Chris McCullough

The 2015 first-round pick tore his ACL midway through his lone season at Syracuse, an injury that delayed his NBA debut until just before the All-Star break. McCullough played only sparingly off the bench upon joining the mix, with the Nets essentially treating his rookie season as a "redshirt year," in the words of then-coach Lionel Hollins. McCullough's workload did pick up a bit down the stretch, as he averaged 6.6 points, 4.3 rebounds and 1.7 steals in 19.4 minutes over the final 12 games of the season. The 21-year-old should benefit greatly from a full offseason to prepare, rather than recover, though he'll likely have trouble supplanting veterans Brook Lopez, Luis Scola and Trevor Booker on the depth chart. McCullough can play both power forward and center, but the former looks to be his more natural position given his ability to space the floor (38.2% mark from three-point range last season). His versatility could prove to be an advantage over Booker and especially, Scola, and if the Nets are well out of contention by midseason, as anticipated, then McCullough could see an expanded role as the focus presumably shifts toward cultivating younger talent.

McCullough was drafted by the Nets with the 29th pick in the first round of July's draft despite the fact that he's still working to return from a torn right ACL that he suffered in his freshman season at Syracuse last January. In 16 games before suffering his season-ending knee injury, McCullough averaged 9.3 points, 6.9 rebounds, 1.1 assists, 1.7 steals, and 2.1 blocks in 28 minutes per game while shooting 48 percent from the field and 56 percent from the line. There's a good chance he won't play at all in his rookie season, but if McCullough can return to the court in time to get a little run, he'll be of use in the defensive stats but little else. The Nets have Brook Lopez and Thaddeus Young starting in the frontcourt and Andrea Bargnani and Thomas Robinson coming off the bench ahead of McCullough, so even if he were healthy, it's unlikely he'd see much playing time as a rookie this season.