TORONTO

On a day when the Raptors brought in a slew of potential NBA draft prospects, including first-round potentials like Jerami Grant of Syracuse, Glenn Robinson III out of Michigan and Cleanthony Early of Wichita State, it was Toronto’s own Sim Bhullar who stole the show.

Now Bhullar may not even hear his name called on draft night, but when you’re 7-foot-5 and tip the scales at a slimmed down 340, where you happen to be slotted in the draft takes a back seat.

As soon as Bhullar enters a room, heads turn and Wednesday was no exception despite the fact many in his audience make their living in and around rather large basketball people.

Bhullar takes things to another level. As he made his way out of the elevator and towards a makeshift interview area just outside the Raptors third-level practice gym at the Air Canada Centre, jaws dropped and cameras went into overdrive.

It’s a natural reaction that no longer fazes Bhullar.

“I’ve been dealing with it my whole life so I’m used to it,” Bhullar said. “I’m used to the attention, the pictures, getting stopped all the time. It’s become an everyday thing for me.”

To put Bhullar’s size in perspective, the tallest Raptor in team history measured in at 7-foot-3. That was Aleksander Radojevic, who played all of three games for the franchise for a total of 24 minutes.

Seven-foot-three is also the height of the tallest current NBA player, that being Hasheem Thabeet of the Oklahoma City Thunder.

The tallest player in league history is a mark shared Manute Bol and Gheorghe Muresan who were both 7-foot-7 when they played.

Few of the big men though outside of Eddy Curry and Shaquille O’Neal towards the end of his career came anywhere close to the 340 pounds that Bhullar currently weighs in at.

And unlike those two, Bhullar is joining the NBA in an age where big men have to be mobile enough to defend the pick and roll, certainly not new to the game but far more prevalent than it ever has been.

Bhullar admits he has been working on his mobility and his stamina. Getting down to 340 was no easy feat he will tell you, but he’s still going to have to lose more if he’s going to have any chance of fulfilling his dream of playing in the NBA.

What he has working for him, though, is that 7-foot-5 frame. As any scout will tell you, you can’t teach size and even in an age where bigs are stepping outside and knocking down three’s there’s always going to be a place in the game for a traditional low post centre who can protect the rim and block shots.

“He’s so large and there is always a market for that in the NBA,” Raptors director of scouting Dan Tolzman said. “You want to look at size and you want to see a player and how his agility is, what his reaction time is like. Any time there is a guy with his size, they have potential.”

Bhullar is doing a two-pronged workout regiment. One that will help him drop weight but at the same time build his muscle mass so he can bang with the big boys in the NBA.

He has been working out with a few NBA types in Las Vegas along with younger brother Tanveer who is no slouch in the size department either measuring in at 7-foot-3 and tipping the scales at 325. And while he admits he has a ways to go, Bhullar has at least convinced himself that strength-wise he can match up with most.

The real key is proving to the NBA minds that he can carry that size at a pace and rate that he’s able to keep up in an NBA game.

“I just want to show them I’m in shape,” Bhullar said. “That I can get up and down the court and bang with the other bigs and just knock down shots.”

WIN AND THEY’RE IN?

Watching an NBA workout can be interesting all on its own, but learning what a potential draft team is looking for can take that interest to another level.

For the Toronto Raptors, one of the focal points or at least an area they track during workouts are wins.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s an individual drill or a team drill, a shooting contest or anything,” Raptors director of scouting Dan Tolzman said.

“We just track the wins because it’s guys like that, the hard-working guys, the competitive guys, they figure out ways to get wins. It might be a three-on-three drill but if their team is always winning I think that says something about the guy.”

Tolzman had not seen the numbers following yesterday’s workout but it sounded very much like Wichita State forward Cleanthony Early made out pretty nicely in that department.

“He’s the type of guy who is always in the mix and wills his team to get a lot done out there,” Tolzman said.