20 Days Till Sixers: Jahlil Okafor And Nerlens Noel In Top 100 Of ESPN's #NBARank

Let me preface this by saying rankings don't matter whatsoever, but it is nice to see the young guns of the Philadelphia 76ers get a little recognition.

After most of the roster popped up in the bottom 200 of ESPN's annual NBA Rank, Jahlil Okafor and Nerlens Noel have finally been able to crack the top 100 best players in the league.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Six months ago <a href="https://twitter.com/JahlilOkafor">@JahlilOkafor</a> won a national championship with Duke. Today he clocks in at No. 90 on our <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/NBArank?src=hash">#NBArank</a>. <a href="http://t.co/lR5jn1hO0O">pic.twitter.com/lR5jn1hO0O</a></p>&mdash; NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) <a href="https://twitter.com/ESPNNBA/status/652098635845488640">October 8, 2015</a></blockquote>

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In comparison to others, Okafor was ranked above the likes of Brandon Knight, Trevor Ariza, and Kobe Bryant, and just below Tobias Harris and former Sixer Jrue Holiday. Fellow rookie D'Angelo Russell was ranked 109th, while top pick Karl-Anthony Towns has not seen his name selected in the countdown thus far.

Nerlens Noel has yet to be given an official rank as well, a good sign that ESPN is fairly recognizing what was a pretty historic rookie campaign. Going into last season, ESPN ranked Noel as the 102nd best player in the league.

Whether or not you agree with the rankings, people are starting to take note that Philadelphia has some legitimate fire power. Let's just hope it starts translating into victories.