Worst 3 draft picks from the last 20 years

[pipfan]

For this list, it has to be guys from the top of the draft. Of course, 29 teams should have taken Jokic, but no one knew what he would become. This is for guys picked in the top 5, over studs. Plus, no hind sight-Oden over KD looks terrible now but was 100% justifiable at the time.

[Warriors Analyst]

Some of these were moderately justifiable at the time. Parker over Embiid I can make sense of because pre-ACL tear Parker was becoming a very good player and there were significant injury concerns with Embiid.

But man, there are some embarrassing ones here. Bagley over Luka stands out, but Williams over CP3 is particularly bad. Every year a GM of a lotto team convinces themselves that a high level athlete with mediocre or non-existent feel will turn into a star on their team and it just... doesn't ever happen. Wes Johnson is another perfect example of that, as is Harrison Barnes and Ben McLemore and Josh Jackson and so on.

Bennet over Dipo is just hilarious. The reporting at the time was that Cleveland wanted to trade out of the pick but Chris Grant's asking price for the #1 was so ridiculous that no team wanted to deal with the Cavs and so they galaxy brained themselves into taking Bennet.

[Sactowndog]

And just think for a moment in time Vivek had Vlade and Joe advising him at the same time.

[Infinite Llamas]

Pretty sure Wiggins over Embiid was justified at the time. Wiggins got hyped as the next Lebron type talent.

Nobody was questioning Fultz at #1 either iirc

[Homer38]

Anthony Bennett was hilarious from the start....

Watch on YouTube

[clyde21]

Thabeet over Harden is never really talked about but that was devastating, and wasn't even remotely justified at the time other than 'must get 7 footer'

Thabeet was also drafted over Steph

yea, gotta go Thabeet.

[Homer38]

Thabeet over Harden is never really talked about but that was devastating, and wasn't even remotely justified at the time other than 'must get 7 footer'

Thabeet was also drafted over Steph

yea, gotta go Thabeet.

Very true...Too much under the radar.

[Warriors Analyst]

Pretty sure Wiggins over Embiid was justified at the time. Wiggins got hyped as the next Lebron type talent.

Nobody was questioning Fultz at #1 either iirc

This I don't agree with. I think Parker was a far more justifiable pick. But Wiggins was fools gold. He never had the wiggle or creativity you'd expect from a future superstar. So much of his ceiling was tied to the assumption that someone with his physical abilities could be taught how to do those things. It's rare that athletic freaks with limited feel ever learn how to do that type of stuff at a superstar level. Jabari had some of that creative juice to his game, but the ACL tears put a hard stop on his ceiling.

[MINDKCUF]

A. Bennet at #1 IS THE WORST PICK OF THEM ALL.

he ONLY STARTED 4 GAMES and averaged 4 ppg over 4 yrs career. biggest bust ever since there was no injury to retirement.

[ATRAIN53]

can't be Darko because his team won the title with him as a rookie LOL

Harden and CP3 are future HOF players

Luka will be in the HOF too if he keeps playing at this pace

Where is Oden over Durant?

How about Kwame Brown over future HOF Pau Gasol?

[Infinite Llamas]

Pretty sure Wiggins over Embiid was justified at the time. Wiggins got hyped as the next Lebron type talent.

Nobody was questioning Fultz at #1 either iirc

This I don't agree with. I think Parker was a far more justifiable pick. But Wiggins was fools gold. He never had the wiggle or creativity you'd expect from a future superstar. So much of his ceiling was tied to the assumption that someone with his physical abilities could be taught how to do those things. It's rare that athletic freaks with limited feel ever learn how to do that type of stuff at a superstar level. Jabari had some of that creative juice to his game, but the ACL tears put a hard stop on his ceiling.

Sure there were some potential issues with Wiggins, but no analyst was lambasting the Cavs for the pick. There were doubts after his one year of college but it was cemented in so many brains that Wiggins was the consensus first pick. Im sure 99% of mock drafts had him as #1. Picks like Darko and Bennett had waaaaaay more question marks at the time.

[Warriors Analyst]

Pretty sure Wiggins over Embiid was justified at the time. Wiggins got hyped as the next Lebron type talent.

Nobody was questioning Fultz at #1 either iirc

This I don't agree with. I think Parker was a far more justifiable pick. But Wiggins was fools gold. He never had the wiggle or creativity you'd expect from a future superstar. So much of his ceiling was tied to the assumption that someone with his physical abilities could be taught how to do those things. It's rare that athletic freaks with limited feel ever learn how to do that type of stuff at a superstar level. Jabari had some of that creative juice to his game, but the ACL tears put a hard stop on his ceiling.

Sure there were some potential issues with Wiggins, but no analyst was lambasting the Cavs for the pick. There were doubts after his one year of college but it was cemented in so many brains that Wiggins was the consensus first pick. Im sure 99% of mock drafts had him as #1. Picks like Darko and Bennett had waaaaaay more question marks at the time.

You are right about it being a totally fine pick via consensus. I'm just more skeptical of the consensus. I remember watching Wiggins for the first time in the game Kansas got eliminated in March Madness and came away from it totally confused as to why he was seen as this high level prospect: in the most important game of his life (up until that point), he just totally shrunk from the moment and did not make use of his considerable physical skills to try and do... well... anything.

Of course, now I'm watching him as a Warriors fan struggling to do much of anything consistently beyond onball defense, so joke is on me.

[shakes0]

For me this is a no brainer. It's the T Wolves taking not one, but two PG's ahead of Steph Curry.

Cmon, nothing in this poll is even close to that level of front office incompetence.

[DCasey91]

Wow didn’t think I would pick all three leading the vote they seem super obvious to me

10 & 4 is a disaster
Vlade knows Luka lol. Euroleague MVP winner at age 18 is very abnormal in the ultra modern era

And Thabeet over Harden? By names it’s a huge no but in saying that though drafts is never in exact science (Thabeet did win a lot of very good defensive awards in College)

Then process of elimination
Fultz was a great prospect, Wiggins/Parker understandable with Embiid’s injury, Oli wasn’t a number one type prospect (Bennett wasn’t either), the rest are marginal aside from Darko over Melo that one is a head-scratcher there.

MKG, Barganani, Mo, Wes had good credentials/awards somewhat pre draft.

[pace31]

I won't penalize picks that we're now judging in hindsight. Thabeet over Harden of course looks bad now, but the guy was really good in college. I thought he'd be very solid in the NBA. I'm going with:

Bagley over Luka
Marvin Williams over CP3
Darko over Melo

all of those picks at the time for me were head scratchers. The latter player in all 3 comparisons had star written all over them.

[Lenneth]

No Rubio/Flynn over Curry?

[LloydFree]

Voted Fultz over Tatum because of my personal distaste for Fultz' status as the #1 pick that year.
But that wasn't the consensus feeling at time.

If I had to pick based on what the general perception at the time of each draft, it would be either Bennett or Bagley.

People need to stop rewriting history with the Darko pick. Guys on this, and other sites were arguing Darko was better than Lebron, let alone Carmelo.

[BostonCouchGM]

I'm not at all surprised people chose Bagley over Luka. It's embarrassing, but not surprising

[HEKTOR]

Kwame Brown going #1 has to be up there, along with Bennett.

[bstein14]

Oden over KD is the worst. Many thought it was a toss up. KD will go down as top 15 player of all time and likely top 5 offensive player ever. It would be like choosing Ryan Leaf over Peyton Manning.