Jared Sullinger was one of the most dominant players in the nation his freshman year. He led the Buckeyes to league title and made it almost to the Final Four before bad luck combined with a hot shooting Kentucky team lead an unexpected exit. That team should have won the championship but they didn't and Sullinger made Buckeye fans happy when he announced he'd be returning for his sophomore season.
His second year started well as he lost 20 lbs, looked quicker, and extended his range. It did worry some that the loss of that much weight would take away his best ASSet from his freshman season but overall Ohio State fans were excited. At the beginning of the season everything looked good but in December Sully sat out a bunch of games. The reports weren't ever clear but varied from plantar facilitis to a herniated disc in his back. Three games later, Sully was back but as the Big Ten season started the dominant presence from the prior year was missing. His numbers were similar but his movements never seemed fluid.
The coaching staff and the Sullingers said little but a few weeks ago it came out that the NBA doctors failed him on their physical and it leaked that the cause was a bulging disc in his back that might need surgery.
This couldn't have been news to the Sullingers. I'm sure Ohio State did a thorough physical as well as whatever agent/draft prep service they were using. At some point the family sat down and decided despite that it was in Jared best interest to go pro.
Tonight Jared Sullinger, who was a probable top 5 pick in 2011, was drafted 21st. The wage scale for rookies was the same in both years so by staying another year Sullinger lost anywhere from $8 - $12 million.
Looking at these numbers I question whether Sullinger should have come out this season. It is a bit more complex than just the above as the sooner he's in the league the sooner he's an unrestricted free agent and the fact that the wage scale has a 3.5% bump in 2013.
The bottom line is his salary for 2012 is $1,306,920. If he could have gotten healthy and proved he was better than he showed in 2011-2, all he would have needed to do was improve 5 spots to make up that in 4 years of his contract. Of course there is always a risk of further injury but it seems to me a pretty good risk to take.
It seems they made a poor decision but that is easy to say in hindsight. It was possible that the doctors could have missed the injury. It was possible a team could have drafted him sooner despite the injury.
I think the more likely scenario is we are going to find the injury is bad enough that it's going to take major surgery with a long rehab which would have made showing improvement next season almost impossible. That's the only thing that makes sense to me but time will tell.
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