Id say 5 seasons is a good benchmark for evaluating whether a player has been a disappointment. The lottery of the draft is as follows:
- Zion Williamson --> NOP
- Ja Morant --> MEM
- RJ Barret --> NYK
- Deandre Hunter --> ATL
- Darius Garland --> CLE
- Jarret Culver --> MIN
- Coby White --> CHI
- Jaxson Hayes --> NOP
- Rui Hacimura --> WAS
- Cam Reddish --> ATL
- Cam Johnson --> PHO
- PJ Washington --> CHA
- Tyler Herro --> MIA
- Romeo Langford --> BOS
When looking at this top 14 I was kind of astonished at how few of these players actually turned out into a successful pick for the team.
Other than the obvious ones (Zion, Ja, Garland, Herro) is there any argument for any of these players not being massive disappointments relative to their pre draft stock? I guess Rui, Cam Johnson and PJ Washington have turned into decent role players, but players like Barrett and Hunter in my opinion have not been close to living up to their pre draft hype and have been pretty clear disappointments.
The rest of the players on this list are either playing meaningless minutes on terrible teams (Coby White, Hayes) or are riding the bench/out of the league.
When zooming out to the rest of the draft it’s even more disappointing with Grant Williams and Jordan Poole headlining the best players.
Am I crazy for thinking this is one of the more underrated bad drafts? I feel like many people talk about some other drafts as being really bad, but I don’t see many talking about this one.
Yeah, this wasn’t a bad top end draft. I’d actually say the 2021 draft is much worse in terms of top 14 picks.