15
Sep
Imports Ranked
'Boomer Bryce' just rewrote the entire pecking order
Cole Anthony, Kendric Davis and Skyar Mays. Photos: Getty Images
Highlights
Bryce Cotton is Australian now, so the NBL27 import rankings open with an entirely different star.
- Bryce Cotton is a naturalised Australian and no longer counts as an import
- Cole Anthony and Kendric Davis lead the countdown from 26 to 1
- Tyler Harvey is also out of the rankings on citizenship grounds
Adelaide 36ers superstar Bryce Cotton's pledge to the Australian flag has turned the Top Imports of NBL27 Rankings into a whole new ball game – literally and figuratively.
The six-time MVP is now a naturalised Australian, and this list is for Imports Only, which also means Tyler Harvey is a non-starter.
Kendric Davis, 27, would have been a lock for the top spot until NBA point guard Cole Anthony, 26, took a detour to Melbourne via Milwaukee in what is more than likely a gap year.
The two Americans lead one of the strongest import classes in NBL history – 26 in all.
More than half (14) have logged NBA minutes in 1,813 NBA games with 51 teams.
More than 100 NBA Games
- Torrey Craig – 458 games (eight teams)
- Brandon Knight – 451 games (nine teams)
- Cole Anthony – 355 games (six teams)
- John Jenkins – 171 games (six teams)
- Skylar Mays – 105 games (four teams)
- Dylan Windler – 101 games (four teams)
Anthony, the son of former New York Knicks point guard Greg Anthony, arrives at Melbourne United entering his prime. He is the league's most “now-credentialled” import. Anthony has turned the MVP race into a three-player showdown between him, Cotton and Davis.
But is it enough to dethrone a two-time MVP runner-up, NBL26 champion and Grand Final MVP?
Below Cotton and Anthony is a logjam of elite talent. We know what we’re going to get from Parker Jackson-Cartwright and Kristian Doolittle, but don’t sleep on South East Melbourne Phoenix point guard Skylar Mays, Illawarra Hawks forward Kelan Martin, and Brisbane Bullets point guard Arnas Velicka.
The most important evolution of clubs signing imports is now about role and fit, not instant “superstar,” and it’s changed the dynamic, profile and calibre.
New Melbourne United head coach Jacob Chance summed it up best before landing on Anthony.
“As long as I’ve been in the NBL, imports can really make or break your season,” Chance said.
“I’ve been really lucky to bring in great imports throughout my time in the NBL, so that’s priority number one for us: trying to find people who fit the values of our club and our team.
“There are a lot of those guys around.
“Then it’s about how they fit tactically on the floor. We need two perimeter players and a big – we’re pretty open about that.
“Exactly what those guys look like may change a little bit. We need someone who can score the ball and help us offensively. Maybe the other perimeter guy offsets that. Do we get a scoring shooting guard and then a defending point guard, or vice versa? That’s a good challenge for us.”
This is the pre-season Top Imports Ranking, counting down from 26 to 1.
Every NBL27 import, ranked 26 to 1
| # | Player (price) | Club | Depth | SC pos | Last club | League | NBL | NBA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26 | Dakota Mathias ($145,200) | Tasmania JackJumpersTAS | SG | GRD | Brisbane BulletsBRI | NBL | 14.0 (8) | 14 (2) |
| 25 | John Jenkins ($152,100) | Adelaide 36ersADL | SG | GRD | Adelaide 36ersADL | NBL | 14.7 (9) | 171 (6) |
| 24 | Darius Days ($277,000) | Illawarra HawksILL | PF | FWD/CTR | San-en NeoPhoenix | B.League | – | 4 (1) |
| 23 | David Johnson ($232,900) | Tasmania JackJumpersTAS | SG | FWD/GRD | Tasmania JackJumpersTAS | NBL | 22.4 (22) | 2 (1) |
| 22 | Nick Rakocevic ($188,400) | Adelaide 36ersADL | PF | FWD/CTR | Adelaide 36ersADL | NBL | 18.2 (30) | 0 |
| 21 | Malique Lewis ($207,900) | Cairns TaipansCNS | SF | FWD | South East Melbourne PhoenixSEM | NBL | 20.0 (25) | 0 |
| 20 | Josiah-Jordan James ($277,000) | New Zealand BreakersNZL | SF | FWD | Hapoel Jerusalem | Israeli Premier League | – | 0 |
| 19 | Yannis Morin ($277,000) | South East Melbourne PhoenixSEM | PF | FWD/CTR | Toyama Grouses | B.League | – | 0 |
| 18 | Charles Bediako ($277,000) | New Zealand BreakersNZL | C | CTR | Motor City Cruise | NBA G League | – | 0 |
| 17 | Nate Hinton ($277,000) | Brisbane BulletsBRI | SF | FWD/GRD | Memphis Hustle | NBA G League | – | 38 (3) |
| 16 | Jaylon Brown ($277,000) | Cairns TaipansCNS | PG | GRD | Petkim Spor | Turkish BSL | – | 0 |
| 15 | Jaylin Williams ($277,000) | Brisbane BulletsBRI | PF | FWD | Stockton Kings | NBA G League | – | 0 |
| 14 | Dylan Windler ($271,100) | Perth WildcatsPER | SF | FWD/GRD | Perth WildcatsPER | NBL | 26.1 (29) | 101 (4) |
| 13 | D'Shawn Schwartz ($277,000) | South East Melbourne PhoenixSEM | SF | FWD | Rostock Seawolves | BBL | – | 0 |
| 12 | Josh Oduro ($277,000) | Melbourne UnitedMEL | PF | FWD/CTR | New Orleans Pelicans | NBA | – | 3 (1) |
| 11 | Brandon Knight (no price yet) | Perth WildcatsPER | PG | – | Mets de Guaynabo | BSN | – | 451 (9) |
| 10 | Milton Doyle ($274,700) | Illawarra HawksILL | PG | GRD | Melbourne UnitedMEL | NBL | 26.5 (33) | 10 (1) |
| 9 | Torrey Craig ($290,400) | Sydney KingsSYD | SF | FWD | Sydney KingsSYD | NBL | 28.0 (8) | 458 (8) |
| 8 | Arnas Velicka ($277,000) | Brisbane BulletsBRI | PG | GRD | Neptunas Klaipeda | LKL | – | 0 |
| 7 | Kelan Martin ($277,000) | Illawarra HawksILL | PF | FWD | UCAM Murcia | Liga ACB | – | 96 (3) |
| 6 | Skylar Mays ($277,000) | South East Melbourne PhoenixSEM | PG | GRD | KK Buducnost | ABA League | – | 105 (4) |
| 5 | Zylan Cheatham ($339,500) | Adelaide 36ersADL | PF | FWD | Adelaide 36ersADL | NBL | 32.7 (33) | 5 (2) |
| 4 | Kristian Doolittle ($317,500) | Perth WildcatsPER | PF | FWD | Perth WildcatsPER | NBL | 30.6 (33) | 0 |
| 3 | Parker Jackson-Cartwright ($405,200) | New Zealand BreakersNZL | PG | GRD | New Zealand BreakersNZL | NBL | 39.1 (33) | 0 |
| 2 | Cole Anthony ($300,000) | Melbourne UnitedMEL | PG | GRD | Milwaukee Bucks | NBA | – | 355 (6) |
| 1 | Kendric Davis ($436,000) | Sydney KingsSYD | PG | GRD | Sydney KingsSYD | NBL | 42.0 (33) | 0 |
4 of the league’s 30 import places are still open, all at Cairns Taipans, Melbourne United, Sydney Kings and Tasmania JackJumpers. Every other club is full, so a mid-season import signing can only come from those clubs.
14 of the 26 have played in the NBA and 12 have not. Torrey Craig leads on 458 games, then Brandon Knight on 451. 12 of the 26 played in the NBL last season, so 14 are new to the league.
Twelve of these players are priced at exactly $277,000, the starting price for a player with no NBL record. Pedigree does not move it: Cole Anthony arrives with 355 NBA games and is priced within $23,000 of a first-year import.
How to read this table
Every player here is an import, taken from our own depth-chart marker, which is checked against a source for each player rather than inferred from where someone was born. Development players, Next Stars and nominated replacement players are deliberately not on this list.
Depth is the column the player occupies on our projected depth chart – PG point guard, SG shooting guard, SF small forward, PF power forward, C centre – which is our reading and not the club’s named five. SC pos is the position SuperCoach lists, and the two disagree often enough to be worth showing side by side.
Avg and Games are the player’s 2025-26 NBL season. A dash in them means the player did not appear in the NBL last season. It does not mean they averaged nothing. Seventeen of the players here have no NBL record at all.
NBA games is career regular-season appearances. A zero means the player has never appeared in an NBA regular-season game, which is different from a dash, and both are stated rather than left blank. Several of the players on nought held NBA contracts without playing: Kendric Davis at Golden State, Charles Bediako on a two-way at San Antonio, Yannis Morin at Oklahoma City and Jaylin Williams on Exhibit-10 deals at Denver and Sacramento.
2025-26 club is where the player spent last season. Eight of them changed clubs during it and the column shows where they played the bulk of the year: Dakota Mathias, John Jenkins, Darius Days, Yannis Morin, Charles Bediako, Jaylon Brown, Milton Doyle, Kelan Martin. Kelan Martin is shown at UCAM Murcia, which is confirmed from January 2026, but no source records a club for the first half of his season.
NBA careers and last-season clubs were checked player by player against two sources each, with identity confirmed on college, height or date of birth rather than on the name. That is not over-caution: two different players called Jaylin Williams and two called David Johnson appear in the same databases, and the NBL27 import in each pair is not the one with the longer NBA career.
Prices are SuperCoach NBL starting prices, taken from the SuperCoach register on 2026-08-31. Each player’s price sits inside their link so it updates once the season is running.
Ranked 26 to 1, counting down to the number one import. The ranking is basketball.com.au's and is editorial; it is not derived from price or from any statistic in this table.
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