Bobcats Assistant General Manager Karl Hicks was in Orlando for the Pre-Draft Camp this week along with General Manager and Head Coach Bernie Bickerstaff and the rest of Charlotte’s coaching staff. BobcatsBasketball.com visited with Hicks when he returned from the Pre-Draft Camp. In the first of a two-part interview, we speak with Hicks about what the Bobcats staff saw at the camp, who improved his stock there and the importance of attending the camp.

Read the Part II of Hicks interview with BobcatsBasketball.com.

(On what he saw at the Pre-Draft Camp in Orlando) There was definitely some talent out there. You always want to see more first round guys. I don’t think there was many first round guys there, but I do believe there were some. It’s difficult because you want to see the guys that you are considering as your first pick, but knowing it was a good possibility we would be getting a second round pick from Sacramento (which they did), it was very useful because there were a number of guys that we would consider with that pick.

(On if he thinks there were a number of guys who improved their stock at camp) Yeah, I think so. The kid Renaldo Balkman out of South Carolina is a high-energy player and played well. I thought the kid from Notre Dame, (Chris) Quinn -- I liked him, I thought he played well down there. He’s a nice player, you can appreciate what a player like Quinn can do in a situation where you have five-on-five, as opposed to seeing that same player one-on-one.

Who else stood out? We had a kid from South Florida in here who I thought played pretty well, Solomon Jones. And the other kid we had in for a workout, Kenny Adeleke, did well there. He is going to come in and lay his body on the line for you and rebound.

Allan Ray (Villanova) also played well. I thought Curtis Stinson (Iowa State) played very well as an underclassman. Curtis Withers, a UNCC kid, held his own. Louis Amundson from UNLV played very well -- he did what he does.

In a camp like this, you don’t necessarily want a guy to come in and show you something you have never seen from him before. What you hope for is that he will come in and do what you know he can do, and do it well, because it confirms he is the player you think he is.

Bobby Jones from the University of Washington is a good solid defender and a good athlete. Denham Brown (Connecticut) also excels in situations like that. Rashad Anderson (Connecticut) is a shooter but doesn’t really have all the other aspects. Brown shoots it and can put it on the floor -- he has a very well-rounded game and it showed out there. Gerry McNamara (Syracuse) played okay. He has some limitations. He really understands how to play, and when he gets into the paint, he’s a really good player, but he’s not going to beat you down the floor -- he doesn’t have that kind of speed. But he can shoot it, and he’s an extremely, extremely, extremely smart basketball player. David Noel (North Carolina) also did a pretty decent job.

But that’s the level of player that we are talking about. All of those guys that I talked about with maybe the exception of McNamara, who could be a late first-round guy -- those are second-round guys for the most part. Ray is probably a second-round guy. Taquan Dean (Louisville), second-round guy. Jones could sneak into the first round because he’s so big. Brown, second round.

Our coaches needed to see these players more to get a better feel of who they are because our scouts have seen them a lot during the year and they didn’t disappoint them.

(On the importance of this camp for potential second-round guys) It’s very important because they are trying to move themselves up. People might be thinking, “Well I’m not so sure about Gerry McNamara, I don’t think he can cover.” He needed to get up there and show that he could cover. “Chris Quinn, well he’s a little on the small side.” He needed a chance to show that he’s small, but he really knows how to play. For those guys it’s not really a chance coming here -- you cannot lose something that you don’t have. Where as a guy who projected to go anywhere from six to 11, well you can lose something. You are already projected to be in that area, and if you have a bad camp you could drop to 20. That’s why they don’t play. I understand why guys don’t participate, but this is the Pre-Draft Camp. They don’t want to potentially drop if they don’t play well, but the scouts want to see them play, because if he’s not really No. 7 or No. 9 pick, I don’t want to draft him at seven or nine. It’s a little bit of a game. I think it’s in the mind of all general managers across the league -- is there a way to make our system better?

(On what can be seen from the players at the camp as opposed to the individual workouts) That’s a good question. Guys that are point guards especially, and even some pivot men -- playing the system, catching the ball -- you want to see them playing five-on-five. In workouts, you can see a point guard’s one on one skills, which is an aspect of his game, but the point guard is the leader of the team. You want to see how he takes on that leadership role on the court. And the pivot guy, you can probably see his low post moves and see how he rebounds against one guy in workouts, but that guy is going to be navigating several people in the post and rushing the ball up to get it to the other side. So you want to know how he passes the ball.

You don’t get to see some of that stuff in workouts. The clear advantage of watching these guys is that they’re not going to be playing for us two-on-two or playing one-on-one. They are going to be playing in a game against competition that’s going to be really tough. Seeing a guy in a workout might confirm whether or not he can shoot the ball or whether he can handle it a certain way. If you have doubt about something, it can also give you more information in the regard. You are not going to see things that you didn’t know a whole lot about in workouts.

A camp like this makes the general managers -- the guys making the million-dollar decisions -- feel a lot better. It also makes the coaches, who don’t get to scout, feel better about whom they might pick. It’s a bit of a conundrum. How can you feel better about a Pre-Draft Camp when a lot of the guys aren’t first round guys? But like I said, the upside is that you get to see some second rounders and we liked what we saw in a lot of those guys.