Los Angeles Lakers: Grading their 2018 draft selections

INTANGIBLES

• Age – 21
• Height – 6’8″
• Weight – 210 LBS
• Wingspan – 6’4.5″
• Standing Reach – N/A

ANALYSIS

For obvious purposes, we will refer him to “Svi,” as he was called at KU by essentially everyone. Mykhailiuk ended his four-year collegiate run with Kansas scoring 14.6 points while rebounding 3.9 boards a game, helping to lead the Jayhawks to the Final Four before a beatdown by Villanova.

The most interesting intangible that most people might not speak on Svi is his age. Mykhailiuk is just 21 years old, younger than both Josh Hart and Kyle Kuzma, interestingly. I believe that in the program that Los Angeles has, Svi will continue to improve on his game, especially on the defensive side of the ball. His wingspan is interestingly only at 6’4.5″, placing him at a much bigger disadvantage to scoring wings such as Klay Thompson.

That being said, the Lakers did right prioritizing this pick with shooting, something they lacked in the 2017-18 campaign (34.5 percent). In his years playing with Kansas University, Svi shot 40.9 percent on 579 attempts for his entire career, raising the bar in his senior year at 44.4 percent. In a league that demands three-point shots (with of course, disdain for Minnesota’s old-fashioned offense), Svi projects to be successful at the backup two or three spot.

Rob Pelinka called Mykhailiuk “one of our best knockdown shooters that we had in our building [for predraft workouts].” Though college statistics might not exactly translate to the NBA level in the best fashion, Svi’s elite season at KU rivaled only 73 other players since 1993. Los Angeles management, and my thoughts included, may have hit a homerun out of the park with this pick.