The biggest reason he was drafted that high was that he was a safe pick. Teams knew he had a very limited upside. He doesn't have the athletic ability you need to be a star or even a consistent scorer in the NBA, but he was a high character guy from a winning team that you knew wouldn't turn out to be an absolute flop like some of the high risk high reward types. It was pretty generally accepted that he could step in right away and be a role player on a good team. I remember that there was some buzz that the Wizards might take Shane number one that year. It was during Jordan's comeback and he wanted a player that would give the team some depth, instead of waiting several years for a high school big man to develop. This was also the year that high school hype really started to fade. Curry was billed as the next Shaq. Chandler was drawing comparisons to Kareem. There were even some scouting sites raving that Chandler had range out to the college 3 line. These couldn't have been more wrong. Not even mentioning Kwame.... I also remember that the Rockets had been really high on Pau Gasol and thought he would still be available when they picked around 13. Suddenly the word got out about him and his stock shot up to the top. I completely disagree that JVG robbed Shane of his offensive abilities. Shane was a lackluster player on offense every year after his rookie season. To blame JVG for that is pretty ignorant. And Pau Gasol was the player that turned Memphis into a decent team, not Shane. Getting ride of Abdur Rahim and his huge contract and replacing him with Gasol was a big move by Memphis.
I agree. Battier, even in college, wasn't a player that had a great jump shot or a player that could create anything from beyond 14 ft. Battier was amazing around the basket (hook shots, etc) and had the fundamentals down pat. But Battier was never an offensive player and he was smart enough to know that, accept that, turned himself into an indispensable player, and made a living off of that.
He played on one of the greatest college basketball teams ever. Jason Williams, Carlos Boozer and Shane Battier were stars at Duke. Unfortunately the Rockets passed on Boozer and went with Bostan Nachbar.
Well you need to post this thread on grizzles fans website, bcuz we weren't the ones who drafted him, but i don't think he is a bust, he is very good players, descent on the offensive end, but great BBall IQ, and great defender....
Exactly! Weak draft + wildly successful college player with great intangibles = getting drafted higher than usual.
Shane wasn't drafted on potential, he was drafted on nba readiness. And he had a pretty decent college career at Duke if i recall correctly.
Well you have to asked yourself who was picked no.1 that year and players selected after Shane like Griffin(RIP), Diop and White where were they now? Overall, it was a weak draft that year!
Because he's a winner. He was a stud. He was the man in DUKE. ALL coaches in the NBA loves to coach a guy like Shane Battier. Battier is the right player for all championship teams.
He got picked that high because of Dick Vitale. I think there are alot of marginal NBA players that are overhyped by Dick Vitale. They should all give him a percentage of there paycheck.
I'm going to have to strongly disagree. If we could go back in time and hold the 2001 draft again, knowing what we know up until today, the lottery would look something like this: 1. Joe Johnson 2. Pau Gasol 3. Tony Parker 4. Zach Randolph (of course, this would be different a month ago) 5. Jason Richardson 6. Richard Jefferson 7. Mehmet Okur (skilled 7 footers are hard to find) 8. Gerald Wallace 9. Gilbert Arenas (even considering the week he's had, you've got to take all those years of All Star production) 10. Shane Battier (might take some heat for this) 11. Tyson Chandler 12. Samuel Dalembert 13. Troy Murphy 14. Brendan Haywood That's a full 14 player lottery in which every single player who would have been taken is a starter for their respective teams in their 9th year in the league. At least the top 5 are still considered stars. That's a fairly impressive lottery if you ask me. After that you have the following names who are still floating around the NBA: Kwame Brown Eddy Curry DaSagana Diop Vladimir Radmonovic Jamaal Tinsley (okay, not technically still in the NBA but he was until VERY recently) Trenton Hassell Brian Scalabrine Earl Watson Bobby Simmons Loren Woods That puts the total to 24 players taken in the 2001 draft that are still playing in the NBA in year 9. To put that into perspective, I only counted 12 players in the 2000 draft who are still in the NBA. The best of them being Kenyon Martin, Jamal Crawford, Mike Miller, Hedo Turkoglu and Mike Miller. Maybe you were thinking of the 2000 draft? :grin: And as for the topic at hand, you might notice that I only have Battier dropping four spots even now. And most of the people above him have made the All Star team at least once.
I think you're exaggerating a bit here. That draft was so horrible. As bad as Kwame has been, there still aren't 28 players from that draft that have been better.
The guy is a leader. There aren't a lot of leaders in the NBA, and those who are.... well they're usually superstars or all-stars. The guy knows how to mentor teams and he's a quick learner and very adaptable. Most of all, the guy was a smart and stable guy. Coachable and very likable.
If you actually look at the list of number 6 picks over the last few decades, Battier's NBA career would probably fall in the top half of that list.
