The NBA Draft is set for Thursday night, with Ben Simmons the likely No. 1 selection for the Philadelphia 76ers. He was joined by Buddy Hield, Marquese Chriss, and Jakob Poeltl — all projected as fellow lottery selections — to give some perspective on the youth of his draft class in a recent Kids Foot Locker feature.
In the video, general cuteness is enjoyed, with children asking the soon-to-be millionaires about very loaded topics: girlfriends, high-fives, emojis, pizza. Simmons is asked to dab at one point, and he is given a demerit for lacking the proper enthusiasm. Tracy McGrady might agree with these children.
There is also, of course, great naive admiration of Poeltl’s feet, which are much larger than some of these children’s heads. And Hield nearly cracking under the pressure of the hard-hitting journalistic inquiry of who his celebrity crush is makes for a wildly enjoyable interview, too.
All of these things are great metrics of characters, and NBA teams should take the wisdom of children more seriously. Nothing could possibly be more indicative of success in professional sports than a lawless round of “heads up, seven up” or a name-calling contest, and it should be expected that the average age of college-to-pro scouts will drop to 11 in coming seasons.
