clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

C.J. Fair, Javon McCrea to play for Dallas in Las Vegas Summer League

Undrafted college standouts C.J. Fair and Javon McCrea will join the Dallas Summer League team in Vegas.

By Ian_Miller
Kevin Hoffman-USA TODAY Sports

Though it was a quiet draft for the Dallas Mavericks, the team will showcase some young players July 11-21 in Las Vegas.

Syracuse Senior forward C.J. Fair will join the team:

Fair led the Orangeman in scoring last season, and with his size(6'8) and production appeared to have an outside shot of being drafted.  Watching him play, with his body type, left-handedness, and athleticism, you see some similarities to first round pick Rodney Hood.  Fair does not have the long-range touch Hood does, of course, but he's an effective scorer thanks to a surprisingly smooth offensive game.  Playing some smallball 4 for the Orangeman, my guess would be that Fair plays a little more on the perimeter at the next level.  Priority #1 for Fair will be improving his jumper.

Some Fair highlights:


Joining Fair will be Javon McCrea, another Senior forward from the University of Buffalo.  This story was broken adorably by Javon's mother, it would seem:

McCrea is an interesting guy.  I will admit that I have not seen him play much, but there's some evidence he could be another small-school steal.  He fills out the boxscore: averaging 18 points, nearly 10 boards, over 2 blocks and 2 assists per game.

What you will undoubtedly notice first about McCrea is that he looks like he could play tight end in the NFL.  He's a little undersized for powerforward at 6'7/6'8, but with a muscular 250 pounds that he uses well to bulldoze his way inside, and a 7'3 winspan that wreaks havoc on defense.  He looks and seems to play a little bit like former Mav Brandon Bass(or, a cross between Bass/college-era Millsap).

The scouting reports on McCrea say that he is a hustle guy, and the stats bear that out.  His block, steal and offensive rebound rates are fantastic, indicating that he goes and gets the ball at both ends of the court.  Surprisingly, based on his highlight reel and solid assist/turnover ratio, McCrea seems to be pretty good for a big at handling the rock.  He also has improved greatly as a free throw shooter in his four years at Buffalo from 50% his first two years to 70% the last two.

Worth noting for any analytics geeks like me out there: McCrea was actually 10th on Kevin Pelton's WARP projections for draft prospects.  He went undrafted likely because of his lack of height, but I will be very interested to see if there's something to McCrea.

More From Mavs Moneyball