Strickland33
Well-known member
Because people have crunched the numbers and found that these older players who are graduating at 23 are less likely to make significant improvement to their games than players who are drafted that are 18-20. It is pretty intuitive. For instance, MCW is the same age as Derrick Favors who is in his 5th NBA season right now and I am pretty sure he is older than Brandon Knight. So you draft an older guy if you are happy with what they would give you right now and you draft younger guys hoping they make big jumps.
titcr
There are obviously exceptions, but the rule holds for the most part. Also, DeAndre Kane is an extreme case as he is going to be 26 in June. That said, he's done a good job at a low-ish level in Europe and it looks like a few teams are keeping tabs on him.