1995 Expansion Draft - Grizzlies/Raptors

[mcgillicutty]

Were there any players that were unprotected and overlooked during the Expansion Draft of 1995?

Rex Chapman, Ron Harper, Doug Christie ,Sedale Threatt, Willie Anderson, Dale Ellis, Reggie Williams, and Stacey King were unprotected and not chosen in the draft.

I have rummaged through the internet and have not been able to find a list of unprotected players during that time, so I can understand the degree of difficulty in choosing potential picks.

[Jase]

http://www.nba.com/history/expansion_drafts.html

[loserX]

The formatting is awful, but the full unprotected lists are here:

http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1995-0 ... -vancouver

As you can see, there weren't really a lot of gems to pass over. (IIRC, Toronto and Vancouver also had salary caps that were less than 100% of every other team's cap, expressly to prevent them from getting too good too quickly! So they had to be judicious about how they allocated their money.)

[Prospect Dong]

How about the `cats? Strikes me they did pretty well, given what was available, but they made a couple of deals for expansion draft picks that they probably should have kept - Zaza and Varejo, off the top of my head. They got Wallace, who everyone thought was the best guy available, and he turned out to be pretty great.

The real screw up was not trading up for Williams/Paul when they had #5 and another late lotto pick.

[chrbal]

Varejao wasn't unprotected. Cleveland offered up compensation for Charlotte not to take Kapono, but Charlotte took him. Cleveland had Kevin Ollie, Ira Newble, Ruben Boujmte-Boujmte, and Kapono unprotected.

Charlotte had a limited cap, there wasn't really any gems that they passed on.

Mostly there was;
a-overpriced veterans
b-expiring contract players that either were done or just about
c-inexperienced players who deserved a shot
d-inexperienced players who didn't belong in the nba
e-"hey we'll give you a draft pick if you take that guy and trade him to us".

they dipped into b, c and e...but they put too much focus on d. It seemed like to help out player agents more then themselves.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=1345047

That list is largely correct. But detroit protected Elden Campbell, Knicks protected Allan Houston, Raptors protected Jalen Rose, and the Lakers protected Derek Fisher. The Spurs declined Charlie Wards' team option after the list became public knowledge because Ward didn't want to play for the Bobcats.

The Bobcats could've focused more on a youth movement, but there was no reason to pick up a bunch of vets.

[Scoot McGroot]

How about the `cats? Strikes me they did pretty well, given what was available, but they made a couple of deals for expansion draft picks that they probably should have kept - Zaza and Varejo, off the top of my head.

Are you confusing Varejao with Sasha Pavlovic, whom the Bobcats did pick, but traded to Cleveland after the expansion draft?

[Prospect Dong]

How about the `cats? Strikes me they did pretty well, given what was available, but they made a couple of deals for expansion draft picks that they probably should have kept - Zaza and Varejo, off the top of my head.

Are you confusing Varejao with Sasha Pavlovic, whom the Bobcats did pick, but traded to Cleveland after the expansion draft?

Yep, looks like I was, thanks.

I checked, and Varejao was traded to the cavs directly, in a completely mystifying deal, then as now:

Varejão was selected by the Orlando Magic in the second round of the 2004 NBA Draft, 30th overall. On July 23, 2004,[citation needed] the Magic traded him along with Drew Gooden and Steven Hunter to the Cleveland Cavaliers, in exchange for Tony Battie and two future second-round picks.

Ouch.