Potential top-three draft prospect Ace Bailey is off to a poor start to his NBA career before even getting drafted.
The 2025 NBA Draft is headlined by none other than Duke Blue Devils’ Cooper Flagg, who is expected to be selected as the No. 1 overall pick, per recent NBA Mock Drafts.
However, aside from Flagg, the likes of Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey are expected to gain the most attention on draft night.
While both Harper and Bailey are viewed as talented prospects, there’s one thing that’s a brutal differentiator between them – Attitude.
Despite being an elite player, Bailey remains the only US-based draft prospect who is yet to work out with any NBA team ahead of the 2025 draft.
It was about to change that as he had a workout scheduled with the Philadelphia 76ers, but Bailey bailed on that as well.
This has caused a major uproar among NBA fans as they furiously called out the former Rutgers star.
“Johnny Davis level prospect. Avoid at all costs,” a fan wrote. While another added: “Sixers dodged a bullet.”
“Ace Bailey is ruining his draft stock in front of our very eyes,” a third NBA fan wrote.
“This kid will be out of the league by 2028,” a fourth fan predicted.
“Without playing a single game, he’s already a bust,” an angry fan stated.
“Who’s this dude’s agent? He definitely should be fired,” a sixth fan wrote.
All things considered, most fans are convinced that Bailey is hurting his draft stock by not working out for any team ahead of the draft.
As Jonathan Givony reported, the 76ers are still interested in drafting the Rutgers star despite him backing out from a pre-draft workout with the team.
However, this begs the question of what led to this decision. Well, ESPN Radio’s Jason Dumas had an answer.
“Source: Ace Bailey was seeking a promise from the Sixers prior to committing to a meeting. That meeting appears to be unlikely now,” Dumas wrote on X.
He added: “As I reported on Friday, there has been a lot of posturing for weeks now with the Sixers unsuccessfully making attempts to get Ace in the building.”
It’s one thing to be confident in your skills; it’s an entirely different thing to lose the trust of NBA teams even before getting drafted to the league.
As things stand right now, Bailey is doing the latter, and it wouldn’t be a surprise if he falls outside the top-five picks.
