2009 Draft... how does someone like Steph Curry fall to #7, and be the 3rd PG selected in his draft class??

[TheWhiteMamba]

Rubio was honestly a good pick at the time... Johnny Flynn was the wrong one...

[CobraCommander]

At every level people doubted that currys shooting would translate or carry over.


They saw him as an unatheletic shooter that would be neutralized by bigger faster longer wings and would be relegated to playing the role of in ‘in game’ spot up shooter with suspect defense....


If that’s the scouting report....he falls to 3rd point taken....they though he was Steve Kerr at best

[Alonzo_Morning]

The real question is why did Washington trade #5 to Minny, a day before the draft.

And how could no one top this.

Traded by the Washington Wizards (as a future 2009 1st round draft pick) with Oleksiy Pecherov, Darius Songaila and Etan Thomas to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Randy Foye and Mike Miller.

Pick 5 was just a throw in with those huge names

[shakes0]

Minnesota that’s how.

was coming here to post the same thing.

[Backcountry]

I guess a qualifying question would be: does Steph become the Steph we know if he is drafted by Minnesota?

[og15]

He should have gone a little higher, but like others have said, unless you don't understand hindsight, there was nothing suggesting he would be an all time great. Also Curry improved a lot after getting to the NBA.

[og15]

I guess a qualifying question would be: does Steph become the Steph we know if he is drafted by Minnesota?

Yes, his issue wouldn't be individual skill, it would be team success as it's hard to trust Minnesota based on history to put a championship level roster around him consistently.

At every level people doubted that currys shooting would translate or carry over.


They saw him as an unatheletic shooter that would be neutralized by bigger faster longer wings and would be relegated to playing the role of in ‘in game’ spot up shooter with suspect defense....


If that’s the scouting report....he falls to 3rd point taken....they though he was Steve Kerr at best

People weren't going to pick Steve Kerr in the lottery, he was already being compared to someone like Abdul Rauf, which is still calling him a 20 ppg NBA player, and 6'3 instead of 6'1, so an advantage there, but that is a long way from All Time great. No one was picking a projected "at best Steve Kerr" in the lottery, lol

[hippesthippo]

At the time, he was the fourth PG drafted. Tyreke Evans was a PG back then. Curry went to a small school so that was against him (name another NBA player from Davison). He was scrawny so definitely questions about durability (and his early ankle issues as a pro was why the Warriors had him on a very team friendly 4 year $41 million contract". No one projected him as great as he has become. The most inexplicable choice was drafting Johnny Flynn. The Warriors were set to trade the pick because they thought Curry wouldn't be available. Curry was expected top 6 I believe. It was a deep draft for point guards with some fans thinking they should have picked Brandon Jennings or Jrue Holiday.

Yeah, that was a great PG draft.

Tyreke, Harden, Rubio, Flynn, Curry, Brandon Jennings, Jru Holiday, Ty Lawson, Darren Collison, Roddy Beaubois, Toney Douglas, Sergio Llull (never played in NBA), Patrick Beverly, Patty Mills

Damn, that was basically a third of the league's starting PG's for a minute. Crazy.

[hippesthippo]

The real question is why did Washington trade #5 to Minny, a day before the draft.

And how could no one top this.

Traded by the Washington Wizards (as a future 2009 1st round draft pick) with Oleksiy Pecherov, Darius Songaila and Etan Thomas to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Randy Foye and Mike Miller.

Pick 5 was just a throw in with those huge names

You telling me the Wizards passed up on Curry for Randy Foye? Dang, that's pretty bad. I forgot how they got that pick.

[monopoman]

He was lucky he went to the Warriors they were the best situation for him by a landslide, while he is a great player people always fail to realize for a player to really maximize their potential and win championships it takes the right team. If he went to the Wolves he might have never been able to achieve the same things, or if he did it would have been later in his career.

[TravisScott55]

He had a lot of question marks before the draft. And he got into the NBA right as they took most of the physicality out of the game.

[HeatIn5]

At the time, he was the fourth PG drafted. Tyreke Evans was a PG back then. Curry went to a small school so that was against him (name another NBA player from Davison). He was scrawny so definitely questions about durability (and his early ankle issues as a pro was why the Warriors had him on a very team friendly 4 year $41 million contract". No one projected him as great as he has become. The most inexplicable choice was drafting Johnny Flynn. The Warriors were set to trade the pick because they thought Curry wouldn't be available. Curry was expected top 6 I believe. It was a deep draft for point guards with some fans thinking they should have picked Brandon Jennings or Jrue Holiday.

Yeah, that was a great PG draft.

Tyreke, Harden, Rubio, Flynn, Curry, Brandon Jennings, Jru Holiday, Ty Lawson, Darren Collison, Roddy Beaubois, Toney Douglas, Sergio Llull (never played in NBA), Patrick Beverly, Patty Mills

Still waiting for Roddy Beaubois to get some adequate playing time. Love that guy

[The Rebel]

The real question is why did Washington trade #5 to Minny, a day before the draft.

And how could no one top this.

Traded by the Washington Wizards (as a future 2009 1st round draft pick) with Oleksiy Pecherov, Darius Songaila and Etan Thomas to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Randy Foye and Mike Miller.

Mike Miller had some value at the time and cap space had a ton of value prior to the 2011 CBA. People forget that the league bought the now Pelicans for the debt they owed (basically a foreclosure) and Jordan bought the Hornets for $30 million in cash and assumption of the debt, teams were in real financial trouble and the salary floor was a lot lower percentage of the cap so teams with cap space didn't have to spend it.

I have ya one better, they drafted PG Rubio #5, PG Flynn #6, PG Ty Lawson #18 (ultimately traded for a future pick), and SG Ellington #28.

The Lawson deal was done before the draft and announced during the draft, it was no ultimately they never had any intention of keeping the pick.

[CobraCommander]

I guess a qualifying question would be: does Steph become the Steph we know if he is drafted by Minnesota?

Yes, his issue wouldn't be individual skill, it would be team success as it's hard to trust Minnesota based on history to put a championship level roster around him consistently.

At every level people doubted that currys shooting would translate or carry over.


They saw him as an unatheletic shooter that would be neutralized by bigger faster longer wings and would be relegated to playing the role of in ‘in game’ spot up shooter with suspect defense....


If that’s the scouting report....he falls to 3rd point taken....they though he was Steve Kerr at best

People weren't going to pick Steve Kerr in the lottery, he was already being compared to someone like Abdul Rauf, which is still calling him a 20 ppg NBA player, and 6'3 instead of 6'1, so an advantage there, but that is a long way from All Time great. No one was picking a projected "at best Steve Kerr" in the lottery, lol

The Steve Kerr part was clearly hyperbole- sorry should have used green type....

Just saying that they thought Curry was going fo be a shooter primarily and not a supersayian guard

Again my bad on even comparing Curry in draft with Kerr lol

[prophet_of_rage]

How does something like that happen?

Steph Curry is going to go down as a top 10 all-time talent. Revolutionized the sport. Incredible legacy. And he's not even finished.


How on earth is this man the 3rd Point Guard selected in his draft???


Was this just very poor draft scouting???

or does Steph Curry not get enough credit for working so hard???

History of ankle issues and lack of athleticism.

Sent from my SM-N970W using Tapatalk

[AbeVigodaLive]

Minnesota that’s how.

David Kahn is unquestionably one of the worst NBA decision-makers in NBA history. And a pompous fool.

And an ear wax eater.

Early in his tenure, he was caught on live tv digging his finger into his ear and then immediately putting that finger in his mouth. THAT's the exact kind of guy who'll build a franchise around TWO smaller PGs and choose Jonny Flynn >> Steph Curry.

[Wolveswin]

People also forget that he was trying to get to NY as well. His camp helped tank his position and scared off the Wolves. Thabeet was the only real reach (at the time) in the top 5, and they knew Rubio wasn’t coming over straight away.

They would have been better keeping Lawson (#18) & trading the 6 to NY who were super hot to get their hands on Curry. They could have gotten the #9 and a future pick. Then taking DeRozan at the 9, they would have had a solid backcourt for the future.

What Kahn should have done, and rumored at the time but better with hindsight, packaged 5+6 to move up to #2 or #3 for Harden. He still had #18 for a pure PG (Lawson).

Jefferson
Love (sophomore year)
Brewer
Harden
Lawson (Sessions as vet)

Plus Kahn still has a top 10 pick in 2010 draft (even as good as rookie Harden was).

[The Rebel]

It is funny how the Flynn hype is being downplayed and people are acting like Curry was the only one that got super hyped up for his tournament games. Flynn had scored like 34 points in the big east tournament while playing 60 plus minutes, which shot him up draft boards. Flynn was also a workout warrior. It is funny a lot of people saying nobody had Flynn rated that highly, when it was actually Harden who many thought was drafted too early and Flynn was thought to be a top 5 pick, curry went right in the range he was expected to go. From everything I heard at the time a lot of teams thought Flynn was going to be a very good pro especially with the rule changes that were known to be getting made that summer. Hell Flynn had a good rookie year going until that hip injury which totally derailed his career.

The Twolves caught a lot of hell for drafting Flynn and Rubio, but that was because they were 2 PGs, not because anybody thought either one was drafted way to early.

[puja21]

I think he was picked right. I remember wanting him to fall to the 14th pick so bad and it felt like it was possible. I can't explain Flynn though.
He was undersized, lacked defense and labeled injury prone. He had a jump shot but no one knew it would be this good. Honestly, I didn't think he would compete with Ray/Reg but to see how far ahead he's gotten. That's amazing.

Flynn had a pretty solid rookie year despite those limitations

The hip injury is what did him in

As you said -- injury prone -- but to be fair, so were Rubio and Curry both

[Jadoogar]

The draft is a crap shoot, nobody can predict the future. Kobe was drafted 15. Giannis drafted 15 I believe. Joker in the second round. Manu in the second round. Agent 0 second round. Daymond second round. Regardless of how good scouting is it's not perfect and somebody is going to fall through.

I know Curry just won the title and he is a great player but I am kinda tired of these hot take threads popping up about him.

Yea i understand going back and reevaluating drafts but it's pretty easy to see why guys like Curry, Giannis, Jokic, Kawhi, Draymond fell in the draft. They all had significant flaws (eg. Draymond was small for a 4) or were unique players at the time (Giannis is truly a unicorn)

Curry in particular was drafted before the 3 pt revolution (Curry pretty much led the charge on this). He was short, played at a small school and a junior in college. It wasn't common to see players take step back threes, transition pull up threes or chucking shots from 5 ft behind the line. It's hard to evaluate unique players, types we haven't seen before.

It's why draft experts are struggling with evaluating Chet.