With the draft just a few days away, it’s a good time to zip through another consensus mock draft. I’ve pulled in the first 14 picks from ESPN, DraftExpres, NBADraft.net, SI, Yahoo and FanHouse to see if we could come to some sort of consensus as to how the first half of the draft might go. If a player was taken by a certain team in three-plus mock drafts, he is listed in bold with the number of drafts in parenthesis. If there was no consensus, or if he was drafted by a team in two mocks, then he is listed in italics.

(I know the font is a little small, but you can click on the table for a larger version.)

A few random thoughts:

- The top four appear to be set, with Wall, Turner, Favors and Wesley Johnson going to the Wizards, Sixers, Nets and T-Wolves, respectively. These picks intuitively make a lot of sense, which probably means they won’t go this way on Thursday night.

- I listed Cousins at #6 because I don’t think there’s any chance that he falls further than that. But with his “character issues,” who knows. He had a great workout in Sacramento, so I’d bet that he goes #5 at the latest. Besides, Monroe seems like a great fit in Golden State with his basketball IQ and willingness to pass the ball.

- After the #6 pick, this draft seems like a free for all. There are a number of forwards — Aminu, Hayward, Babbitt, Davis and Patterson — all jockeying for position.

- Even though he wasn’t the consensus — there was no conensus — Babbitt seems destined to land in Utah. Aldrich is a possibility there as well.

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It’s been nearly a month since we published our first mock draft, so it’s a good time to take another look and see where certain players are going.

I’ve pulled in the latest mocks from ESPN, DraftExpress, NBADraft.net and FanHouse to come up with a consensus of the first 14 picks.

If a player is picked by two or more sites, they’re the consensus, unless there’s a tie. In that case, I’ll make the pick. The same goes for when there are four different players listed.

A few random thoughts…

- It seems like the top four are starting to settle — John Wall (WAS), Evan Turner (PHI), Derrick Favors (NJ) and Wes Johnson (MIN). I think those are all solid picks for those franchises. DeMarcus Cousins might have the most upside of anyone in the draft, but his proverbial “character issues” are weighing him down. He didn’t test very well athletically, though that doesn’t matter much in my mind, due to his rebounding prowess. A bigger concern is his body fat, which tested pretty high at the combine, but is reportedly coming down. Maybe I’m just a Bucks fan that is gun-shy about fatties that suddenly drop weight after the Robert “Tractor” Traylor debacle.

- Greg Monroe is just a so-so athlete, but he’s a good passer and a good feel for the game. He’d be a great guy to feed in the high post with the idea that he’d be able to hit guys cutting to the basket. It looks like it’s between Monroe and Cousins at #5 right now.

- The Clippers are an interesting pick. They have two good young players at power forward (Blake Griffin) and shooting guard (Eric Gordon), an aging point guard (Baron Davis) and a pretty good center (Chris Kaman) who is in his prime. (Kaman averaged 19-9 last year, believe it or not.) The big hole is at small forward, and the pipe dream has LeBron coming to L.A. As a backup plan (which they’ll no doubt need), the Clips could grab Xavier Henry here, who tested better than expected at the combine. Another small forward option would be Hayward, who is the more polished player at this point. Luke Babbitt is a shotmaker who would space the floor well for Griffin and Kaman down low.

- Speaking of Babbitt, he just seems like a Utah player. If he slips past #9, I’d be surprised, but it’s interesting to see that none of these mocks have him going #11 to New Orleans. The Hornets landed a good shooting guard in Marcus Thornton last year, and Chris Paul could really use another shooter to set up at small forward. Everyone (except Chad Ford) seems to think he’s headed to Memphis.

- I think Patrick Patterson is going to make some late lottery team in need of a good power forward very happy. He tested better than expected at the combine, and along with his tremendous strength and his record of improvement, he should blossom into a fine starter. His detractors point to his rebounding (7.4 rpg), but it’s tough to post eye-popping rebounding numbers when you play alongside a boardmonster like DemMarcus Cousins. He averaged 9.3 in his sophomore year, so he should be fine on the glass.

Photo from fOTOGLIF

It’s early, but what the hell? The lottery is behind us, so let’s take a stab at our first consensus mock draft. I’ve pulled in the latest mocks from ESPN, DraftExpress, NBADraft.net and SI.com to come up with a consensus of the first 14 picks.

If a player is picked by two or more sites, they’re the consensus, unless there’s a tie. In that case, I’ll make the pick. The same goes for when there are four different players listed.

The first three picks seem settled already, though much can change in the next month. Wall-Turner-Favors makes a lot of sense, especially for the teams in question. John Wall seems to be a no-brainer for the Wizards. If they hold onto Arenas, he can play the two. I think they’ll eventually move Agent Zero and build around Wall.

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The draft kicks off (or is it “tips off”?) in less than three hours, so I thought it would be fun to publish one last edition of the consensus mock draft. I pulled in mocks from SI.com and ProBasketballNews since they are current and are well respected enough for NBA.com to use in their consensus.

If three or more mocks made a pick, then it’s considered majority rules and that pick is listed in bold with the number of votes next to it in parenthesis. For those picks that have two or fewer mocks agreeing on a pick, I make the pick for them. For example, the five mocks have five different players going to the Knicks, so I made my best guess — Jrue Holiday. I went with Jennings over Flynn for the Bucks at #10 because Chad Ford reported that the Bucks are in love with Jennings’ upside. Et cetera.

A few random thoughts…

- Even though the #5 and #6 picks aren’t true consensus picks, three mocks had the T-Wolves using one of those back-to-back picks on Stephen Curry, while three mocks had the T-Wolves using the other pick on James Harden — who cares who is picked first? (Besides the players, of course. Their salary depends on it!)

- I’d be a little surprised if the Thunder drafted Rubio and kept him. Although I don’t think it would be a bad move, as Russell Westbrook is too much of a shoot-first point guard in my opinion, Westbrook’s camp has been pretty adamant that he doesn’t want to move off the ball. If OKC sees Westbrook as a point guard, then the best fit appears to be James Harden.

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Chad Ford and Draft Express updated their mocks, so it’s a good time to take another look at the consensus. I also added Rotoworld’s most recent mock to the equation, and added a column (“consensus”) that makes a pick if two or more of the mocks agree on a player.

A few random thoughts…

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Both ESPN (Chad Ford) and NBADraft.net updated their mock drafts today, so it’s a good time to update our consensus mock draft. (Come on, DraftExpress and DIME, your mocks are getting stale!)

A few things to note:

- Whether or not Jordan Hill slips might depend on what happens with James Harden. If he’s there at #5, the Wizards could very well take him, and the teams picking #6 through #9 will probably pass on Hill, leaving him for the Bucks at #10. As a Bucks fan, I’d be happy if the team got Hill in the draft and re-signed Ramon Sessions.

- It doesn’t look like Ricky Rubio is too keen on going to Memphis, but he probably won’t slip past the Kings at #4. If the Thunder see Russell Westbrook as their point guard of the future (which is what Chad Ford is reporting), then it wouldn’t make sense for OKC to draft him, though they could try to trade down and pick up a good player in the process. They could trade down to #5 and grab Hill, but the Wizards aren’t looking to trade up.

- Brandon Jennings’ range in this consensus is #7 to #14. Expect that to change as he does a few individual workouts. He was considered the top talent in his class by many coming out of high school, but his stock has slipped some since he played (inconsistently) over in Italy this season.

- The four mocks have the Warriors taking four different point guards. It just goes to show what kind of depth there is at the position this year.

- Of these four mocks, the one I trust least is DIME. From Earl Clark going #6 to the Jazz passing on Hansbrough at #20, there are a few headscratchers. I’d like to see an updated mock from DIME.