Teams Drafts that changed the teams in last decade – NBA Feature (Part-1)
In this years’ NBA Draft, the Cleveland Cavaliers hit the jackpot and had the luxury of choosing two of the top five picks available. After weeks of speculations, in which many combinations were fabricated by the NBA moguls, the
Cavs went for a traditional route over the number one draft pick and brought in the consensus favourite Duke Point guard Kyrie Irving.
However, much to the surprise of everybody, the Cavaliers roped in Texas power forward Tristan Thompson fourth overall. At 6 ft 9 in, Tristan is considered by many analysts as an eccentric choice for a power forward.
With most of the dominating power forwards in the league like Kevin Love, Pau Gasol, Chris Bosh and Zach Randolph standing at or near seven, the young rookie is sure to be butchered on the post. What makes it worse is that, the
paint play is already his biggest drawback, with the exception of jump shooting off course. What’s more is that, like most big men around the league (if you consider him big that is), Tristan struggles from the stripe and has been a below 50 percent shooter
in his collegiate career.
However, the Cavs and their scouts must have seen something in the Canadian big and who know that sometime down the years, the duo of Irving and Tristan might bring back the glories of the LeBron James era to the wine and gold,
or perhaps, even go a step further.
For now, we will look as some of the best team drafts of the last decade.
Chicago Bulls – Ben Gordon and Luol Deng
In the same year, when the Orlando Magic brought in the likes of Dwight Howard and Jameer Nelson, the Chicago Bulls roped in Ben Gordon with the number three draft pick. Luol Deng, a British national of Sudanese origin was also
picked up by the Phoenix Suns as the seventh overall.
Ben Gordon was an instant hit in the windy city. As a rookie, Gordon averaged 15.1 points, 2.6 rebounds and 1.9 assists per game on an average playing time of 24.2 minutes per game. In a total of 21 games in that season, Gordon
scored in double figures and won the Rookie of the Month award three times. Although, he could not beat Dwight Howard in the race to the Rookie of the Year award, he did become the first rookie ever to nab the ‘Sixth Man of the Year’ award.
Chicago, who were only a shadow of their past glories after Michael Jordan left them in 1998, marked their first playoff appearance that very year. Gordon would go on to be Chicago’s leading scorer in the next four seasons.
Like Gordon, Chicago also hit a jackpot with Deng. He played in 61 games during the first season and averaged 11.7 points per game. Since then, Deng became a regular in the Bulls starting lineup. Although his wrist injury caused
him major concerns in his career, he really announced himself in the last season, when in combination with Derrick Rose, he guided the Bulls to the best regular season record in the NBA and the Eastern Conference Finals.
In the first game that the Bulls won in the Conference Finals it was Deng, who hounded Miami Heat’s LeBron James and showed that he belonged to the league of the very best forwards. He went on to be a reliable scoring option in
the rest of the series, but the Bulls just didn’t have the resources to contain the star cast of Heat.
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