What do these players have in common? Shawn Respert Kerry Kittles Adonal Foyle Larry Hughes Andre Miller Jamal Crawford Dasagna Diop Chris Wilcox TJ Ford Rafael Araujo Channing Frye Between 1995 and 2005 they were, in order, the #8 pick in the NBA Draft. Foyle is the only one who stayed with his "team" for any amount of time. Some are out of the league. Most are disappointments and have been moved around multiple times based on, I guess, their potential which is largely still unrealized. A final thought... maybe Eddy Curry will have been worth the #2 pick when all is said and done. It is possible. BTW, Battier was the sixth pick in the first round in 2001-- right before Eddie Griffin.
I wanted Battier BAD in that draft, more than EG by a long shot. And this is exactly the point I brought up in the long Redick thread that the number 8 pick is not really that great. DD
Battier had a shot to go number 1 in his draft. Rudy Gay went 8 in a weak draft. We made a good move here.
Go back in your mind to 2001: Kwame Brown Tyson Chandler Pau Gasol Eddy Curry Jason Richardson Shane Battier Those are the top six picks. Three high-schoolers, one late-rising European, an athletic early-entrant, and a college senior. I'd say that Shane was worthy of #1 consideration and with the benefit of hindsight should have been picked no later than second or third behind Gasol and maybe Richardson.
With the benefit of hindsight, Battier probably barely cracks the top ten: 2001 draft picks that are clearly better: Arenas Gasol Tony Parker Richardson Jefferson Joe Johnson Then you get into the big debate about Battier being better than his numbers, and being worth more than players with more traditional production. Either way it's at LEAST debatable that Battier is going to be definitely better than this list of guys: Randolph Chandler Curry Dalembert Okur Murphy Radmanovic Earl Watson (who statheads love as much as Battier) Bobby Simmons Is Battier better than this second tier of players? Maybe. But you definitely can't say that for certain. At best, Battier is a tossup with this list, and ends up barely being worth a top ten pick.
Reasonable conclusion. Remember though that Battier was "only" the sixth pick. That's just inside barely cracking the Top Ten for 2001. I was only re-shuffling the Top Six picks but you get no argument about Arenas and Tony Parker and possibly Richard Jefferson Joe Johnson is on his third team and Jason Richardson is something phenomenal-- emphasis something. By accounts, West has resisted trading Battier. This is the same West who is called a genius for wanting Rudy Gay. I bet West acknowledges in his mind that he is the one rolling the dice here.
I didn't like Shane very much back then either. Moderate talent. Of course they're gonna say that. Hell, I think even we said it was tough to trade Steve. It's just the nice thing to do.
Why is it that "great athletes" require rules changes and refereeing advantages to succeed in the NBA? Just looking back over the NBA drafts since 2000, we realistically could have had these mediocre talents: 1. Speedy Claxton 2. Kevin Martin, Luther Head 3. Shane Battier 4. Nick Collison 5. Yao Ming Throw in McGrady and Mike James and that's a pretty good rotation made up of largely inferior athletes but smart hoopsters. Is that also a roster of First Round Exiters?
What do they have in common? With the exception of Respert, Kittles, Foyle, and Araujo, I'd take ANY of them right now for the Rockets. Hell, of the 8 players, more than half of them would even start for the Rockets.
Besides Respert and Araujo i'm taking em ALL now for the Rockets. And from there the only others that WOULDNT start is Diop and Foyle. Kittles was injury prone and heck even NOW i'd consider him a cheap backup, compared to the crap we got now on the roster. And without question even with injuries he's a starter on this team if it were his prime years. I wouldnt mind at all having Adonal Foyle as a backup center to Yao. Even he would get a crack at starting the 4 if the Rox put Cato next to Yao before... Wow that's how bad its really gotten huh....
