The thing is, Portland's gotten great value on their picks under Olshey. Just because some were lottery and some aren't here doesn't mean that we didn't find some sort of diamonds in the rough. Homeruns: 6th Lillard (Top 2 Player in his draft) 10th McCollum (Top 3 Player in his draft) 55th or Lower Pick - Traded for Moe Harkless Doubles: 23rd Pick - Traded for Mason Plumlee 31st Crabbe (Top 10 Player in his draft) Singles: 40th Barton (Borderline Top 10 in his draft) 47th Layman (Should be top 30 in his draft) Strikeouts: 11th Leonard (Taken over Fournier, Crowder, Draymond, Middleton, etc) 20th Beasley (That's who DEN drafted with the pick they got for Afflalo) The 2nd Rounders traded for Thomas Robinson (Good risk to take, didn't pan out)
It's the toughest position to project. The great college shooters often don't pan out in the NBA, and the NBA 3-and-D guys tend to be unheralded college players. I guess you could scout on the basis of an underwhelming college career, but then half of S2 would be hiring agents.
Congrats, you found ONE example. ONE that traded their best player, a lottery pick, for arguably the best 2 way player in the league. LOL, I stand corrected
Further note: even if there wasn't an ACTUAL example of a team that did this that wouldn't undermine the point of the thread, because it says that it's POSSIBLE (like: it's POSSIBLE for LeBron James to pass Derek Fisher for most playoffs games played). That is, there are players available after the lottery in almost every draft that, if you combined them, would make a championship caliber team. Players like Jokic, Gobert, Draymond Green, Jimmy Butler, Siakam et. al. Of course, it would be hard for a team to TRY to do it, because you have to actively avoid trading for players picked in the lottery. But my point was about how a team can both stay good and get great talent in the draft (like the Spurs did and the Nuggets are doing now).
I get the premise, But I think there is one stat that should be valuated prior to assuming this could be possible. What is the percentage of lottery picks that bust vs become a star? What is the percent of second rounders busting vs being a star? Meaning., I think talent scouts would miss alot more in actively trying to find a star outside of the lottery than they would in the lottery. I get your premise, but skimming the surface, I don't think its realistic at all because of the percentage drop off of potential stardom of nonlottery picks. Another way to analyze would be to take the total number of lottery picks for say the last ten years and the percent of them that became a star. Now do the same for non lottery picks. Without knowing, Im pretty sure the percentage of nonlottery pick stars is going to be extremely low. And you would need to nail almost all of them to make this come to fruition. Just not possible in my opinion.
Lol. I dunno. Ask a hurt KD or a hurt Klay Thompson how they feel about last years finals. Also, Thy drafted a lottery pick and traded for one of the best two way players ONLY because the two way player wanted out and the trading team wanted him in a different conference. Yes luck can make most things happen, but to actively try to make it happen is all but impossible in my opinion. I mean if it were that easy, teams would bypass the lottery players and just pick 2nd rounders out of the gate. Id like to see your thoughts about the percentage questions I had regarding lottery busts vs nonlottery busts.
Note title: "You can build a great team with non-lottery picks". Toronto was a great (not just great: title-winning) team composed of non-lottery picks. Well, it would be a pretty savage indictment of the entire industry of scouting if lottery picks weren't a fuck of a lot more likely to be better than non-lottery picks.
OF COURSE IT'S UNLIKELY! But the number of really really good players available outside the lottery EVEN IN THIS DAY AND AGE is remarkable.
Ah I mixed up great team with championship team. NO doubt a great team can be had. But the Can is very low percentage in my opinion.
Was Toronto truly built without lottery picks? That's not exactly the same as saying they had no lottery picks on the roster when they won it... Gasol was traded for a lottery pick (Gasol) albeit by a different team, Kawhi was traded for a lottery pick (Derozan), and probably others fit the bill. They needed lottery picks as assets to build the roster.
If that's the benchmark, I don't think it's even possible to build an NBA team without having lottery picks involved in some way, shape, or form. I think it's pretty clear that the premise of this thread is regarding a team's own lottery picks being significant contributors to that team's greatness. BTW, I see the Bucks were mentioned a few years ago in this thread, but they most definitely fit the bill now. They're clearly a great team, and they haven't received significant contribution from a lotto pick since...Brandon Jennings?
