<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">North Carolina's Raymond Felton won the national championship. Wake Forest's Chris Paul never got past the third round. Felton executed the equivalent of a basketball miracle, changing his technique after his sophomore season and developing a lethal outside shot. Felton could have won every comeback award on the planet except for one disqualifying detail. He never had a shot to begin with, just a flying elbow. As the gold dust settled over the NBA Draft, however, Felton again waded into a sea of skeptics. The Charlotte Bobcats, desperate for a point guard, used the fifth overall pick on the speed dribbler with the South Carolina birth certificate and Chapel Hill pedigree. Felton got what he wanted - millions for his family, blessed relief from time-released career anxiety - but he also got a nasty question. The question, minus the polite packaging: How does it feel to be the fallback choice of a franchise that loved Chris Paul but couldn't marry him? Felton sighed once more and cited his competitive drive to prove all doubters wrong. Charlotte coveted Paul, but Utah traded for the third slot and leapfrogged the Bobcats, who lost their teeth and their dream. Utah took tall point guard Deron Williams of Illinois. New Orleans (Old Charlotte) had given up on Baron Davis and traded him, leaving a hole at the point. The Hornets, picking fourth, concluded that Paul should drive Coach Byron Scott's fast-moving train across the land and attach his magnetic smile to a basically sad franchise.</div> Source
