It’s Getting Drafty In Here: 2000s Edition
Because I’m a basketball nerd, I sometimes look back at past NBA drafts and try to figure out how could a team I can create from a given year’s selectees. I then start to think about which year would produce the best team. But rather than waste time with such silly mental dalliances, I’ve decided to do a series of posts wherein I determine the best “team” per draft and, from there, the best draft per decade and, ultimately, the best draft team ever.
A few rules:
- I’m picking a 5 man squad. So if a draft ran 10 deep but lacked the super star power of a shallower draft, it will probably lose out. Dems da breaks!
- Each player will be assigned to a position he played at least part-time during his career. So Tim Duncan can play PF or C but John Stockton can only play PG.
- When we start to compare teams from different eras, we’ll assume each player played as the peak level exhibited during his career. So we don’t have to try to figure out how a 6-10 Bill Russell would fare against modern 7-footers or want the relaxed defensive rules would have meant for Michael Jordan.
- I’m picking the squads based on whatever criteria I damn well please. Mostly, it will be gut. Yes, I know advanced basketball analytics have exploded recently but this is more for fun than science. Deal wit it!
Without further ado, let’s start with the 2000’s (including players selected from the 2000 Draft through the 2009 Draft). I’m holding off on the current decade as most of the drafts are too recent to really judge.
2000
- PG: Jamal Crawford
- SG: Michael Redd
- SF: Mike Miller
- PF: Hedo Turkoglu
- C:
Marcus CambyKenyon Martin
Snapshot assessment: Woof! Some great outsid shooting, but zero defense save for Camby’s rim protection, limited ball movement, and no true super star. The scary thing is there wasn’t much debate about which five to take.
2001
- PG: Tony Parker
- SG: Joe Johnson
- SF: Shane Battier
- PF: Zach Randolph
- C: Pau Gasol
Snapshot assessment: This is a good squad. ZBo in the low post and Gasol at the elbow running pick-and-roll with Parker. Battier spotting up in the corner and Joe Johnson able to shoot from deep or drive-and-kick. A case could be made for putting Tyson Chandler at the 5 and sliding Gasol to the 4, but there ain’t no way I’m leaving ZBo off my squad!
2002
- PG: Flip Murray
- SG: Caron Butler
- SF: Tayshaun Prince
- PF: Amar’e Stoudemire
- C: Yao Ming
Snapshot assessment: Ugh! I had to scrape the bottom of the bin to find a point guard. Who scores for this team? Stoudemire, I guess? But can he create his own shot? I’m tempted to put Jay Williams at the point based simply on his college career but this squad sucks no matter what. Moving on…
2003
- PG: Kirk Hinrich
- SG: Dwyane Wade
- SF: Carmelo Anthony
- PF: LeBron James
- C: Chris Bosh
Snapshot assessment: This is the year that usually leads me to conduct this most important of mental exercises. The guys left off this squad are probably better than the ’00 and ’02 squads: Korver, West, Diaw, Josh Howard, Mo Williams, Barbosa, Perkins. I’m tempted to leave ‘Melo off for Korver since this team doesn’t really need him dominating the ball and loafing on defense, but, nah, that’s silly. This is the team to beat for the decade and arguably for the entire exercise.
2004
- PG: Devin Harris
- SG: JR Smith
- SF: Andre Iguodala
- PF: Al Jefferson
- C: Dwight Howard
Snapshot assessment: This is an interesting draft. There were lots of quality second and third bananas… guys you’d be perfectly happy to have as core components of a championship caliber team but who you’d be hard pressed to win with as THE MAN. Most calls were pretty easy, though a case could be made for Luol Deng over Iggy at the 3. Iggy won me over with his behind-the-backboard dunk in the Slam Dunk Contest that one year, so I’m giving him the nod. Also, I’m a little giddy about the idea of JR Smith being involved in anything related to basketball history.
2005
- PG: Chris Paul
- SG: Monta Ellis
- SF: Danny Granger
- PF: David Lee
- C: Andrew Bogut
Snapshot assessment: This is a stellar defensive team. With Paul pressuring the ball, Bogut protecting the rim, and Granger setting his sights on the opposing team’s best perimeter play, they can get away with Ellis and Lee. And all of these guys bring something on the offensive end as well. This is a good squad even if it seems to lack much star power. It is worth noting that this was the last draft that allowed American high school players to enter.
2006
- PG: Rajon Rondo
- SG: Brandon Roy
- SF: Rudy Gay
- PF: Paul Milsap
- C: LaMarcus Aldridge
Snapshot assessment: I sorta cheated a bit here. Aldridge played some 5 his rookie year, so I snuck him in there. He and Milsap are probably the two best guys in this draft and given how thin it was, leaving one off with no other veritable center in the mix just felt wrong. Rondo over Lowry was a coin flip and I went with the former because I think he has more upside especially when surrounded by guys who can score. Roy had his career cut short by injuries but was a dynamic player when healthy. Gay about sums this team up… Meh…
2007
- PG: Mike Conley
- SG: Aaron Afflalo
- SF: Kevin Durant
- PF: Al Horford
- C: Marc Gasol
Snapshot assessment: This team has a dominant front court, holy crap! Conley is a good distributor. I don’t know that the 2-guard really matters with the way this team is assembled, which is probably for the better given the options.
2008
- PG: Russell Westbrook
- SG: Goran Dragic
- SF: Nicholas Batum
- PF: Kevin Love
- C: DeAndre Jordan
Snapshot assessment: This was a really deep draft. So much size! In addition to Love and Jordan, you also had Hibbert, Ibaka, the Lopez twins, and Omar Asik, all of whom are good to great players. You also had some point guard depth, with Derrick Rose and George Hill missing the cut and Dragic sneaking on at the 2. This team would wreak some havoc offensively.
2009
- PG: Stephen Curry
- SG: James Harden
- SF: Chase Budinger
- PF: Blake Griffin
- C: Jordan Hill
Snapshot assessment: This draft produced three elite players — Curry, Harden, and Griffin — and not much else. Each of those guys have logged 50+ Win Shares in their career and could have made arguments for MVP consideration at different points (including Curry and Harden being the top two contenders this year). Unfortunately, things really take a tumble after that. There were some other nice pieces — Jeff Teague, Taj Gibson, Ty Lawson, Danny Green, DeMr Derozan — but they are all well behind the elite guys at the same positions.
With that done, let’s now rank the different squads. Here is how I have them, from best to worst, with a brief explanation why:
2003: Lots of teams had multiple great players, but this is the only one with multiple historical greats. Wade and LeBron are in that conversation, plus you have ‘Melo and Bosh. ‘Nuff said.
2009: The next few squads are pretty tightly packed, but this team would be impossible to defend.
2007: Held back by the week backcourt.
2001: Not as exciting as some other squads, but they’d get it done with a well-balanced attack.
2008: A very exciting team but I worry about chemistry.
2005: The Paul/Bogut combination on offense and defense sets this team apart.
2004: Lotsa good, little great.
2006: Aldridge leads a ragtag group but doesn’t get very far.
2002: At least they’d be popular in China.
2000: Sorry, this team just stinks.
So the 2003 squad moves on! Disagree? TOUGH NUTS! Take it to the comments!
My single quibble is that I would put 2008 at three, or perhaps even two. (2008 v 2009 is the only matchup in the lot I wuld get excited about seeing in a 7-gamer.)Report
Teams 2-5 are the tightly packed ones so you could make a strong case for any ordering of them.
It is possible that I skewed towards some of the earlier teams because we know who those guys are better. We know who Tony Parker is. I’m still not sure who DeAndre Jordan is and even Kevin Love has me raising an eyebrow.Report
My worries about 2009 — and why I might slide them down from two to three — is it seems like a lot of people who have a history of wanting to be the alpha at the expense of team ball. (Curry not so much this year, but I would like to wait and see what he does in serious playoff basketball before counting on him to be a distributor when it counts.) Too many guys who need to have the ball most of the time.
Though to be honest, if it had been me I would have left Budinger off and picked Tyreke Evans in his place.Report
Wow. This post really drives home how little I’ve paid attention to pro basketball for a while. I don’t know most of these names.Report
I know the ones who’ve played for the Warriors. I think I’ve heard of that LeBaron guy too.Report
Well I like Steph Curry because we went to college together and he said more than zero words to me during that time. But as for the rest, I’m with Vikram.Report
John Voight drove a LeBaron.Report
Marcus Camby was drafted in 1996.Report
Was about to point this out as well.
The 2000 draft class is probably the worst out of the last 30 years. Moving someone who wasn’t even in it still doesn’t help it that much.Report
Chris,
I meant Kenyon Martin. I’ll change it. I mix those guys up sometimes because of some similarities to their careers.Report
Man, Camby was one of the best college players ever, but was one more piece of evidence that being a a superstar big man in the NBA is as much about luck as it is about skill.Report
I do not want to jinx things by naming a very good big man who might finally have a healthy playoffs.Report
Camby when healthy actually had a pretty good pro career also. The fact that he wasn’t a primary scorer in the pros diminishes most people’s impression of his success, but he was an elite defensive player and rebounder. Those are both vital skills for NBA teams to have on the court. The biggest problem was he wasn’t healthy for many seasons and missed basically two seasons of his peak career.
In his own draft class, I have him ranked 5th (behind Ben Wallace, who wasn’t drafted) but ahead of Iverson. Which is only a minor disappointment with the 2nd pick. The actual 2000 2nd pick was mediocre (Swift), and the 2001 and 2003 2nd picks were total busts, as a comparison.Report
The biggest problem was he wasn’t healthy for many seasons and missed basically two seasons of his peak career.
Right, this is the luck issue with big men. It’s really hard for their legs to hold up over multiple 82 game seasons, which results in many exceptionally talented big men, like Camby, losing out some of their best years. This is likely true of Howard as well, to say nothing of Bynum and Oden, or classicaly, Sam Bowie. I worry that it will happen with Anthony Davis, too, who’s shown a proneness to leg injuries. Hell, it even got Durant this year, though I’m hoping that his otherworldly physical makeup will allow him to come back at full strength.Report
Agreed, but it doesn’t really put Camby in some unusual company and he’s nowhere near as crippled by injuries as Bynum or Bowie or Oden. He actually had a very good stretch of years after he missed those two seasons (03-04 season to the 09-10 season, and even the next two seasons he remained an effective defender/rebounder in more limited minutes), including the defensive player of the year award. Bynum/Bowie/Oden doesn’t have anything like that. They were hurt more persistently as well.
He’s not on Howard’s level (Howard scored more to make him a borderline HoF career), much less Duncan/KG/Hakeem (elites). I’m not arguing that. But he’s a lot better than people expect. If his draft class includes Ray Allen, Kobe, Nash, AI, Peja, and an undrafted Ben Wallace, most people probably would not think he’s in the top 5.Report
Right, I don’t mean to suggest that Camby was completely hobbled by injuries, merely that his peak was limited by injuries in a way that many big men have their peaks limited in what might otherwise been. Camby played in all or part of 17 season. In only 3 of those did he play 70 or more games (79, 72, and 70), in 11 he played fewer than 60, and six of those were 40 or fewer. He averaged double-digit rebounds for all but one year in his prime, but played 63, 29, 29, 72, 66, 56, 70, 79, 62, 41, 23, and 59 games in that stretch. Seventy-nine is a full season, we can even give him 70 and 72, but that means that in 17 years he played 3 full seasons, and frequently played 2/3 of a season or less. That’s what injuries do to big men. That he somehow made it 17 seasons suggests that he had some serious healing capacity or an incredible work ethic, or both.
Injuries get 1s, 2s, and 3s as well, of course, but great big men seem to have careers limited by them at a higher rate. This is why someday Tim Duncan’s legs will have to be donated to science and studied by the world’s leading medical experts.Report
Chris,
In what way was Camby’s career shaped by luck? Injuries? I think the Camby we saw when healthy was about what we could have expected from him. He is a guy who is underrated by traditional box score stats.Report
2004 – I don’t like JR Smith being on the starting 5. I’d take Tony Allen over him as a close proxy. Kevin Martin’s been much better or Iggy could be used at the 2 and Deng at the 3. JR’s a pretty major downgrade from either of those options. He basically has had one good season and mostly been on mediocre teams (one Nuggets and one Knicks team). Martin was on mediocre teams but had very good seasons if there must be a good stats bad team player. I’d rather find a way to put Deng and Iggy on as that’s a monster defensive team on the perimeter.
2006 – Lowry probably has passed Rondo after this season, but Rondo had a really good prime. It probably wouldn’t be close without injuries involved though.Report
Steve,
A strong case could be made for Allen over Smith. I couldn’t find evidence of Iggy playing the 2 for any extended period so even though he probably could do it, I was trying to stay relatively true to what these guys have already done.
I tended to favor peak over career. If we are looking at a one-game or similar style tournament, we don’t care how long you hung on for; we’re assuming you’re at your best.Report
Tod Kelly,
I couldn’t find a record of Evans playing the 3.Report