Playing behind DeMarcus Cousins on a deep and talented Kentucky team, Daniel Orton is one of the closest things to Swen Nater that we have seen in several seasons. Nater played behind Bill Walton at UCLA, but became the ABA Rookie of the Year in 1974 and even led the NBA in rebounding during the 79-80 season.

But Cousins is certainly not Walton and Orton is probably not Nater, but the comparison is too obvious not to at least mention.

Orton is a big-bodied big man, though he is a little short to be a true center, even his game is best suited for that position. He is far from special athletically, but is plenty agile and that bigger build will benefit him.

Sometimes Orton lacked the explosion to cleanly finish some of the lobs from John Wall that were great looks, but requite a little extra athleticism. Those were lobs that Cousins was able to lift for, but Orton finishes the easy lobs with ease. Orton's problems missing dunks were a somewhat chronic problem, but I think he'll sort that out in times as he improves his fitness and strength.

Orton's game is more below the rim and when he seals his man in the halfcourt, he is impossible to contain. He still needs to be more consistently conscious of this part of his game, which maximizes his size.

Orton moves well into open space ahead of shot attempts and also dribble penetration. Because of this sense of where he is on the floor, Orton creates a wealth of open looks and offensive rebounds for himself.

At Kentucky, Orton often trailed the play in early offense and has excellent instincts on where to flash and get into space.

He has good hands on the catch and is extremely quick to the rim when he has space. Orton gets to the rim with relative ease and frequency in the halfcourt.

Orton makes himself a big target for post entry passes and has a good array of post moves, though he certainly has room for improvement here. He has a nice little baby hook out of the left block going into the paint and has shown enough to make you believe he has a good enough shot to hit 10-footers out of a reverse pivot in the mid-post.

He has strong shot mechanics on his jumper for a big his size and age. It is a smooth clean shot that he'll try to extend out to 20-feet on occasion, though that is beyond his range at this point. He shot just 52.4% from the line, but I expect that number to eventually to nudge up to the high 60s, low 70s.

He also is capable of hitting a turnaround jumper from the free throw line and a fadeaway out of the post.

Orton sometimes doesn't lift enough over his defender in the post, something that will be even more of a problem against NBA competition. Furthermore, Orton's misses in the post are typically flat.

He is best suited for a halfcourt offense and should develop into a valuable pick and pop, pick and roll player. He sets a huge screen, but needs to develop better footwork when rolling to the bucket. Orton will flip all the way around instead of pivoting open to the dribbler.

As a passer, Orton undoubtedly struggles. He will sometimes be far too ambitious with his outlet passes after defensive rebounds, leading to passes that go into the second row or to the other team. Some of his passes, unfortunately, are laughably bad in judgment.

Defensively, Orton uses every bit of his length, maximizing his reach to get his block hand as high as possible.

Unlike Cousins, Orton does a fairly good job defending post players one-on-one and also has a good understanding of where to be in help defense.

I really like Orton as a shotblocker, both for what he is already and also the kind of player he can develop into in this facet of his game. With that said, however, Orton is way too eager of a jumper. He is extremely vulnerable to the up and under with how easily he is baited to challenge shots. I like the aggressiveness and he'll get his fair share of on-ball blocks in the post in addition to those that come naturally in help defense.

Orton has decent baseline to baseline speed given his size and his lateral movement is also good, but when he closes out on a shooter on the perimeter, he is slow to stop and change directions. This directional change quickness is something he will only be able to improve incrementally.

He is undoubtedly a good defensive rebounder and takes up a lot of space, but he doesn't always attack the glass. He'll sometimes get in the habit of floating out into transition, which is an especially egregious cardinal sin for Orton since he isn't the type of player that really gets up and down the floor in that way.

Orton has excellent intangibles, particularly in comparison to Cousins. He is receptive to instruction and will certainly work hard to improve, which is certainly a necessary requirement given how far away he is from being a legitimate contributor in the NBA.

Chris Reina is the executive editor of RealGM. Follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/cr_reina.