BasslineSpin.com
2003
6/25/03 Guest Column, by Mark Wong (AKA "Wonger"), Elk Grove, CA
My inspirations for this guest column are, for starters, BobStar has been a homey from way back in the day and I saw a replay of the 1984 NBA Draft on NBA TV a couple of days ago. I have to admit the NBA Draft is becoming one of the hardest to predict out of the major sports. Aside from the NFL Draft no one cares about either hockey or baseball drafts.
Once, a day to look forward for us "Old School" Kings fans, now draft day in this city comes and goes like the cool summer breezes off the Delta. As of now, the Kings don't even own a single draft pick in either round this year. I guess we should be happy, although I was looking forward to that parade down J Street last week, but that's a whole other issue.
The NBA Draft will never ever be an exact science. This is where my viewing of the '84 draft comes into play. The first three picks in that draft were in this order - Akeem Olajuwon, Sam Bowie, and Michael Jordan. Hakeem (as he later changed to) was the clear-cut number one pick and even though MJ turned out to be MJ it is hard to dispute that. We know Portland made that monumental mistake taking Sam Bowie, but who would have known. Hindsight tells us that the top three should have been Hakeem, MJ, and Charles Barkley. Then questions could arise, would MJ have been as successful in Portland? Could Charles have brought championships to Chicago? We will never know. It was also surreal listening to MJ's interview after his workout for the Olympics. I believe he said, "I'm just looking forward to helping the Bulls in any way I can." That's why we love the retro craze and watching these old schools telecasts.
Look at the '86 draft. Out of all the trouble those draft choices found themselves in, the best player, I believe, to come out that draft is Dennis Rodman. Who would have thought we would be saying that? Pick a year, any year…if the '95 draft were held today, Kevin Garnett would be the unanimous #1 pick. Same with '96, if you were Philly would you pass on Kobe? Speaking of '96, how deep was that draft…those players have been MVP's, All-Stars, World Champions, and Olympians. Kobe, AI, Jermaine O'Neal, Stephon Marbury, Ray Allen, Peja, Steve Nash, Antoine Walker, Shareef Abdur-Rahim, and Zydrunas Ilgauskas were all first round selections. So if you're Philly, if the '96 and '97 drafts were done right, in hindsight, their bookend wings would have been Kobe and T-Mac. Now that would have been ridiculous.
Since '84, only Hakeem, Ewing, D Rob, Shaq, C-Webb, AI, Duncan, Yao Ming, and this year, LeBron have even been clear-cut #1 overall picks. There are even some years the NBA should have just canceled the draft and moved on - '86, '88, '89. I'm sure those years ring a bell. So my issues with this year's draft are that we definitely know who the first three picks will be in the exact order. LeBron James, Darko Milicic, and Carmelo Anthony are clearly the top three picks this year and those teams would be foolish to pass on any of those players. After pick #3, who knows what might happen. I'm starting to get on the Chris Bosh bandwagon. You can't teach size and natural ability. Same goes for Michael Sweetney; he'll be a great bench/role player on any team in the league, although he is still a mid-first round pick. I am not sold on either Hinrich or Collison. Something about those former Kansas players not named Paul Pierce. As we try and become NBA GM's for a day and start formulating our own mock drafts, the question becomes five years from now, should Cleveland have taken Maciej Lampe over LeBron????? I think I may be safe with answering "no" to that one.
