NBA Draft Busts

[JasonEvans]

Just to be fair...I would think that 6 years in the NBA is pretty decent. Sure, you would hope that your top draft pick would last over a decade, but given that we are discussing so many "busts" obviously that career length isn't too common. In fact, the average career of an NBA player is less than 5 years.

http://rpiratings.com/NBA.html
By the way, check out the opening sentence of that article, it's fun!

Yeah, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a #4 pick who only lasted 6 years.

[rsvman]

Ohmygod... I just finished the list. Among the most overrated players in NBA history he cites Patrick Ewing, Lebron James, Karl Malone, and Kevin McHale.

I am really worried that some of the stupid that infects that article has worn off on me as a result of me reading it. Seriously, I very well may be dumber because I read that list!! How dare you do that to me!!!?! I am already dumb enough without having to add that mindless list to my short-term (very short-term, I hope) memory!!

Wow... just horrible.

-Jason "serves me right for clicking on a Bleacher Report link" Evans

I didn't click on the link, but if the guy really said that, I'd argue that Bleacher Report is a step BELOW posting on a message board. Kevin McHale and Karl Malone are arguably 2 of the 5 best power forwards of all time. Anybody who puts McHale's name on a list of "overrated" players is not old enough to have seen him play and didn't bother to do any semblance of research. Sheesh!

[tommy]

Yeah, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a #4 pick who only lasted 6 years.

Hard-pressed? Try unable!

Over the last 25 years, there have been no #4 overall picks who did not play at least six years in the league. The quickest out was Iowa State's Marcus Fizer, picked #4 in 2000, who played four years for the Bulls, hurt his knee, then got selected by the expansion Bobcats, didn't make the team, then bounced around signing for short stints with a few other teams, culminating in 2006. So even he qualifies as having played in parts of six seasons.

Even guys who seem like they were washouts, like Reggie Williams and Chris Morris, played way longer than six years. It was 10 for Reggie and 11 years in the league for Morris.

[tommy]

You want a bust, look at the entire 2000 draft. It is full of bad or, at best, mediocre players. I mean, here are the first 13 picks--

1. Kenyon Martin - a decent NBA player, but not nearly what you normally get from a #1 pick
2. Stromile Swift - yup, he was the #2 pick in the draft
3. Darius Miles - actually started out pretty well as a rookie, but never seemed to get much better
4. Marcus Fizer - lasted just 6 seasons in the league
5. Mike Miller - a decent player, but not with the #5 pick
6. Derrmarr Johnson - the Hawks again squander a high draft pick on a worthless player
7. Chris Mihm - A career role player, with the #7 pick in the draft
8. Jamal Crawford - easily the best pick so far, NBA 6th man of the year once and a great pure scorer
9. Joel Przybilla - career scoring average, 4.0 ppg
10. Keyon Dooliing - a career backup player
11. Jerome Moiso - lasted just 5 seasons in the league, never played much
12. Etan Thomas - a career 5 ppg scorer
13. Courtney Alexander - a mega-scorer in college, lasted less than 5 years in the NBA
14. Mateen Cleaves - won an NCAA championship, barely played in the NBA
15. Jason Collier - 5 NBA seasons and then he was done

--Jason "the best player in that draft -- Michael Redd, who went in the middle opf the 2nd round" Evans

What about 1989? Pretty bad too. Here are the top 13 picks from that draft:

1. Pervis Ellison - "Out of Service Pervis" was just hurt almost all the time
2. Danny Ferry - Developed as a niche 3 point shooter but never a real impact player
3. Sean Elliott - Solid starter, averaged 20 ppg one year, career avg of 14. Fine.
4. Glen Rice- Best of the top 13, averaged 18 ppg over a 15 year career. Had an All-Star MVP.
5. J.R. Reid - career averages of 8 points and 5 rebounds. Never approached realizing the potential many folks thought he had.
6. Stacey King - career averages of 6 points and 3 rebounds. Bench guy.
7. George McCloud - early washout but got a second chance and did OK as a shooter off the bench for some teams
8. Randy White - washed out in 5 years in the league. The supposed "next Karl Malone" never averaged even 10 ppg.
9. Tom Hammonds - somehow stuck around for 12 years, but career average was 5 ppg
10. Pooh Richardson - averaged 11 ppg and 6.5 assists over 10 years. Never close to one of the best in the league at the point.
11. Nick Anderson - pretty decent career playing alongside Shaq and Penny, but never recovered from his free throw shooting debacle in the finals against Houston.
12. Mookie Blaylock - pretty good, but not great point guard. Excellent hands on defense, decent distributor, but never led a very good team.
13. Michael Smith - out of the league in two years. Good color commentator for the Clippers, though.

What makes this draft better, though, than 2000 is that it had a few guys taken lower who were real good players. Tim Hardaway at 14, Sean Kemp at 17, Vlade down at 26. And Uncle Cliffie Robinson in the 2nd round at 36. Still, compared to the great majority of other drafts, this one was pretty stanky.

[UrinalCake]

I don't think anyone's mentioned Haseem Thabeet - #2 overall pick, went immediately to the D-League (which is rare, usually a top 3-5 pick gets to start no matter what), I think he's made it back to the NBA but isn't doing much.

Funny how many of these busts are big men. You'd think it would be the other way around, as guards rely on a lot of intangibles that are hard to quantify, but at the same time bigs take longer to develop and they tend to get drafted just for being big.

[tommy]

No negative rep, BUT:

http://www.nba.com/history/draft_top13.html

When you get down to picks 4+ you start to see the misses increase.

I've analyzed the last 25 years of NBA drafts, or at least the first 30 picks of each of those drafts, so 750 selections. Where you start to see the drop-off is after the #5 or at latest #6 pick.

I placed each of the 750 players into one of the following categories, and put the whole thing onto an Excel:
1. Hall of Famer (either already enshrined or in my mind very likely to be a HOF'er -- guys like Shaq, Tim Duncan, Kobe, LeBron, Steve Nash, Dirk, and a few others. Nobody who's too young to tell.)

2. All-Star, meaning a non-HOF'er but who has played in at least one all-star game.
3. Starter. Not an All-Star, but a solid NBA starter.
4. What I call a "pension man." Meaning a rotation guy, a guy good enough to hang around the league for a number of years, reputation as a decent player for awhile. I know, very subjective, but when you're going over this many guys, you've just got to make some calls!
5. Marginal. Guys who were/are in the league for a few years, but didn't have or haven't had much impact, and for the younger guys don't look likely to. Again, very subjective I know.
6. Washouts.

I also put a few guys down as "injured" -- like Len Bias, J-Will, Hurley, DeJuan Wagner, and a few others.

Here are my "findings":
Of the 13 Hall of Famers selected since in drafts since 1986, 5 were #1 picks, 3 were #5 picks, one was a 9, one was a 10, one a 13 (Kobe), one a 15 (Nash), and one a 27 (that was Rodman.) So 8 of the 13 were top 5 picks.

Of the 100 All-Stars, 12 were #1 picks, 8 were #2's, 12 were #3's, 8 were #4's, 7 were #5's, 6 were #6's, and then the numbers really drop off from there. 53 of the 100 were top 6 selections. Keep in mind these don't count the Hall of Famers. I have guys in the "All-Star" category who have made All-Star teams but not the Hall of Fame. But if you add the numbers for HOF'ers plus the numbers for All-Stars, you'd have 113 guys. 61 of the 113 were top 6 picks.

The line between Starters and Pension Men is a little blurry, and I'm not sure how useful the data is given how subjective my assignment of labels to those guys is. But the numbers for starters drop off after the #13 pick. Meaning that guys drafted later than #13 have a much reduced likelihood of becoming solid starters in the league, statistically speaking.

On the flip side, of the 106 players whose careers I evaluated as "marginal," only 18 were top 7 selections. The numbers get bigger starting at draft position #8, and stay pretty steady from there on down.

Then there are the total busts, who I labeled as "washouts." Striking is the sheer number of them -- 262 in the last 25 years. And that really undercounts, because a number of young guys still hanging around in the league will be gone this coming year or next and would rightfully be moved into this category. But anyway, of the 262 that I felt comfortable labeling as "washouts," only 6 were top 5 picks (Washburn, Dennis Hopson, Marcus Fizer, Tsikishtivili, and Adam Morrison) and then the numbers start to grow. They are moderately larger for selections 6 through 13, and then starting at 14 they get bigger, and then bigger again at 25.

I also counted the number of guys drafted below #30 who went on to become All-Stars. In the last 25 years, that number is 7. 7 of 750 players. Which makes it sound like it would bode a heck of a lot better for Kyle and Nolan if they got drafted late in the first round than early in the second, but not really. The number of guys drafted between 25 and 30 over the last 25 years who made an All-Star team is also 7.

So I know my methods are utterly pick-apart-able on a number of fronts, but thought, even given the subjectivity of the categorization I did, it would still be interesting to see where the dropoffs are in the draft as well as the sheer numbers of utter washouts. I've got all the numbers on a spreadsheet if anyone's interested!

[monkey]

I've analyzed the last 25 years of NBA drafts, or at least the first 30 picks of each of those drafts, so 750 selections. Where you start to see the drop-off is after the #5 or at latest #6 pick.

5. Marginal. Guys who were/are in the league for a few years, but didn't have or haven't had much impact, and for the younger guys don't look likely to. Again, very subjective I know.
6. Washouts.

Really interesting tommy - what's the difference, to you, between the marginal guys and the washouts? Is a marginal guy the big guy off the bench that averages a couple points a game but somehow lasts a decade?

Who, besides Boozer, were the 7 all stars picked in the second round? I can think of Arenas and maybe Van Exel off the top of my head.

What was Shane categorized as? Starter?

[tommy]

Really interesting tommy - what's the difference, to you, between the marginal guys and the washouts? Is a marginal guy the big guy off the bench that averages a couple points a game but somehow lasts a decade?

Who, besides Boozer, were the 7 all stars picked in the second round? I can think of Arenas and maybe Van Exel off the top of my head.

What was Shane categorized as? Starter?

Yeah, to me a marginal guy is a guy who at least hung around for awhile, stayed in the league, maybe bounced around, but not a real impact guy, doesn't have a full length career. Like Brandan Wright, for example. A washout is a guy like Will Avery (and a ton of European draftees) who were just out of the league in 2-3 years, or less.

I categorized Shane as a starter, though he hasn't always been one, and he could've also been labeled a pension man.

As to the second round All-Stars, I messed up. Probably due to the fact that I did this at almost midnight last night when I should've been asleep. But there have actually been 14 guys drafted in the second round (or not at all) in the 25 years I looked at that have gone on to play in at least one all-star game, not just 7 guys.

The 14 are: (with draft year)

1986 - Kevin Duckworth, Jeff Hornacek
1989 - Clifford Robinson
1990 - Antonio Davis, Cedric Ceballos
1993 - Nick Van Exel
1998 - Rashard Lewis, Brad Miller (undrafted)
1999 - Manu Ginobili
2000 - Michael Redd
2001 - Gilbert Arenas and Mehmet Okur
2002 - Carlos Boozer
2003 - Mo Williams

Nobody since the 2003 draft.

[JasonEvans]

Fabulous research, tommy! is it possible for you to post the spreadsheet for all of us to peruse? Also, I have given you rep points recently so I could not give you points for this post but I urge others to give tommy pitchfork points! This is the kind of stuff that deserves a rep bump!

-Jason

[jimsumner]

Yeah, to me a marginal guy is a guy who at least hung around for awhile, stayed in the league, maybe bounced around, but not a real impact guy, doesn't have a full length career. Like Brandan Wright, for example. A washout is a guy like Will Avery (and a ton of European draftees) who were just out of the league in 2-3 years, or less.

I categorized Shane as a starter, though he hasn't always been one, and he could've also been labeled a pension man.

As to the second round All-Stars, I messed up. Probably due to the fact that I did this at almost midnight last night when I should've been asleep. But there have actually been 14 guys drafted in the second round (or not at all) in the 25 years I looked at that have gone on to play in at least one all-star game, not just 7 guys.

The 14 are: (with draft year)

1986 - Kevin Duckworth, Jeff Hornacek
1989 - Clifford Robinson
1990 - Antonio Davis, Cedric Ceballos
1993 - Nick Van Exel
1998 - Rashard Lewis, Brad Miller (undrafted)
1999 - Manu Ginobili
2000 - Michael Redd
2001 - Gilbert Arenas and Mehmet Okur
2002 - Carlos Boozer
2003 - Mo Williams

Nobody since the 2003 draft.

Mark Price was a second-round pick in 1986.

[JasonEvans]

As to the second round All-Stars, I messed up. Probably due to the fact that I did this at almost midnight last night when I should've been asleep. But there have actually been 14 guys drafted in the second round (or not at all) in the 25 years I looked at that have gone on to play in at least one all-star game, not just 7 guys.

The 14 are: (with draft year)

1986 - Kevin Duckworth, Jeff Hornacek
1989 - Clifford Robinson
1990 - Antonio Davis, Cedric Ceballos
1993 - Nick Van Exel
1998 - Rashard Lewis, Brad Miller (undrafted)
1999 - Manu Ginobili
2000 - Michael Redd
2001 - Gilbert Arenas and Mehmet Okur
2002 - Carlos Boozer
2003 - Mo Williams

Nobody since the 2003 draft.

Interesting that there has not been one since 2003, an 8 year gap, which is longer than any gap in previous history. Still, part of that may be that 2nd rounders from the past few years are still waiting to develop into All-stars.

That said, there are not many 2nd rounders having much of an impact in the NBA right now from the past few years. The guys with the best shots at being future All-stars, in my mind, would be Dejaun Blair (once Timmy D retires), Mario Chalmers (who could go unguarded as everyone pays attention to Wade and Bron-bron), and perhaps Omer Asik (who showed me some potential for the Bulls in the playoffs).

-Jason "again, fabulous research!" Evans

[tommy]

Mark Price was a second-round pick in 1986.

True. But he was the 25th overall pick. I had noticed that he and Rodman were both second rounders that year (Rodman was 27th), but because more recent drafts have 30 first round selections, I kind of considered for my purposes that picks 1 through 30 were "first round" and #31 began the second. Or maybe I was just really tired when I was doing this and just messed it up!

[gwlaw99]

As a Sixers fan, I will throw in Shawn Bradley.

[tommy]

Fabulous research, tommy! is it possible for you to post the spreadsheet for all of us to peruse? Also, I have given you rep points recently so I could not give you points for this post but I urge others to give tommy pitchfork points! This is the kind of stuff that deserves a rep bump!

-Jason

Thanks Jason. Appreciate it. I know my categorizing of guys is so subjective, and many would I'm sure disagree with some of them, but what can you do?

I'm happy to post the Excel spreadsheet. But how to do it on the board?

Interesting that there has not been one since 2003, an 8 year gap, which is longer than any gap in previous history. Still, part of that may be that 2nd rounders from the past few years are still waiting to develop into All-stars.

That said, there are not many 2nd rounders having much of an impact in the NBA right now from the past few years. The guys with the best shots at being future All-stars, in my mind, would be Dejaun Blair (once Timmy D retires), Mario Chalmers (who could go unguarded as everyone pays attention to Wade and Bron-bron), and perhaps Omer Asik (who showed me some potential for the Bulls in the playoffs).

-Jason "again, fabulous research!" Evans

I thought that 8 year gap was interesting too. I took from it the possibility that the drafting is getting more sophisticated, so that guys with real All-Star potential are not getting "missed" and falling to the second round like they used to.

Another set of data that is easily gleaned from the spreadsheet is the relative strengths and weaknesses of each year's draft. That has been discussed in a couple of different threads already. Conventional wisdom states that the '96, '99, and '03 drafts were three of the strongest in modern times. Sure enough, the '96 draft yielded 4 Hall of Famers and 5 other All-Stars in the first round; the '99 draft yielded 8 All-Stars, and the '03 had 1 HOF'er (projected LeBron) and 6 other All-Stars.

On the other end of the spectrum, the '86, 2000, and 2006 drafts are considered to be the worst by may observers. The numbers back up these perceptions. The '86 draft's first round ended up producing just 1 HOF'er and 2 All-Stars; the 2000 produced no HOF'ers and just 2 All-Stars, and the 2006 draft, while guys can still develop and achieve, of course, at this point appears to have no HOF'ers and only 2 All-Stars. Not too hot.

By the way, I have the '91 first round as having the most Washouts, with 15. Upon looking closer at all the names, I may have unfairly put one or two guys in that category, who rightfully belong as "Marginals." I'm sure there are a lot of guys that upon further reflection I would move up or down one category, especially considering the lines between the categories -- other than All-Stars and HOF'ers of course, are blurry.

[bdeviled11]

He was the 2nd overall pick in 2001, and has pretty much been labeled a bust ever since. What if he was taken 30th overall? What would the perception of him be? To me it really isn't fair to label players as "busts", they don't have any control where they are taken.

To me, teams and talent evaluators should be taken to task much more than the players. I'd like to see a list of the best drafting teams in the NBA, and off the top of my head, historically, the Utah Jazz, and San Antonio Spurs have been pretty wise in their draft picks. So I did a quick google search.

Then I found this link with some somewhat surprising results.

http://www.82games.com/bestdraftingteams.htm

The Milwaukee Bucks are the best drafters? Crazy.

Take a look at this link too:

http://www.82games.com/starsandbusts.htm

They have some really surprising results.

[jimsumner]

True. But he was the 25th overall pick. I had noticed that he and Rodman were both second rounders that year (Rodman was 27th), but because more recent drafts have 30 first round selections, I kind of considered for my purposes that picks 1 through 30 were "first round" and #31 began the second. Or maybe I was just really tired when I was doing this and just messed it up!

The '86 draft is fascinating. The first-round was a train wreck. Drugs derailed the careers of Len Bias (2), Chris Washburn (3), William Bedford (6), Roy Tarpley (7) and Pearl Washington (13). John Williams (12) ate himself out of the league. Brad Daugherty (1) was an all-star but chronic back problems shortened his career. Johnny Dawkins (10) never got back all of his quickness following a knee injury, while Mark Alarie (18) suffered a career-ending injury. Others-Walter Berry, Maurice Martin, Ken Barlow--just weren't that good.

But look at what happened after the first round. Mark Price, Dennis Rodman, Nate McMillan, Johnny Newman, Kevin Duckworth, Jeff Hornacek, Drazen Petrovic. Even afterthoughts like Andre Turner or Kenny Gattison stuck around longer than many of the glamour guys.

A curious draft. I trust more than a few front-office types had their held to the fire for this one.

[darjum]

The '86 draft is fascinating. The first-round was a train wreck. Drugs derailed the careers of Len Bias (2), Chris Washburn (3), William Bedford (6), Roy Tarpley (7) and Pearl Washington (13). John Williams (12) ate himself out of the league. Brad Daugherty (1) was an all-star but chronic back problems shortened his career. Johnny Dawkins (10) never got back all of his quickness following a knee injury, while Mark Alarie (18) suffered a career-ending injury. Others-Walter Berry, Maurice Martin, Ken Barlow--just weren't that good.

But look at what happened after the first round. Mark Price, Dennis Rodman, Nate McMillan, Johnny Newman, Kevin Duckworth, Jeff Hornacek, Drazen Petrovic. Even afterthoughts like Andre Turner or Kenny Gattison stuck around longer than many of the glamour guys.

A curious draft. I trust more than a few front-office types had their held to the fire for this one.

I still believe that Roy Tarpley is one of the most physically dominate players I ever watched play, had drugs not have consumed his career the possibilities were endless. Such a shame when people can't meet their potential based on personal demons. But in the end he is a bust...

[FourWins]

I'm happy to post the Excel spreadsheet. But how to do it on the board?

At docs.google.com, you can upload and share the file

---

[hq2]

That '86 draft was kind of weird. However, I don't think anyone could have predicted that that many top players would burn out. Also, if you examine the second round, most of those players had clear deficiencies that made them questionable NBA players, which each of them somehow managed to overcome. You can't really fault the front offices for how they drafted.

[uh_no]

I don't think anyone's mentioned Haseem Thabeet - #2 overall pick, went immediately to the D-League (which is rare, usually a top 3-5 pick gets to start no matter what), I think he's made it back to the NBA but isn't doing much.

Funny how many of these busts are big men. You'd think it would be the other way around, as guards rely on a lot of intangibles that are hard to quantify, but at the same time bigs take longer to develop and they tend to get drafted just for being big.

I was going to mention him. He was always a bit of a head case at Uconn, and never really had an offensive skill set (what he did have was size and length...which allowed him to pretty much do whatever)...he was of course the best defender in the country while he was in school, but never did well against guys stronger than him...the guys at ND and Pitt beat him up a couple times...I think he's the classic come from modest background, get NBA paycheck, pack it in kind of guy (to his credit he's very smart though...)...shame he didn't have a shot at Hans-bro in the title game