Draft Winners & Losers (Then & Now) w/ Warriors & Knicks
Aug 5, 2015 18:54:33 GMT -6
London and Portland like this
Post by New York on Aug 5, 2015 18:54:33 GMT -6
Hindsight is always an interesting thing but never more so than when you are looking at the ABCA draft. Immediately following the draft, you evaluate what took place and pinpoint your bust, steals, projects, reaches, winners, losers, no-brainers and whatever other labels you can think of. Then once a season or so passes those labels get passed on to different players from that draft. Why? There are plenty of reasons but the most obvious is the fact that training camp can change a player in the snap of a finger. So in this article, San Francisco and I teamed together to evaluate the winners and losers of this draft. The catch is that San Francisco evaluated the draft immediately after it took place and I am evaluating it now after a training camp and 6+ sims.
So with that out of the way let’s kick things off with the team’s that San Francisco deemed winners at the time of the draft and my views on them now.
DRAFT WINNERS
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
Yes, the made a curious move a curious move but they turned around and flipped him for similar level assets as they gave up as Indiana will be aging by the time that pick is due. In the draft they got Leandro Barbosa and Kwame Brown at picks 18 and 20 respectively and spent a 2nd round pick on Dan Gadzuric. Barbosa is an interesting athlete and offensive talent who will have to improve defensively to get heavy minutes long term. Brown is a nice young big who projects as a solid interior defender and rebounder. With some tc luck he could turn into a solid starter. Gadzuric represents one my favorite 2nd round picks, yes he is very raw, but he has the potential to be a difference maker as a starter center. He is the type of gamble you should take a rebuilding team. The team also flipped a few assets that they will not need or rely on future 2nds, adding more young assets to the equation longterm. No homeruns in this draft but a solid rebuilding effort that could pay off long term.
NOW (NEW YORK)
So this looked like a pretty solid draft in my eyes for Milan at the time of the draft. However looking at this now, I’d probably have to take them out of the winners category personally. Leandro Barbosa had the potential to be a nice guard piece for this team as he developed specifically on the offensive end. But a lot of the potential he had has disappeared on both ends of the floor and he looks like a guy that may make a few rosters but won’t get much playing time now. Before he had solid B potential in all offensive areas and a B PRD potential now a few of those have dropped to C potential including his PRD which hurts the possibility of him being anything more than a bench body a lot. Kwame Brown I still like as he is a project big man that Milan will have to be patient with but could definitely be something down the line as the team is moving away from it’s current era. Dan Gadzuric is now in San Miguel as a throw in piece to get Darrell Griffith and as I have mentioned before I wasn’t a big fan of him in the 2nd round because we rarely see super raw guys become anything. So basically right now after training camp, the success of this draft rests on the shoulders of Kwame Brown and while I like Kwame he isn’t enough to keep him in this spot. This team had a successful off-season with the additions of Kevin McHale, Damon Stoudemire, Kwame Brown, Darrell Griffith, Wayman Tisdale and other pieces i’m sure i’m missing but in hindsight the draft wasn’t as solid for them as we initially thought.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
Fresh off the title, the Champs traded aging franchise cornerstone Otis Birdsong to Beijing for the 14th pick in the draft and Detroit’s first next year. The team used the pick on SF Danny Granger who looks like a very nice potential wing scorer for the team. At pick 27, the team selected a defensive stalwart in guard Tony Allen. Yes his offensive abilities are suspect, but players who can make life miserable for the opposition always have a chance to make your rotation. The team had 2 2nd round picks and came away with Nikoloz Tskitishvili and Carlos Delfino. Both are projects with some holes in their games, but they were solid value picks with upside and in the 2nd round that is a good thing.
NOW (NEW YORK)
I won’t go too in depth about my own team but I think the Knicks deserve to stayy in the winners category. Nikoloz Tskitishvili busted but Carlos Delfino survived and could be a depth piece far down the line. But the biggest thing is Danny Granger looks like a contributor already on the offensive side and Tony Allen looks better than he did when drafted. Neither star players but they were mid-late round picks and if the Knicks snagged two rotation guys then I think it’s fair to call them winners still.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
The Lakers headed into the draft armed with the 24th pick in the draft. They turned that pick into Darrall Imhoff and Gus Williams, to vets that will contribute heavily to the team moving forward, including a sorely needed quality starting PG in Williams. The team then flipped recently acquired Mark Aquirre to Belgrade for the rights to Andre Iguodala who was selected 7th overall, Ricky Davis and a future first. Iggy seems like a perfect fit next to Harper as a pair of athletic wings who could wreak havoc defensively in a couple of year. All in all an excellent draft sees a perennial threat get stronger and deeper.
NOW (NEW YORK)
Everything that San Francisco mentioned after the draft still holds up for the Lakers. They turned the 24th pick into Gus Williams who is a starter for them still and Darall Imhoff who while not a starter is currently the third most important player on the team according to the Value Added statistic. Andre Iguodala hasn’t really gotten a chance to play much this year so we haven’t seen if he is worthy of that #8 spot or Mark Aguirre but when we have seen him he has shown flashes of the potential Los Angeles saw. I’d say putting yourself in a better position to win now and adding a future starter on a cost effective contract still classifies as a win.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
Similar to Milan, the team made a bit of a head scratching moving trading previous young franchise cornerstone Kobe Bryant to the Bulls in a pre draft deal. The team ended up adding 4 rookies in Dwight Howard, Amare Stoudamire, DeJuan Wagner and Boris Diaw. Howard and Amare are complimentary posts that project as a fearsome front line down the road. Adding them allowed the team to trade Big Z to Toronto for talented SF Joe Johnson who should replace Kobe offensively long term. Wagner was a nice go big or go home pick at 12. Yes, there were sure things but Wagner is a good TC and/or a jump away from being a pretty unique guard, especially offensively. If he hits Philly will be a dangerous team quickly. Boris Diaw is a decent 2nd round pick. Philly added 4 potential starters via the draft and once they add a young PG to run the show they should be in fine shape moving forward.
NOW (NEW YORK)
Boris Diaw is not very good. DeJuan Wagner looks like he will need to grow and/or jump to be a starter in ABCA. Okay now the negatives are out of the way, lets talk about why this team is still a winner and arguably even more of a winner than originally thought. Dwight Howard has not lit the world on fire with his PPG numbers and to some that may make him look unimpressive but what I see is a guy that is shooting 59% from the field as a rookie and PER 36 is averaging 14 PPG | 9 RPG | 2 APG | 2 BPG. He may not develop into a star but he’s going to be a heck of a starter in this league. Joe Johnson has looked a lot better than he did in his rookie season. Much like Dwight his numbers are not staggering or anything but he is up from 36% shooting to nearly 47% while averaging 14 PPG | 3.4 RPG | 2.8 SPG in just 27 MPG. Still not looking like he’ll be much defensively but this offensive talent is there and pairing him with a strong defensive guard can help mask his weakness on D. But now the biggest reason why the 76ers look like winners is Amare Stoudemire and I hate to say I told you so….but I told you so. Even Philly didn’t seem sold on the guy at first as he brought him off the bench in sim one but he’s averaging basically 22 PPG | 7 RPG on 60.4% in only 31 MPG in his rookie season! Unless he gets hit with a TC drop you are looking at a guy that will be a 25+ PPG scorer from the PF position. Does he have holes? yes. But Philly likely found their #1 scorer here at #4 in the draft and that’s more than you can really ask for.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
The Warriors packaged up Shawn Marion and a bunch of picks this year for John Stockton. Anytime you can add an elite PG you are doing well and a core of Stockton, Sampson (assuming he re-signs) and Scott should be a strong contender moving forward. Bottom line they made the biggest impact move this off season to date and used a plethora of draft picks this year to do so.
NOW (NEW YORK)
They added Stockton, who in my mind is the 2nd best player in the league for Shawn Marion who I like but still hasn’t found his footing as a starter in our league, Caroon Butler who I liked at draft time but have soured on since then, Chris Kaman, Luol Deng another one I soured on, Drew Gooden, and Jason Terry. This package didn’t look great at the time that it happened and if i’m being honest it looks less impressive now for the #2 guy in the league. Adding Stockton has given the Warriors new life and put them as the favorites to win a title while Berlin was headed for a disaster season before getting his pick back. Warriors are definitely a winner still.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
A one pick draft and they are winners? Well picking up SF James Posey in the mid 20s represents a great value pick for the Sonics and a player who should fit in as a guy who can defend all over the floor. Posey will need to work on his offensive game but represents great value and the reason the Sonics stay at or near the top in the West year after year.
NOW (NEW YORK)
We have got to see next to nothing of Posey since the season started but he still looks like he has the potential to be a starting caliber SF in my eyes. If the GMs that were at the live draft remember I said my two top players when my pick was getting close were Tony Allen and James Posey and it’d be a hard decision for me to choose from. But Seattle made my choice for me and grabbed Posey. Like San Francisco said this was a value pick and while Posey hasn’t shown anything this year I think the value in adding him was alway in what he could be in the long term. Seattle can stay in the winner spot.
DRAFT LOSERS
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
Ring wielding GM returns and starts making moves. The questions is are they the right one. It is no secret that change was coming to Buenos Aires but I am a little surprised by the deals that they did this, trading two starters for the 24th pick and then passing on better looking wing prospects to take corner three, non athlete Mike Dunleavy. Don’t get me wrong, Dunleavy probably has a role in the league for a long time, just don’t see him as a long term starter without some serious TC love.
NOW (NEW YORK)
Buenos Aires is an interesting one for me. I remember San Fran and I were going back and forth with whether they were a loser in this draft or not. Seeing Imhoff and Gus fill in for the Lakers you wonder if they could’ve gotten more out of LA (maybe Eddy Curry, who knows). As for their actual picks I think they were hot and cold. Mike Dunleavy is a guy I just praised in my recent article and say what you will about his ratings, he’s producing. What is his long term role? I don’t know but he’s been the team’s most productive player not named Anthony Mason or Larry Bird. Jason Terry on the other hand has been worse than I thought he’d be and maybe that’s because he needs to fill out but he has definitely been less than impressive so far. Chris Kaman we don’t know what he is going to be because he isn’t really playing much for his team. I wasn’t a big fan of him though at the draft and I still can’t say I am but he’s okay. So to recap, I didn’t really like the value of the Imhoff+Gus deal, i’ve been impressed with Dunleavy, i’ve been disappointed in Terry, and Kaman i’m pretty neutral on. If there was some type of middle ground i’d move them there but I don’t think they did enough to move all the way upp to winner so i’ll stick with San Fran here.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
The Celtics got themselves into a bit of a cap jam and needing to re-sign Toni Kukoc they ended up overpaying to ship out some contracts and gave away their late lotto pick in the process. This felt like a team that needed to add another young piece or two to make a leap into playoff contention and that won’t happen this year after dealing their first and adding Rasho Nesterovic in the 2nd round. They came out of the draft with no impact players or additions to bolster a young core that shows promise.
NOW (NEW YORK)
The Boston Celtics once again look like they’ll be on the outside looking in this year after trading their first round pick (#14) + Mo Cheeks for Andre Miller for cap reasons. The irony of that is that Mo Cheeks was traded to Boston for the 14th pick in the draft before this one. So Mo Cheeks cost Boston 2 lotto pick. I can’t find a reason to take Boston out of the draft day loser category because they got no real value out of a lotto pick that eventually played a big role in landing Otis Birdsong (who say what you will about his decline but Birdsong would upgrade the Boston backcourt). But back to Boston, the pick trading is becoming a worrying trend when you realize that since drafting Chris Webber in 2025 they have traded 3 lotto picks along with their pick this year which is a likely lotto pick and what they have to show for it is Kenny Anderson, Michael Finley, Jerry Lucas, Gerald Wallace and maybe a small piece or two that I am missing. So yeah I have to keep Boston in the draft loser section but i’m still hopeful that they will figure out how to put it together because Webber and Kukoc could really be something.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
Detroit is really high on Nene. They passed on a lot of prospects that many other teams had a lot higher on the board to add him. Without their first next year, reaching for a big man who many worry about his ability to control the defensive glass was a bit of a curveball. Detroit is adamant that this is the right pick and added another solid big in the 2nd round in Theo Ratliff, but I don’t see either pick moving the needle for a franchise that seems stuck in the mud at the moment.
NOW (NEW YORK)
Detroit was a big reason we decided to revisit this article. Nene was for the most part looked at as a reach around draft time. One Training Camp later and he looks like a pretty good pick up for Detroit. So far Nene has been the best rebounder in this draft, the fourth highest scorer, and 2nd highest shot blocker. Not to mention that the only player below him that has a higher VA this year is Mike Dunleavy and we talked about him already. He’s at minimum a long term rotation player for the Pistons and more than likely they’ve landed a starter. No question about it, Detroit moves out of the loser column and into the draft winners column.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
Robert Swift is an interesting young project bigman. But Indiana left bigger needs and better players in the green room to take him. Then the team traded a future pick for Kareem Abdul Jabbar who is a great center but is aging and neither he nor Shaq really look equipped to play PF. The team then drafted another big in Chris Wilcox in the 2nd round so apparently that is all they do is draft bigs. So a bit of a head scratcher in Indiana so far, time will tell how this plays out but for now gotta put them down as one of the losers in the draft.
NOW (NEW YORK)
I think everyone was surprised by the Robert Swift pick even Indiana. He hasn’t gotten the chance to play and i’m almost positive if they had a chance to do this over they’d have at least 4-5 guys in front of him including especially since this was going to be a project pick. If you were taking someone that would play down the line then James Posey, Tony Allen, Mike Dunleavy, Josh Howard, Ben Gordon and probably a handful of other names would’ve been higher on their draft list. They’ve done well with their team since the draft but this is still one thing they whiffed on recently.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
For years SMB was simply missing either a SG or SF to fill out a stacked roster and become the title team that everybody knew they were capable of. Consecutive off seasons have seen them trade a top 3 center (Ewing) and now a top 3 PG (Stockton). They added two talented wings in moving Stockton in Darwin Cook and Vince Carter and then in the draft took another wing in Ben Gordon. Gordon was solid value in the late first, but now this is a team without a PG and I am not sure how good the rest of their roster is without an elite PG. Lots of talent in SMB but not sure what to make of the team moving forward.
NOW (NEW YORK)
If the Stockton draft deal covers San Fran, Berlin and Beermen then that definitely already started Beermen out in the hole. However that trade technically didn’t involve any draft picks on the Beermen side of things so i’m going to ignore it for this portion of the article. The Ben Gordon pick I wasn’t a huge fan of but it wasn’t a bad pick. I personally preferred TJ Ford and Josh Howard over him at that point but it’s personal preference. What I did like though was Beermen taking that solid at best pick and turning it into Jo Jo White to fill the gap that was left by Stockton. Plus in that deal they added Michael Olowokandi who despite being the butt of a few jokes in ABCA actually has respectable potential. We praised LA for turning a late pick into Imhoff and Gus but Beermen turned an even later pick into Jo Jo White and that takes them out of the loser category for me and into the winner category.
THEN (SAN FRANCISCO)
Maccabi had a ton of picks and came out of the draft with an understandable but perhaps overwhelming collection of talent. Brandon Roy was a logical pick at 5 and if he hits will form a really interesting win combo with Ron Artest. After that things get questionable as I felt David Lee was a huge reach at 9 with his limited defense and scoring. With the bigs in this draft waiting to pick one up later, trading down or simply reaching for a more well-rounded big would have made more sense to me. They followed that pick up with Kendrick Perkins at pick 30, which isn’t a bad value and between Perk and Lee they should have one starting quality big. In the 2nd round they took another post in Nened Krstic. This is a team loaded with young talent, I think after Roy I would have stuck with the BPA motto for the rest of the night and worried about positions later. Adding higher upside wings to a wing heavy team would have made more sense in my opinion. Not a horrible draft, just not sure the team made any progress from it.
NOW (NEW YORK)
I do not remember if I had Maccabi as a loser post draft but I do remember not liking the David Lee pick so lets focus on that. I still don’t think David Lee was the right pick or even the right big man to pick if you were going that direction. Like I talked about above Nene wasn’t looked at as a great pick originally but I am on record saying that of the two big men I liked Nene more and that was before he jumped in TC. Leaving Caron Butler and Luol Deng on the board doesn’t look as bad now but at the time it seemed strange even with the Artest - Roy duo. But then you have Danny Granger who survived TC and i’d argue is a better prospect. So the David Lee pick doesn’t look as bad now but it still isn’t the right one in my eyes especially if you factor in Nene’s improvement. So while I don’t hate the draft Maccabi had since you can’t with them landing Roy, I think there other picks may have hurt them.
