Tyler Lydon, a forward formerly of the Syracuse Orange has declared for the NBA draft. There were several rumors circulating around in the days leading up to the decision on what he would choose to do. His decision to forgo his junior year and enter the NBA draft was confirmed via a tweet from Lydon himself.

Now before we get into what I think about the decision, Lydon has not confirmed if he has signed with an agent or not. Once Lydon signs with an agent he officially will enter the NBA draft and can not return to the Orange.

Now, lets see if Lydon made the right choice. I will start off by saying I think Syracuse had a failure of a season. They had some big wins but they were countered by many ugly losses. With a first round loss to Miami in the ACC tournament, the Orange were right on the cusp of the NCAA tournament. They were not selected to the big dance and even had an early exit in the NIT tournament. It was definitely a different story from what Lydon had with the 2015-16 Orange. Perhaps this ugly season drove him away. In his freshman year Lydon averaged 10 points and 6 rebounds. Nothing spectacular, but not bad college numbers by any means. This year Lydon improved his all around game and increased his averages to 13 and 9 per game. A Huge upside to Lydon’s game is his perimeter shooting, where he shot 39 percent from this past year.

While he does have the ability to shoot from the outside, it is hard to say what position he would play in the NBA. Lydon is one of those players fit for the NCAA, but the NBA is a totally different story. Lydon stands at 6 foot 9 inches and weighs 223 pounds. For comparison, Kevin Durant, the same height, weighs 240 pounds. With that being said Lydon is not big enough to out muscle NBA forwards and he is not athletic enough to run the floor. Going back to his strengths, the modern day NBA game is a shooters game, thanks Steph Curry, and Lydon does have that going for him.