The NBA is more than just scoring. Points aren’t everything. The NBA is about role players, too.

With Julian Wright hours away from becoming Kansas University’s ninth first-round NBA draft choice in the last decade, think Greg Ostertag, Scot Pollard and Jacque Vaughn.

Scouts say Wright’s most glaring weakness is an inability to manufacture points, but that’s what they said about Ostertag, Pollard and Vaughn, too.

Even though he couldn’t shoot his way out of a paper bag, Ostertag lasted 11 years in the NBA because he stood 7-foot-2 and was a gifted shot blocker. Ostertag averaged a piddling 4.2 points a game over his pro career after hearing his name called with the 28th pick in the 1995 NBA Draft.

Pollard was just as offensively challenged as Ostertag and was three inches shorter, yet Pollard was drafted nine slots higher than Ostertag two years later. Pollard has survived nine NBA seasons with a 4.5 career scoring average because he can run, muscle inside and distract opponents with his wacky hairdos.

Then there’s Vaughn. A 6-1 guard with shaky shooting skills, Vaughn was taken eight picks after Pollard in the ’97 draft and he, too, just finished his ninth pro season – with an NBA Championship ring to boot. How has Vaughn lasted so long with only a 4.6 career scoring average? By understanding and accepting his strengths, and by adopting the mentality of a back-up player.

How Wright’s career will unfold nobody knows, of course, but he does appear to possess enough secondary skills – notably athleticism, determination and citizenship – to fashion a lucrative nine- or 10-year pro career. Or perhaps even longer because of his youth.

Ostertag, Pollard and Vaughn all played the maximum four years in college while Wright is departing after just two years in a KU uniform. Looking at it another way, by leaving school Wright has added two years of earning power in a business where careers are defined by age-induced body deterioration.

Eight former Jayhawks played in the NBA last season, and the only one who made less than $1 million was Wayne Simien, and he was very close at $932,760. Paul Pierce made a stunning $15.1 million. Raef LaFrentz pocketed $11.5 million. Drew Gooden raked in $6.6 million.

Will Wright’s NBA salary ever climb into the double-digit million-dollar category? Probably not, but if he lands in the right situation, he might reach that lofty monetary plateau.

LaFrentz, for example, is one of the NBA’s most overpaid players based on his career production because he was fortunate enough to secure an overblown contract while with the Dallas Mavericks. In the NBA, sometimes it isn’t so much about how good you are, but where you are.

Still, when it comes to the NBA’s instant wealth, there really isn’t a bad place to start.