Chen Kuo-wei (Courtesy of UBA)
A total of 56 players are in the field of the 2008 SBL local players draft and the second edition of local player draft will be held on July 1, the Chinese Taipei Basketball Association (CTBA) announced.
Several media outlets reported that Chen Kuo-wei, a 190cm forward from Taiwan Sports University in Taichung, is expected to be selected by Bank of Taiwan with the top pick.
Well, if this is true. It's kind of sad. Judged from what I have seen, Chen is at best a solid backup four in the SBL and now he is supposed to go No.1?
However, the situation has a lot to do with the draft rule. The university basketball federation has been in talks with the CTBA for years trying to come up with a plan to "seperate" the university players and professional players. It used to be like 90% of the pro players in Taiwan are college students and the university sports official wanted to change that.
In the proposed plan which has now in effect, only college seniors and those non-NT players are eligible for this year's draft. Which explains why Chen Kuo-wei, who's now a graduate student, is expected to be the top pick because he can play right away.
Wu Feng-cheng, last year's top pick, did not play a single minute for Bank of Taiwan this past season because he was only a sophomore when he was drafted.
Yeah, I know it's difficult to understand but here's the deal. In short, 22 of 87 applicants were drafted last year and only five of those drafted players actually played in the SBL due to the rule mentioned above.
The draft order this year will be the reverse order of the regular season finish: BOT at No.1 and followed by Taiwan Mobile, Dacin, Pure Youth, dmedia, Taiwan Beer and Yulon.
194cm forward Chung Shiou-nai, son of former BBC Mars (now known as Taiwan Mobile) head coach Chung Chi-meng, is in the draft which also included three overseas players: 193cm forward-guard Chang Jun-wei from the University of Toronto and a pair of Taiwanese Americans Kuo Yen-yu and Lee Pi-chuan.