The NBA Draft is over and that means teams and prospects will turn their sights towards the NBA Summer League. This year’s slate features NBA Summer League showcases in Utah, Las Vegas and Sacramento. Sacramento is the newest destination for a slate of NBA Summer League games since Orlando will no longer host games like they have in the past. Ultimately, the winners and losers in these contests don’t always matter. The top performers aren’t always going to produce in the regular season either. However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of reasons to watch and follow the 2018 NBA Summer League. Here are some storylines to watch when the Summer League begins in Utah and Sacramento on July 2 through the conclusion in Las Vegas on July 17. 1. Player Participation Throughout the entire NBA Summer League, play close attention to who plays and doesn’t play. Some players will play in select games like Lonzo Ball last year. Other players will play the entire tournament and dominate like Kyle Kuzma last season. A few players might play a few games before the team decides to sit them out because they’re that valuable or that far ahead of the competition. Brandan Ingram, Ben Simmons, Donovan Mitchell and others have proved this in years past. Some players will opt out of the experience altogether to preserve their health. Already, 2018 No. 14 overall pick Michael Porter Jr. is uncertain for the Denver Nuggets. Porter Jr. was expected to be a top pick but he slid in the 2018 NBA Draft due to questions about his back. It is unclear if he will be ready for the start of the season, let alone Summer League exhibitions. Also, Luka Doncic is expected to not play in Las Vegas either. Doncic was the No. 3 pick to the Dallas Mavericks. However, they do not want to overwork him given that the Euroleague season just reasonably concluded. The 19-year-old has played over 150 games during the past two seasons thanks to FIBA play, Eurobasket and ACB league games. Either way, the NBA Summer League usually offers the first glimpse into the NBA’s top prospects. Hence, it is always interesting to see who plays and does not play in these exhibitions. The same thing goes for second and third-year players. Occasionally, these players will play in Summer League if they’re rehabbing injuries or coming off a bad first season. Last year’s rookies who did play well usually skip the Summer League a second time. Kyle Kuzma and Lonzo Ball are already out for this year’s Summer League but it will be interesting to see if any other players from the 2017 NBA Draft do end up playing. Here are my winners and losers from the 2017 NBA Summer League. 2. Ball Family Watch Basketball’s infamous Ball family always makes news and the Summer League is no different. Last year, LaVar was a crowd favorite every time he pulled up to watch Lonzo Ball play in the tournament. Expect the same effect this year, especially if middle son LiAngelo Ball is invited to a Summer League squad. Maybe that is the Ball Family Stan in me but it is safe to say that you can expect reports on Gelo’s every NBA Summer League appearance, whether he makes a team or not. The younger brother of Lonzo Ball was not drafted in the 2018 NBA Draft despite his father’s plans and prophecies. Now, he’ll look to catch onto a Summer League roster. Thus far, it appears that shot won’t come with the Lakers Summer League teams in Sacramento or Vegas. The Lakers will not invite Gelo to their team. Lavar Ball has already said his middle son will need to produce in the Summer League regardless of the fact that he wasn’t drafted. LiAngelo will need to get a shot from a team before all that. Whatever team does extend an opportunity to Gelo can expect a target on their back. Wherever the Ball family goes, they bring their extensive clan of Big Baller Brand fans as well as their headline-making machine pops Lavar Ball. This comes with both good and bad brand awareness. Keep in mind NBA teams invite players based on family ties all the time. Chris Smith, Zoran Dragic, Giannis’ Brothers, Seth Curry, Taylor Griffin, and more are some of the players’ who have bigger last names than basketball games but still got chances in the NBA Summer League. Even players and coaches sons like Gary Payton II, Larry Drew II, and Elijah Brown have gotten a shot in the Summer League. It will be interesting to see if and where a team gives Gelo a shot. The 19-year-old has the world telling him he is not an NBA player due to limited competition in Lithuania, an undefined position, an off-court incident at UCLA and limited athleticism. Can Gelo prove them wrong by dominating the Summer League much like he has always been the leading scorer on his teams? Even if no team signs LiAngelo, will the Ball family crash the summer league anyways? 3. NBA Summer Growth After many seasons hosting games in Orlando ended, Sacramento is the newest city to host NBA Summer League games. Tickets for Sacramento are available to the public but how will the experiment go? Also, NBA TV and ESPN will televise a record number of games. For the first-time-ever, every NBA Summer League game will air on TV, including a potential matchup between No. 1 pick DeAndre Ayton and No. 2 pick Marvin Bagley III on July 7 at 7:30 p.m. EST on ESPN. Las Vegas’ 14th year will also have a record 10 games on July 6 including 5 games on NBA TV and a tripleheader on ESPN. Last year, the NBA Summer League saw record growth per NBA.com: NBA Summer League 2017 set records for total attendance (127,843) and single-day attendance (17,500). ESPN and NBA TV combined to televise the most-viewed NBA Summer League ever, averaging 227,000 daily viewers (up 29 percent from 2016), per NBA.com. A matchup between the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers was the most-watched NBA Summer League game in history, with 1.1 million viewers on ESPN. Across social media platforms, fans accounted for 436 million video views, an increase of 37 percent from the year before. Will the NBA Summer League growth continue in 2018? As someone who has gone to the Las Vegas Summer League every year for over a decade, I can say the event continues to grow in both organization and attendance. Las Vegas will grow even more as all 30 teams are on the schedule for 82 games in twelve days. Over the past few years, it has gotten crazy to find a good seat in either the Thomas & Mack or Cox Pavilion for the general admission event. Once upon a time, you could bounce between the neighboring arenas and find a seat to watch whatever prospects or teams intrigued you. Now, you pretty much have to camp in one spot and have someone spot your seat when you go to the bathroom or grab something from the consensions stands. That is pretty crazy considering I remember watching Kevin Durant and Blake Griffin play in the half-filled Thomas & Mack arena during their respective rookie campaigns. Added, you never knew who you were sitting by back in the day. You could catch NBA players and stars sitting casually in the stands along with fans, scouts, agents and media members. I once sat next to Goran Dragic, Marcus Smart, Damien Lillard and even got a chance to briefly meet Gary Payton, Derek Fisher and a bunch of your favorite NBA journalists. Now, this activity with big names is much more private and discrete since Las Vegas has gotten a much bigger profile. Part of the added growth includes the Lakers and Suns appearing at the top of the draft. Phoenix and Los Angeles always traveled well to Las Vegas Summer League since it is regionally very close. However, that was amplified with both teams having early lottery picks the last few seasons.<doc-sep>Former Gonzaga Bulldog Johnathan Williams will play with the Los Angeles Lakers in the NBA Summer League, the forward confirmed in a text message. Williams expects to report to the Lakers on Thursday. Los Angeles will play in the Sacramento and Las Vegas summer leagues. Every NBA team will be represented in Las Vegas, so NBA administrators should see a great deal of the athletic, 6-foot-9 Williams. Williams, a two-time All-West Coast Conference selection, helped Gonzaga reach the 2017 national title game and the Sweet 16 last year. His contract with the Lakers includes a partial guarantee, which typically means a certain amount of money even if he doesn’t make the roster. Sacramento’s Summer League, which includes Golden State, Sacramento and Miami, runs July 2-5. Games in Las Vegas are scheduled from July 6-17. Williams is the fourth free agent to sign with the Lakers following Thursday’s draft, joining North Carolina’s Joel Berry II, Oklahoma State’s Jeffrey Carroll and Kansas’ Malik Newman. Berry was MVP of the Final Four after UNC edged Gonzaga 71-65 in the championship game. The Lakers’ Summer League crew should include draft picks Moritz Wagner of Michigan, Kansas’ Svi Mykhailiuk and German teenager Isaac Bonga. Wagner and Bonga are 6-10 and 6-9 forwards, respectively. The draft picks will be joined by the free agents and some Lakers’ returners but probably not Lonzo Ball or Kyle Kuzma. Williams, who played two seasons at Missouri before transferring to GU, averaged 13.4 points and 8.5 rebounds last season, both team highs. He made 61 percent of his shots inside the arc and 32 percent on his 3s in two seasons at Gonzaga. The Zags went 69-7 in Williams’ two years.<doc-sep>Following today’s press conference to introduce new Dallas Mavericks Luka Dončić and Jalen Brunson, ESPN’s Tim MacMahon had the following report: A Mavs source says Luka Doncic is unlikely to play in the Las Vegas summer league. The Mavs don’t want to overwork Doncic in the wake of a long EuroLeague season that ended earlier this week. — Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) June 22, 2018 For those familiar with Dončić this should not be a surprise. Between FIBA play, Eurobasket, and ACB league games, Dončić has played over 150 professional basketball games the last two seasons. Tracking the contests game by game, he’s been playing basketball continuously for the last 18 months. Part of his late draft stock tumble can in part be linked to concerns about his conditioning and how he took care of himself, but when a player is this young and playing this many games, it’s really a shock he’s played as well as he did the last few months. The Mavericks are probably anxious to get Dončić into their strength and conditioning program while also letting him have legitimate time away from competitive games. It’s disappointing in some respect, because we’re all very excited to see Dončić play in a Maverick uniform. This could change in the next two weeks, particularly given Dončić’s competitive nature, but with the investment the Mavericks made in Luka, it’s extremely unlikely.<doc-sep>
Kevin Hagen/Associated Press While the stars of the NBA are off enjoying their summer vacations, putting in long days in the gym and trolling the rest of the league on social media (Yes, we're talking about you Joel Embiid), the future stars of the game will be showcasing their talents in the Las Vegas Summer League. The opening set of games will be played at two venues in Las Vegas over five days, starting July 6, before the teams are seeded into a tournament-style bracket. Throughout the first five days of the Las Vegas Summer League, there are plenty of intriguing matchups in which first-year stars will try to impress in an attempt to earn roster spots. On the other end of the spectrum are the first-round picks ready to show off their talents for the first time in an NBA uniform. Below is a look at three of the top games to watch from July 6-10 at the start of the Las Vegas Summer League. Video Play Button Videos you might like Biggest Games on Las Vegas Summer League Schedule Dallas vs. Phoenix (Friday, July 6, 9:30 p.m., ESPN) Deandre Ayton's Las Vegas Summer League debut comes in primetime on the first night of the competition, but he'll be the only high-profile first-round pick on the floor at the Thomas and Mack Center. Dallas is going to rest Luka Doncic after a long European season with Real Madrid, per ESPN's Tim McMahon. Even without Doncic on the floor, the Suns-Mavericks clash is going to be intriguing to watch, especially from the Phoenix perspective. In addition to Ayton, the Suns will get their first look at Mikal Bridges, who was sent to Phoenix in a draft night trade with Philadelphia, and Elie Okobo, a French point guard who was taken with the first pick of the second round. How Ayton, Bridges and Okobo combine will be worth watching, as they look to boost the Suns out of the bottom of the Western Conference in the regular season alongside a young core led by Devin Booker and Josh Jackson. Bridges will go to head-to-head with his former Villanova teammate Jalen Brunson, who went 33rd overall to the Mavericks. Brunson will be fighting for playing time at point guard, and the Summer League will a nice springboard for his professional career. Memphis vs. Orlando (Sunday, July 8, 9:30 p.m., ESPN2) A pair of lottery selections face off in the clash between Memphis and Orlando at the Thomas and Mack Center. No. 4 overall pick Jaren Jackson Jr. should feature in a starring role for the Memphis Grizzlies, while No. 6 selection Mo Bamba headlines Orlando's roster. Eric Gay/Associated Press The pair of rookie big men could go head-to-head in the paint on numerous occasions, and it will be a nice test for them so early in the Summer League campaign. The supporting cast of both teams should be fun to watch as well, as point guard Jevon Carter joins Jackson and Melvin Frazier, who was an underrated second-round selection out of Tulane, teams up with Bamba. Carter might end up as one of the steals of the draft, as he carries a wealth of experience from his time at West Virginia dealing with the rigorous Big 12 schedule. Atlanta vs. Chicago (Tuesday, July 10, 6 p,m., NBATV) The Trae Young experience has a chance to captivate audiences in Las Vegas, as the rookie point guard looks to impress during Summer League with the Atlanta Hawks. NBA Photos/Getty Images Young is one of a few players the Hawks added during the draft, as they also brought in shooting guard Kevin Huerter from Maryland with the 19th pick and Omari Spellman out of Villanova with the 30th selection. How Young, Huerter and Spellman operate in the Hawks' system will be interesting to watch, as they all enjoy shooting from beyond the arc, especially Young and Huerter. Chicago possesses a nice group of first-year players as well, as first-round picks Wendell Carter Jr. and Chandler Hutchison should end up as complementary pieces to Lauri Markkanen. The showdown between the Hawks and Bulls takes place on the final day of the first set of games in Las Vegas, which means by the time they step on the floor at Cox Pavilion, Young, Carter and the rest of the rookies should have a level of comfort within their respective systems. Follow Joe on Twitter, @JTansey90