Pistons Host Syracuse's Rakeem Christmas, North Carolina's J.P. Tokoto At Pre-Draft Workout
By Ashley Dunkak
@AshleyDunkak
AUBURN HILLS - The Detroit Pistons continued with their pre-draft due diligence Monday, hosting six more players for a workout at the team's practice facility. The participants included Syracuse forward Rakeem Christmas, North Carolina forward J.P. Tokoto and William and Mary guard Marcus Thornton.
For North Carolina last season, Tokoto averaged 8.3 points, 5.6 rebounds and 4.3 assists. At the combine, he showed off his improved shooting, a result of several weeks of work at IMG Academy.
At IMG, Tokoto worked on keeping his elbow in, keeping his wrist locked toward the basket, and stepping into shots in a one-two manner rather than hopping into them. The number of reps he took helped those mechanics become second nature.
After demonstrating his improved shooting at the combine and now in workouts with teams, Tokoto hopes teams see he can be a more complete player than he was in college.
"Everybody knows I can defend, I can finish at the rim, make plays, find open guys, those kind of things that I've done in the season at North Carolina," Tokoto said. "Now it's time to show that I can be a spot-up shooter, catch-and-shoot guy, off-the-dribble guys, whatever it is."
Tokoto said he thinks he has a shot to be taken late in the first round.
"Anything can happen," Tokoto said. "You go in and kill a guy they're looking at, they're probably going to pick you just because you worked harder, and I know they look at a lot of upside stuff, so being a confident guy I feel like I can bring a lot to the table to a team and stuff that I haven't shown at Carolina that I have in my game now."
Christmas, in his final season at Syracuse, averaged 17.5 points and 9.1 rebounds. Christmas estimated he is about halfway through his 18 or so visits with NBA teams. He said his preparation for the draft, even before the visits began, has been constant.
"After my last game, just went straight into working out, didn't take any time off, just getting ready for this whole process," Christmas said. "It helped me a lot."
For Christmas, areas for improvement include offensive versatility and strength.
"I need to improve my shooting ... that free-throw line jump shot, making that consistently and just being stronger, keeping up with the fours and fives in the NBA, they're very physical, and they're bigger than me, so just put on some weight," Christmas said, "but right now I'm aggressive, I'm physical, I'm athletic and just ready to try and do all those things."
Thornton, who finished his career as the all-time leading scorer at William and Mary, averaged 20.0 points and 2.9 assists as a senior. Not surprisingly, in his eyes the fact his impressive numbers came against small schools does not mean he cannot compete at the next level. He is enjoying working to prove that he can do just that.
"I feel very confident in what I've been able to do," Thornton said. "It's fun for me. I get a chance to go against top-level guys, high-ranked guys and really prove myself. That's one of the big knocks on guys coming from smaller schools, they may not have played against the best competition, but out here we're all wearing the same jersey, it's no more school names, so it's fun to get out here, compete and prove myself."
Other players in attendance Monday included Virginia forward Darion Atkins, UNC Charlotte point guard Pierria Henry and Georgetown forward Greg Whittington.
