahce a couple of weeks before the draft and who therefore won't be joining the NBA this season. Bojan Bogdanovic's name is spelt suitably near to "Mr Bojangles" that the nickname is just going to have to be forced upon him.

The announcement of Bogdanovic's selection is heavily booed by the watching Nets fans, who still think Miami are making it. Little do they know that they just booed a future Net.

Bojan Bogdanovic - As has been the case with Vesely, Bogdanovic has been touted as a shooter when he really isn't one right now. He certainly takes a lot of three pointers, and is capable of hot streaks, yet he's also a 34% three point shooter. And that's from the shorter European range. If you're calling Bojan Bogdanovic a wing shooter, you might as well call Dante Jackson a wing shooter.

Then again, unlike Vesely, Bogdanovic projects to be one. He has demonstrated that with his hot streaks and workouts. The form's nice, the confidence unwavering, and the ability to get open and shoot off the dribble ever-improving. He is not just a catch and shoot player out there - he has become a featured player offensively, and, with his decent passing vision, handle and smooth athleticism, now somewhat resembles Jiri Welsch with the potential of Antoine Rigaudeau. [Please don't be scared off by that.] Standing 6'8, Boggs's physical frame is not in question, and his quick development as an offensive player shows no signs of slowing up.

Bogdanovic has already signed a new contract for next season, moving from Partizan Belgrade to Fenerbahce. It is not clear to me what the contract stipulates in the event of a good NBA offer, or even if Bogdanovic wants to hear one, yet it does now make it extremely unlikely that Bogdanovic comes over immediately. This, though, is fine, because Fenerbahce being amongst Europe's elite gives Bogdanovic a great place to learn. If he can develop some Turkish defensive intensity in the process, even better.

- Mladen Sekularac

Another former Mavericks draft pick - although his rights are now owned by the Warriors - Sekularac was projected to be a sweet shooting 6'8 swingman, much like Bojan Bogdanovic projects to be (or is) in the upcoming draft. But M-Sek never panned out due to injuries. Injuries kept him out for all but one game of last season as well - the first game of the year - yet finally, after 18 months on the shelf, Sekularac returned to action when he signed with Bosnian team Igokea Aleksandrovac in March. (Not to be confused with the bigger Serbian team, Partizan Igokea.) Igokea Aleksandrovac are not an Adriatic League team, playing only in the Bosnian league, yet March saw them pull off a triple whammy of big signings when they landed Sekularac, LaVell Blanchard and Jamar Butler. Not sure how they did this, but they did this.

Statistics are not available for Rack, other than to say he totalled 8 points in 24 minutes in their last game.