Yes the talent pool is diluted right now...the same thing can be said of baseball and football. It just goes to figure that if you add more teams you don't automatically get the talent to fill out the roster spots on those teams so back in the day you would get teams with legends like: Magic, Jabaar, Worthy or Bird, McHale, Parrish. Do you think that Milwaukee, Toronto, Charlotte, Memphis, Sacramento, the LA Clippers, and Oklahoma City have quality rosters? They have 1-3 quality players but all together they have nothing.

Sure Kobe, Lebron, D-Wade, and most importantly the Big 3 (a TEAM) have grown the game a little since The Depression Era (the Post MJ, Bird, Magic era) and it's better than that but to outright compare any of the current players to the legends in anything other than describing a playing style is ape shit crazy. People can say Kobe plays LIKE Jordan and I am fine with that but people saying Kobe is as good or better than Jordan are just out of their God damn minds!

I don't get your question about the high schooler who went pro...I know there have been high schoolers before who have gone pro and did very well without benefit of marketing Moses Malone and Darryl 'Chocolate Thunder' Dawkins (from the planet Lovetron) are two from way back that I can think of....but from 2000 on I am not sure, Kwame Brown maybe if you're thinking of a bust...Tracy McGrady if you're thinking of someone good.