would you be satisfied with a 2014 top 5 pick

[hwangjini_1]

I think I’d be “satisfied” with a top 6 pick.  For me it goes like this:

#1 pick - Screaming from the rooftops with joy:
Embiid

Top 3 pick - Ecstatic:
Wiggins
Parker

Top 5 pick - Really excited:
Exum (As intriguing as top 3, but slightly bigger unknown & greater risk based on limited info)
Vonleh (Probably a bigger project, but I love his potential and could easily see him being one of the 3 best players in this draft)

Top 6 pick - Satisfied:
Randle (I agree with others sentiment that he's being undersold.  He'll be a solid NBA player.  Not an ideal match with Sully, but what the C's need right now is talent acquisition and he fits the bill)

When we get to the Aaron Gordon & Marcus Smart zone, that is where my sentiment shifts to disappointed.

good post, good ranking, and best of all it matches my thinking. 

as i see it, there are 5 players in this draft who would make the celtics a much better team in the future, and you spotted them all.

tp, which now give you the rare distinction of having more tps than posts. enjoy it while you can.

[D.o.s.]

I think I’d be “satisfied” with a top 6 pick.  For me it goes like this:

#1 pick - Screaming from the rooftops with joy:
Embiid

Top 3 pick - Ecstatic:
Wiggins
Parker

Top 5 pick - Really excited:
Exum (As intriguing as top 3, but slightly bigger unknown & greater risk based on limited info)
Vonleh (Probably a bigger project, but I love his potential and could easily see him being one of the 3 best players in this draft)

Top 6 pick - Satisfied:
Randle (I agree with others sentiment that he's being undersold.  He'll be a solid NBA player.  Not an ideal match with Sully, but what the C's need right now is talent acquisition and he fits the bill)

When we get to the Aaron Gordon & Marcus Smart zone, that is where my sentiment shifts to disappointed.

Good post. I have to point one thing out however. Exum is not  going pick number 5. There is no way POSSIBLE  Exum goes higher than 4. As much as people don't want to admit it the top 4 picks are already locked in (Embiid,Parker,Wiggins,Exum) Once the the season ends, and the GM's, and the scouts get to see Exum more its over. Outlook: Big, smooth guard with tremendous ball-handling skills and creativity. Outstanding talent and clear-cut NBA prospect. If he can improve his jump-shot, the sky is the limit.

You seem pretty sure of yourself, tankwatch. Are you an NBA scout?

Like the ranking Homer, btw. TP.

He's an Eastern Conference scout with multiple sources

[tankwatch1]

I think I’d be “satisfied” with a top 6 pick.  For me it goes like this:

#1 pick - Screaming from the rooftops with joy:
Embiid

Top 3 pick - Ecstatic:
Wiggins
Parker

Top 5 pick - Really excited:
Exum (As intriguing as top 3, but slightly bigger unknown & greater risk based on limited info)




With all do respect, I have to disagree  with your statement saying there are 5 players who can change the Celtics future. There are 4 period (Embiid,Wiggins,Parker,Exum) Those are the only 4 I feel comfortable saying have a great chance of being a future star. My question for you is, Which other player in the draft are you putting in with those 4 players. There is a HUGE drop off after pick number 4. I'll argue and give major flaws with any player after pick 4.

I can't stress enough how important it is for the Celtics to have a top 4 pick. If your not in the top 4, your missing the party, your the red headed step child, it's a MAJOR disappointment anyway you want to put it.

Pick number 5 is not where the Celtics want to be. Again I ask anyone, honestly which player after the top 4 can you say is in their league.
Vonleh (Probably a bigger project, but I love his potential and could easily see him being one of the 3 best players in this draft)

Top 6 pick - Satisfied:
Randle (I agree with others sentiment that he's being undersold.  He'll be a solid NBA player.  Not an ideal match with Sully, but what the C's need right now is talent acquisition and he fits the bill)

When we get to the Aaron Gordon & Marcus Smart zone, that is where my sentiment shifts to disappointed.

good post, good ranking, and best of all it matches my thinking. 

as i see it, there are 5 players in this draft who would make the celtics a much better team in the future, and you spotted them all.

tp, which now give you the rare distinction of having more tps than posts. enjoy it while you can.

[HomerSapien]

Hahaha.  I should retire while I'm at my peak. 

Too clarify, I agree that Exum is the probable #4 pick.  I grouped him with Vonleh because I think my excitement level would be roughly the same for both (I'm probably a little more of a Vonleh optimist than others) and I think they both have a really high ceiling, albeit with a greater risk factor than the top 3.

I really can't wait for draft day.

[wahz]

Top 3 three pick or bust.

Agreed.

It's not quite the end of the world if the Celtics end up with #4 or #5 but I really want a top 3 pick and would be disappointed if the C's didn't land there.

Thing is that its certainly possible Da takes Exum at 3rd, instead of Parker or Wiggins. I think top 4 is fine but after that its possible there is a drop. As early as late Nov I felt the big drop for "sure thing stars" was after the first two who I thought should be Embiid then Parker. I still feel that way but there will be many good players left.

[LooseCannon]

There is no way POSSIBLE  Exum goes higher than 4.

It is possible that Exum is involved in a horrendous car wreck that injures his back, leading to a long recovery period and concerns that he is at risk for recurring back injury.

[tankwatch1]

Top 3 three pick or bust.

Agreed.

It's not quite the end of the world if the Celtics end up with #4 or #5 but I really want a top 3 pick and would be disappointed if the C's didn't land there.


Pick 5 is the end of the world for me

Thing is that its certainly possible Da takes Exum at 3rd, instead of Parker or Wiggins. I think top 4 is fine but after that its possible there is a drop. As early as late Nov I felt the big drop for "sure thing stars" was after the first two who I thought should be Embiid then Parker. I still feel that way but there will be many good players left.

[D.o.s.]

There is no way POSSIBLE  Exum goes higher than 4.

It is possible that Exum is involved in a horrendous car wreck that injures his back, leading to a long recovery period and concerns that he is at risk for recurring back injury.

I don't think they have cars in 'Straya, though. They ride dingos for day trips and well-conditioned bogans for long journeys.

[chambers]

I believe it is possible to build a contender without a top five pick.

Without drafting one, without using the pick in a trade, or without having one on your roster?

Are the Pacers a contender this year? 

And I don't think you should count acquiring a former top five pick via trade or free agency, either.  It is possible- reasonable even- for the Celtics to be able to build a contender in the next few years without ever picking in the top five, whether they keep the player or trade the pick.

I figured you'd cite the Pacers, but really I just wanted to know if you'd count having a top 5 pick and trading it away counted as "building a contender without a top five pick."

Well, it's definitely been possible doing it the opposite way (not drafting in the top-5, but at some point trading (or using free agency) to _bring_ a "top 5 pick" talent onto the team).   That has been the most common pattern to get teams over the hump from 'playoff team' to 'title contender'.

Some useful truisms are:

1) Almost all title winning teams have at least a couple of top-5-drafted players as key players.  Duh-uh.  You need top talent to win.

2) The vast majority of top-5-drafted talent will end up moving to other teams before they end up on a contender.

3) Only a couple of top-5-drafted players in recent decades have managed to contribute to winning the title on the team that drafted them.

While I'm eager and hopeful that we get a good draft spot and get great value out of this draft, I'm simply not going to stress out over it if we end up picking, say, 10th or whatever.   The historical trends are that having a top-5 pick isn't that big of a deal towards getting back to a title.   I won't complain if we get one.  But it won't be the end of the world if we don't.

If we don't end up with a top pick, Danny will just have to do some trade magic at some point to get that guy from some other team.   Neither path back to the finals is necessarily going to be faster or slower.

I agree with most of your points here, except I think most people don't realize:

1)how many championship teams or teams that reach the NBA finals do so with at least one of their own top 5-10 picks.
2)How difficult it is to actually win an NBA championship...when only the very best franchises in the NBA control the NBA championship trophy cabinet. How many franchises have won the trophy in the last 25 years?

We're talking about top 5 picks here specifically in this topic, but looking at points 2 and 3 you made, if you change the pick to top 10, pretty much every title team in the last 20 years has at least their own top 10 drafted player and has added to that core.
If you re-worded point 3, most of those guys who left their team were  pretty much conference finals or NBA finals appearance guys who's management could never build around them due to luck or bad choices etc..

How many of the last 20 years of championships have not been won by teams with their own top 5 or 10 pick (franchise guys in most cases- bench All Stars in worst cases) in place already?

Stars to attract stars and developing your own players is key, but....

Looking at the last 20 seasons of NBA champions and NBA finalists, you'll notice that every team that won or made the finals had their own drafted top 10 pick, The exceptions are the Pistons and Kobe on the Lakers- again another example where he went 14th but if he had to play in college was a top 5 prospect quite easily. They acquired the pick (player)by trading Divac.

Anyway, the list of those home-drafted NBA finalist/champs is:

Wade-Miami x3 +finals appearance. Pick number 3 (added Shaq)
Duncan- Spurs x 3(or 4?) +finals appearance Pick number 1 (joined Robinson first championship as rookie)
Pierce x1 2 +finals appearance Pick Number 10 (added KG + Ray Allen)
Dirk Nowitzki x 1 Pick number 9 (drafted by Mavs, added Tyson Chandler DPOY)
Lebron 1x finals appearance Cleveland Pick 1 (drafted by Cavs, added scraps lol)
Kobe 3+ 1 finals appearance pick 13 (Highschool) Draft day trade by Lakers. (added Shaq, Added Gasol, Drafted Bynum)
Bynum x 1 pick 10 (high school)
Shaq 1 in Orlando Pick number 1
Penny Hardaway 1 in Orlando Via first round pick, attained via trading away Chris Webber
Howard 1 in Orlando pick 1
Durant 2x finals appearance pick 2
Westbrook 2x finals appearance

Lets go back a bit further

Nets Kenyton Martin x 2 finals appearances pick number 1. (added Kidd)
Pacers Reggie Miller pick number 11
Knicks Patrick Ewing pick 1
Allan Houston pick 11
Bulls Jordan x 6 pick 3
Pippen x 6 pick 5
Jazz Malone x2 finals pick 13 (Added Jeff Malone)
Stockton x 2 finals pick 16
Sonics Gary Payton pick 2 (Added Perkins, Schrempf)
Shawn Kemp pick 17
Houston Olajuwan pick 1 x 2 championships (added Drexler + Thorpe)
Spurs David Robinson pick 1 (added Duncan)

The math holds a monstrous truism that without your own top 5 or 10 draft pick in place (who's become an All Star), the odds are STACKED against you.

  People get a little too into dissecting previous teams IMO. It's true most title teams have players that they drafted in the top 10. It's also true that most teams that don't win titles have players on their roster that they drafted with a top 5-10 pick. Also, you're pointing out that the vast majority of these title teams have players that they picked in the top 5-10 that became all-stars. We have Rondo, who we drafted and who became an all-star. If we'd have traded up and drafted him 10th would we suddenly be more likely to win a title? Of course not. Some people (not necessarily you) argue that we need to pick top 5 because other champions did like there's magic involved, and we're basically doomed if we don't get such a pick.

Of course, the Bobcats and Cavs have had plenty of top 10 picks over the years, a few of them have been All Stars too.
 I mean top 10 picks that turn into top 10 players in the NBA- particularly guys who are 'go to' in the final minutes of the game. Rondo (IMO) is a top 20-25 player at full health, maybe even better. He's had some great playoff series and if we judged him off this small sample size or his last playoff series he'd be a top 10 player. Why isn't he easily in the top 10 or better?

I'd argue that he's not a regularly reliable 'go to' guy in the scoring sense that can get an easy, reliable shot off on his own- when the team needs someone to take over like Pierce. Rondo will do one of the best jobs in the NBA of finding Pierce for his isolation move, but the very best guys in the game are those who you have faith in giving the ball with 20 seconds left to make a tough basket.
Rondo's shooting looks like it's getting pretty good at the moment- but I don't think he's ever been confident enough in his own shot to be 'the guy' in those stages of the game. We've argued/compared Chris Paul to Rondo and I think we both came to the conclusion that CP3 was slightly better than Rondo if by a tiny amount.
 Why does CP3 generally get the nod over Rondo 'overall'? Because you can give him the ball every possession for the last 10 possessions and tell him to score the basket on his own OR make the correct pass feeling confident that he'll usually get off a high percentage shot, or get to the free throw line and convert, or make a great assist. There's pretty much CP3 and Tony Parker (or younger Nash) that can do this at the PG spot.
It's the one key 'x factor' that Rondo's been missing in his game. To his credit he's realized this and has been working on the jumpshot/shooting to take his game to that final level.

Those players control the NBA trophy cabinet, and pretty much every championship team on that list has had one of those top 10 players, whom they drafted themselves. They may have added to him to become a true contender but his presence meant the organization decided he had the mojo and confidence in him to be that building block. I'm not sure if Danny thinks that's what Rondo is yet. Maybe he does.

The good news is that if Rondo's new and improved shooting stays like this for the rest of his career, and he gets his 2p FG% back to where it was pre-injury- and lastly gets 90% of his athleticism back over the next 8-12 months we could be looking at our own top 10 player in the NBA who wasn't picked in the top 10- something quite rare in the NBA.
The task then is surrounding him with more top 10-25 players and hoping we don't get more injuries.
Fingers crossed.

I've gone close to wandering off topic but we still don't have one of those guys on our roster. Just because we get a pick in the top 10 doesn't mean that player will pan out, but those players generally come from top 5 to 10 picks in the lottery, and teams that win NBA championships have those players, generally one they drafted themselves or sometimes in much rarer case- a guy they drafted themselves outside the top 10, that has beaten the odds and worked his way into the top 10 to become a 'go to' guy in the NBA.

Fact= we don't have a top 10 player yet.
Fact= the majority of NBA championship teams have a top 10 player whom they drafted themselves in the top 10 and built around.

[mmmmm]

I believe it is possible to build a contender without a top five pick.

Without drafting one, without using the pick in a trade, or without having one on your roster?

Are the Pacers a contender this year? 

And I don't think you should count acquiring a former top five pick via trade or free agency, either.  It is possible- reasonable even- for the Celtics to be able to build a contender in the next few years without ever picking in the top five, whether they keep the player or trade the pick.

I figured you'd cite the Pacers, but really I just wanted to know if you'd count having a top 5 pick and trading it away counted as "building a contender without a top five pick."

Well, it's definitely been possible doing it the opposite way (not drafting in the top-5, but at some point trading (or using free agency) to _bring_ a "top 5 pick" talent onto the team).   That has been the most common pattern to get teams over the hump from 'playoff team' to 'title contender'.

Some useful truisms are:

1) Almost all title winning teams have at least a couple of top-5-drafted players as key players.  Duh-uh.  You need top talent to win.

2) The vast majority of top-5-drafted talent will end up moving to other teams before they end up on a contender.

3) Only a couple of top-5-drafted players in recent decades have managed to contribute to winning the title on the team that drafted them.

While I'm eager and hopeful that we get a good draft spot and get great value out of this draft, I'm simply not going to stress out over it if we end up picking, say, 10th or whatever.   The historical trends are that having a top-5 pick isn't that big of a deal towards getting back to a title.   I won't complain if we get one.  But it won't be the end of the world if we don't.

If we don't end up with a top pick, Danny will just have to do some trade magic at some point to get that guy from some other team.   Neither path back to the finals is necessarily going to be faster or slower.

I agree with most of your points here, except I think most people don't realize:

1)how many championship teams or teams that reach the NBA finals do so with at least one of their own top 5-10 picks.
2)How difficult it is to actually win an NBA championship...when only the very best franchises in the NBA control the NBA championship trophy cabinet. How many franchises have won the trophy in the last 25 years?

We're talking about top 5 picks here specifically in this topic, but looking at points 2 and 3 you made, if you change the pick to top 10, pretty much every title team in the last 20 years has at least their own top 10 drafted player and has added to that core.
If you re-worded point 3, most of those guys who left their team were  pretty much conference finals or NBA finals appearance guys who's management could never build around them due to luck or bad choices etc..

How many of the last 20 years of championships have not been won by teams with their own top 5 or 10 pick (franchise guys in most cases- bench All Stars in worst cases) in place already?

Stars to attract stars and developing your own players is key, but....

Looking at the last 20 seasons of NBA champions and NBA finalists, you'll notice that every team that won or made the finals had their own drafted top 10 pick, The exceptions are the Pistons and Kobe on the Lakers- again another example where he went 14th but if he had to play in college was a top 5 prospect quite easily. They acquired the pick (player)by trading Divac.

Anyway, the list of those home-drafted NBA finalist/champs is:

Wade-Miami x3 +finals appearance. Pick number 3 (added Shaq)
Duncan- Spurs x 3(or 4?) +finals appearance Pick number 1 (joined Robinson first championship as rookie)
Pierce x1 2 +finals appearance Pick Number 10 (added KG + Ray Allen)
Dirk Nowitzki x 1 Pick number 9 (drafted by Mavs, added Tyson Chandler DPOY)
Lebron 1x finals appearance Cleveland Pick 1 (drafted by Cavs, added scraps lol)
Kobe 3+ 1 finals appearance pick 13 (Highschool) Draft day trade by Lakers. (added Shaq, Added Gasol, Drafted Bynum)
Bynum x 1 pick 10 (high school)
Shaq 1 in Orlando Pick number 1
Penny Hardaway 1 in Orlando Via first round pick, attained via trading away Chris Webber
Howard 1 in Orlando pick 1
Durant 2x finals appearance pick 2
Westbrook 2x finals appearance

Lets go back a bit further

Nets Kenyton Martin x 2 finals appearances pick number 1. (added Kidd)
Pacers Reggie Miller pick number 11
Knicks Patrick Ewing pick 1
Allan Houston pick 11
Bulls Jordan x 6 pick 3
Pippen x 6 pick 5
Jazz Malone x2 finals pick 13 (Added Jeff Malone)
Stockton x 2 finals pick 16
Sonics Gary Payton pick 2 (Added Perkins, Schrempf)
Shawn Kemp pick 17
Houston Olajuwan pick 1 x 2 championships (added Drexler + Thorpe)
Spurs David Robinson pick 1 (added Duncan)

The math holds a monstrous truism that without your own top 5 or 10 draft pick in place (who's become an All Star), the odds are STACKED against you.

  People get a little too into dissecting previous teams IMO. It's true most title teams have players that they drafted in the top 10. It's also true that most teams that don't win titles have players on their roster that they drafted with a top 5-10 pick. Also, you're pointing out that the vast majority of these title teams have players that they picked in the top 5-10 that became all-stars. We have Rondo, who we drafted and who became an all-star. If we'd have traded up and drafted him 10th would we suddenly be more likely to win a title? Of course not. Some people (not necessarily you) argue that we need to pick top 5 because other champions did like there's magic involved, and we're basically doomed if we don't get such a pick.

Of course, the Bobcats and Cavs have had plenty of top 10 picks over the years, a few of them have been All Stars too.
 I mean top 10 picks that turn into top 10 players in the NBA- particularly guys who are 'go to' in the final minutes of the game. Rondo (IMO) is a top 20-25 player at full health, maybe even better. He's had some great playoff series and if we judged him off this small sample size or his last playoff series he'd be a top 10 player. Why isn't he easily in the top 10 or better?

I'd argue that he's not a regularly reliable 'go to' guy in the scoring sense that can get an easy, reliable shot off on his own- when the team needs someone to take over like Pierce. Rondo will do one of the best jobs in the NBA of finding Pierce for his isolation move, but the very best guys in the game are those who you have faith in giving the ball with 20 seconds left to make a tough basket.
Rondo's shooting looks like it's getting pretty good at the moment- but I don't think he's ever been confident enough in his own shot to be 'the guy' in those stages of the game. We've argued/compared Chris Paul to Rondo and I think we both came to the conclusion that CP3 was slightly better than Rondo if by a tiny amount.
 Why does CP3 generally get the nod over Rondo 'overall'? Because you can give him the ball every possession for the last 10 possessions and tell him to score the basket on his own OR make the correct pass feeling confident that he'll usually get off a high percentage shot, or get to the free throw line and convert, or make a great assist. There's pretty much CP3 and Tony Parker (or younger Nash) that can do this at the PG spot.
It's the one key 'x factor' that Rondo's been missing in his game. To his credit he's realized this and has been working on the jumpshot/shooting to take his game to that final level.

Those players control the NBA trophy cabinet, and pretty much every championship team on that list has had one of those top 10 players, whom they drafted themselves. They may have added to him to become a true contender but his presence meant the organization decided he had the mojo and confidence in him to be that building block. I'm not sure if Danny thinks that's what Rondo is yet. Maybe he does.

The good news is that if Rondo's new and improved shooting stays like this for the rest of his career, and he gets his 2p FG% back to where it was pre-injury- and lastly gets 90% of his athleticism back over the next 8-12 months we could be looking at our own top 10 player in the NBA who wasn't picked in the top 10- something quite rare in the NBA.
The task then is surrounding him with more top 10-25 players and hoping we don't get more injuries.
Fingers crossed.

I've gone close to wandering off topic but we still don't have one of those guys on our roster. Just because we get a pick in the top 10 doesn't mean that player will pan out, but those players generally come from top 5 to 10 picks in the lottery, and teams that win NBA championships have those players, generally one they drafted themselves or sometimes in much rarer case- a guy they drafted themselves outside the top 10, that has beaten the odds and worked his way into the top 10 to become a 'go to' guy in the NBA.

Fact= we don't have a top 10 player yet.
Fact= the majority of NBA championship teams have a top 10 player whom they drafted themselves in the top 10 and built around.

I think you have successfully driven this thread way off the rails from where my comments were.

I pretty clearly was talking about 'top-5 draft picks'.   You promptly shifted the discussion over to 'top-10-draft picks'.   And now, you've moved the bar over to 'top-10 picks who become top-10-in-the-NBA' (an extremely rare commodity).

The convenience for you there is that sort of ranking becomes a completely subjective argument (whether a player is 'top X in the NBA').

I'll pass on this argument.

[BballTim]

I believe it is possible to build a contender without a top five pick.

Without drafting one, without using the pick in a trade, or without having one on your roster?

Are the Pacers a contender this year? 

And I don't think you should count acquiring a former top five pick via trade or free agency, either.  It is possible- reasonable even- for the Celtics to be able to build a contender in the next few years without ever picking in the top five, whether they keep the player or trade the pick.

I figured you'd cite the Pacers, but really I just wanted to know if you'd count having a top 5 pick and trading it away counted as "building a contender without a top five pick."

Well, it's definitely been possible doing it the opposite way (not drafting in the top-5, but at some point trading (or using free agency) to _bring_ a "top 5 pick" talent onto the team).   That has been the most common pattern to get teams over the hump from 'playoff team' to 'title contender'.

Some useful truisms are:

1) Almost all title winning teams have at least a couple of top-5-drafted players as key players.  Duh-uh.  You need top talent to win.

2) The vast majority of top-5-drafted talent will end up moving to other teams before they end up on a contender.

3) Only a couple of top-5-drafted players in recent decades have managed to contribute to winning the title on the team that drafted them.

While I'm eager and hopeful that we get a good draft spot and get great value out of this draft, I'm simply not going to stress out over it if we end up picking, say, 10th or whatever.   The historical trends are that having a top-5 pick isn't that big of a deal towards getting back to a title.   I won't complain if we get one.  But it won't be the end of the world if we don't.

If we don't end up with a top pick, Danny will just have to do some trade magic at some point to get that guy from some other team.   Neither path back to the finals is necessarily going to be faster or slower.

I agree with most of your points here, except I think most people don't realize:

1)how many championship teams or teams that reach the NBA finals do so with at least one of their own top 5-10 picks.
2)How difficult it is to actually win an NBA championship...when only the very best franchises in the NBA control the NBA championship trophy cabinet. How many franchises have won the trophy in the last 25 years?

We're talking about top 5 picks here specifically in this topic, but looking at points 2 and 3 you made, if you change the pick to top 10, pretty much every title team in the last 20 years has at least their own top 10 drafted player and has added to that core.
If you re-worded point 3, most of those guys who left their team were  pretty much conference finals or NBA finals appearance guys who's management could never build around them due to luck or bad choices etc..

How many of the last 20 years of championships have not been won by teams with their own top 5 or 10 pick (franchise guys in most cases- bench All Stars in worst cases) in place already?

Stars to attract stars and developing your own players is key, but....

Looking at the last 20 seasons of NBA champions and NBA finalists, you'll notice that every team that won or made the finals had their own drafted top 10 pick, The exceptions are the Pistons and Kobe on the Lakers- again another example where he went 14th but if he had to play in college was a top 5 prospect quite easily. They acquired the pick (player)by trading Divac.

Anyway, the list of those home-drafted NBA finalist/champs is:

Wade-Miami x3 +finals appearance. Pick number 3 (added Shaq)
Duncan- Spurs x 3(or 4?) +finals appearance Pick number 1 (joined Robinson first championship as rookie)
Pierce x1 2 +finals appearance Pick Number 10 (added KG + Ray Allen)
Dirk Nowitzki x 1 Pick number 9 (drafted by Mavs, added Tyson Chandler DPOY)
Lebron 1x finals appearance Cleveland Pick 1 (drafted by Cavs, added scraps lol)
Kobe 3+ 1 finals appearance pick 13 (Highschool) Draft day trade by Lakers. (added Shaq, Added Gasol, Drafted Bynum)
Bynum x 1 pick 10 (high school)
Shaq 1 in Orlando Pick number 1
Penny Hardaway 1 in Orlando Via first round pick, attained via trading away Chris Webber
Howard 1 in Orlando pick 1
Durant 2x finals appearance pick 2
Westbrook 2x finals appearance

Lets go back a bit further

Nets Kenyton Martin x 2 finals appearances pick number 1. (added Kidd)
Pacers Reggie Miller pick number 11
Knicks Patrick Ewing pick 1
Allan Houston pick 11
Bulls Jordan x 6 pick 3
Pippen x 6 pick 5
Jazz Malone x2 finals pick 13 (Added Jeff Malone)
Stockton x 2 finals pick 16
Sonics Gary Payton pick 2 (Added Perkins, Schrempf)
Shawn Kemp pick 17
Houston Olajuwan pick 1 x 2 championships (added Drexler + Thorpe)
Spurs David Robinson pick 1 (added Duncan)

The math holds a monstrous truism that without your own top 5 or 10 draft pick in place (who's become an All Star), the odds are STACKED against you.

  People get a little too into dissecting previous teams IMO. It's true most title teams have players that they drafted in the top 10. It's also true that most teams that don't win titles have players on their roster that they drafted with a top 5-10 pick. Also, you're pointing out that the vast majority of these title teams have players that they picked in the top 5-10 that became all-stars. We have Rondo, who we drafted and who became an all-star. If we'd have traded up and drafted him 10th would we suddenly be more likely to win a title? Of course not. Some people (not necessarily you) argue that we need to pick top 5 because other champions did like there's magic involved, and we're basically doomed if we don't get such a pick.

Of course, the Bobcats and Cavs have had plenty of top 10 picks over the years, a few of them have been All Stars too.
 I mean top 10 picks that turn into top 10 players in the NBA- particularly guys who are 'go to' in the final minutes of the game. Rondo (IMO) is a top 20-25 player at full health, maybe even better. He's had some great playoff series and if we judged him off this small sample size or his last playoff series he'd be a top 10 player. Why isn't he easily in the top 10 or better?

I'd argue that he's not a regularly reliable 'go to' guy in the scoring sense that can get an easy, reliable shot off on his own- when the team needs someone to take over like Pierce. Rondo will do one of the best jobs in the NBA of finding Pierce for his isolation move, but the very best guys in the game are those who you have faith in giving the ball with 20 seconds left to make a tough basket.
Rondo's shooting looks like it's getting pretty good at the moment- but I don't think he's ever been confident enough in his own shot to be 'the guy' in those stages of the game. We've argued/compared Chris Paul to Rondo and I think we both came to the conclusion that CP3 was slightly better than Rondo if by a tiny amount.
 Why does CP3 generally get the nod over Rondo 'overall'? Because you can give him the ball every possession for the last 10 possessions and tell him to score the basket on his own OR make the correct pass feeling confident that he'll usually get off a high percentage shot, or get to the free throw line and convert, or make a great assist. There's pretty much CP3 and Tony Parker (or younger Nash) that can do this at the PG spot.
It's the one key 'x factor' that Rondo's been missing in his game. To his credit he's realized this and has been working on the jumpshot/shooting to take his game to that final level.

Those players control the NBA trophy cabinet, and pretty much every championship team on that list has had one of those top 10 players, whom they drafted themselves.

  Right. So since the main thing you need from a point guard to contend is great scoring down the stretch Rondo's not the guy to have but players like Nash (2 trips to the conference finals and no trips to the finals in 18 years) and Chris Paul (2 playoff series wins in 8 years) "control the NBA trophy cabinet". Got it.

[chambers]

I believe it is possible to build a contender without a top five pick.

Without drafting one, without using the pick in a trade, or without having one on your roster?

Are the Pacers a contender this year? 

And I don't think you should count acquiring a former top five pick via trade or free agency, either.  It is possible- reasonable even- for the Celtics to be able to build a contender in the next few years without ever picking in the top five, whether they keep the player or trade the pick.

I figured you'd cite the Pacers, but really I just wanted to know if you'd count having a top 5 pick and trading it away counted as "building a contender without a top five pick."

Well, it's definitely been possible doing it the opposite way (not drafting in the top-5, but at some point trading (or using free agency) to _bring_ a "top 5 pick" talent onto the team).   That has been the most common pattern to get teams over the hump from 'playoff team' to 'title contender'.

Some useful truisms are:

1) Almost all title winning teams have at least a couple of top-5-drafted players as key players.  Duh-uh.  You need top talent to win.

2) The vast majority of top-5-drafted talent will end up moving to other teams before they end up on a contender.

3) Only a couple of top-5-drafted players in recent decades have managed to contribute to winning the title on the team that drafted them.

While I'm eager and hopeful that we get a good draft spot and get great value out of this draft, I'm simply not going to stress out over it if we end up picking, say, 10th or whatever.   The historical trends are that having a top-5 pick isn't that big of a deal towards getting back to a title.   I won't complain if we get one.  But it won't be the end of the world if we don't.

If we don't end up with a top pick, Danny will just have to do some trade magic at some point to get that guy from some other team.   Neither path back to the finals is necessarily going to be faster or slower.

I agree with most of your points here, except I think most people don't realize:

1)how many championship teams or teams that reach the NBA finals do so with at least one of their own top 5-10 picks.
2)How difficult it is to actually win an NBA championship...when only the very best franchises in the NBA control the NBA championship trophy cabinet. How many franchises have won the trophy in the last 25 years?

We're talking about top 5 picks here specifically in this topic, but looking at points 2 and 3 you made, if you change the pick to top 10, pretty much every title team in the last 20 years has at least their own top 10 drafted player and has added to that core.
If you re-worded point 3, most of those guys who left their team were  pretty much conference finals or NBA finals appearance guys who's management could never build around them due to luck or bad choices etc..

How many of the last 20 years of championships have not been won by teams with their own top 5 or 10 pick (franchise guys in most cases- bench All Stars in worst cases) in place already?

Stars to attract stars and developing your own players is key, but....

Looking at the last 20 seasons of NBA champions and NBA finalists, you'll notice that every team that won or made the finals had their own drafted top 10 pick, The exceptions are the Pistons and Kobe on the Lakers- again another example where he went 14th but if he had to play in college was a top 5 prospect quite easily. They acquired the pick (player)by trading Divac.

Anyway, the list of those home-drafted NBA finalist/champs is:

Wade-Miami x3 +finals appearance. Pick number 3 (added Shaq)
Duncan- Spurs x 3(or 4?) +finals appearance Pick number 1 (joined Robinson first championship as rookie)
Pierce x1 2 +finals appearance Pick Number 10 (added KG + Ray Allen)
Dirk Nowitzki x 1 Pick number 9 (drafted by Mavs, added Tyson Chandler DPOY)
Lebron 1x finals appearance Cleveland Pick 1 (drafted by Cavs, added scraps lol)
Kobe 3+ 1 finals appearance pick 13 (Highschool) Draft day trade by Lakers. (added Shaq, Added Gasol, Drafted Bynum)
Bynum x 1 pick 10 (high school)
Shaq 1 in Orlando Pick number 1
Penny Hardaway 1 in Orlando Via first round pick, attained via trading away Chris Webber
Howard 1 in Orlando pick 1
Durant 2x finals appearance pick 2
Westbrook 2x finals appearance

Lets go back a bit further

Nets Kenyton Martin x 2 finals appearances pick number 1. (added Kidd)
Pacers Reggie Miller pick number 11
Knicks Patrick Ewing pick 1
Allan Houston pick 11
Bulls Jordan x 6 pick 3
Pippen x 6 pick 5
Jazz Malone x2 finals pick 13 (Added Jeff Malone)
Stockton x 2 finals pick 16
Sonics Gary Payton pick 2 (Added Perkins, Schrempf)
Shawn Kemp pick 17
Houston Olajuwan pick 1 x 2 championships (added Drexler + Thorpe)
Spurs David Robinson pick 1 (added Duncan)

The math holds a monstrous truism that without your own top 5 or 10 draft pick in place (who's become an All Star), the odds are STACKED against you.

  People get a little too into dissecting previous teams IMO. It's true most title teams have players that they drafted in the top 10. It's also true that most teams that don't win titles have players on their roster that they drafted with a top 5-10 pick. Also, you're pointing out that the vast majority of these title teams have players that they picked in the top 5-10 that became all-stars. We have Rondo, who we drafted and who became an all-star. If we'd have traded up and drafted him 10th would we suddenly be more likely to win a title? Of course not. Some people (not necessarily you) argue that we need to pick top 5 because other champions did like there's magic involved, and we're basically doomed if we don't get such a pick.

Of course, the Bobcats and Cavs have had plenty of top 10 picks over the years, a few of them have been All Stars too.
 I mean top 10 picks that turn into top 10 players in the NBA- particularly guys who are 'go to' in the final minutes of the game. Rondo (IMO) is a top 20-25 player at full health, maybe even better. He's had some great playoff series and if we judged him off this small sample size or his last playoff series he'd be a top 10 player. Why isn't he easily in the top 10 or better?

I'd argue that he's not a regularly reliable 'go to' guy in the scoring sense that can get an easy, reliable shot off on his own- when the team needs someone to take over like Pierce. Rondo will do one of the best jobs in the NBA of finding Pierce for his isolation move, but the very best guys in the game are those who you have faith in giving the ball with 20 seconds left to make a tough basket.
Rondo's shooting looks like it's getting pretty good at the moment- but I don't think he's ever been confident enough in his own shot to be 'the guy' in those stages of the game. We've argued/compared Chris Paul to Rondo and I think we both came to the conclusion that CP3 was slightly better than Rondo if by a tiny amount.
 Why does CP3 generally get the nod over Rondo 'overall'? Because you can give him the ball every possession for the last 10 possessions and tell him to score the basket on his own OR make the correct pass feeling confident that he'll usually get off a high percentage shot, or get to the free throw line and convert, or make a great assist. There's pretty much CP3 and Tony Parker (or younger Nash) that can do this at the PG spot.
It's the one key 'x factor' that Rondo's been missing in his game. To his credit he's realized this and has been working on the jumpshot/shooting to take his game to that final level.

Those players control the NBA trophy cabinet, and pretty much every championship team on that list has had one of those top 10 players, whom they drafted themselves. They may have added to him to become a true contender but his presence meant the organization decided he had the mojo and confidence in him to be that building block. I'm not sure if Danny thinks that's what Rondo is yet. Maybe he does.

The good news is that if Rondo's new and improved shooting stays like this for the rest of his career, and he gets his 2p FG% back to where it was pre-injury- and lastly gets 90% of his athleticism back over the next 8-12 months we could be looking at our own top 10 player in the NBA who wasn't picked in the top 10- something quite rare in the NBA.
The task then is surrounding him with more top 10-25 players and hoping we don't get more injuries.
Fingers crossed.

I've gone close to wandering off topic but we still don't have one of those guys on our roster. Just because we get a pick in the top 10 doesn't mean that player will pan out, but those players generally come from top 5 to 10 picks in the lottery, and teams that win NBA championships have those players, generally one they drafted themselves or sometimes in much rarer case- a guy they drafted themselves outside the top 10, that has beaten the odds and worked his way into the top 10 to become a 'go to' guy in the NBA.

Fact= we don't have a top 10 player yet.
Fact= the majority of NBA championship teams have a top 10 player whom they drafted themselves in the top 10 and built around.

I think you have successfully driven this thread way off the rails from where my comments were.

I pretty clearly was talking about 'top-5 draft picks'.   You promptly shifted the discussion over to 'top-10-draft picks'.   And now, you've moved the bar over to 'top-10 picks who become top-10-in-the-NBA' (an extremely rare commodity).

The convenience for you there is that sort of ranking becomes a completely subjective argument (whether a player is 'top X in the NBA').

I'll pass on this argument.

Ok well here's the jist... and yes I did go off topic slightly in response to Tim's comment.

Basically...

The clear majority of top 10 players come from top 10 picks. The clear majority of League MVP's come from top 5 picks.
You win titles with MVP players.

What are the best ways to get a perennial MVP contender caliber player on your team?

1) Draft him directly with a top 5 pick.
2) Draft a top 10 player and build a solid core around him, attempting to add an MVP contending player to that top 10 pick when the opportunity arises.

 Firstly you need the top 5 or top 10 pick, then you need to get lucky enough for the pick to actually be good. But if the player is taken in the top 10 in the draft- history says that your chances of winning a title are the highest by either directly drafting the MVP guy or building a team that is an MVP caliber player away from an NBA championship.

If we want to be a true contender in the NBA, a top 5 pick is preference number one. If that's not possible, then a top 10 pick is preference number two.
We currently don't have either of the above. It's a given that the top 10 players in the NBA are All Stars. Tim interpreted what I said as literally needing just an All Star which might have been my fault of wording. What I meant was you need a top 10 NBA player.

The original statement you made was:
3) Only a couple of top-5-drafted players in recent decades have managed to contribute to winning the title on the team that drafted them.

I disagreed with this, saying you need a top 10 draft pick (who eventually beats the odds and does turn into a top 10 player).
I'm saying that a top 5 pick gives you a better shot of getting one of the 10 best players in the draft.(Obviously)
I'll attach a picture to this thread that highlights the importance of getting as high a pick as possible.

Top 5 and top 10 picks are the mecca of the NBA even more now than before. With internet scouting and youtube, finding guys like Dirk, Kobe, Marc Gasol, Nash and Tony Parker outside the top 5 or top 10 will basically be like finding a needle in a haystack and extensive scouting with analytics and hours of video reducing the difficulty of choosing specific players at specific spots.



How important are drafting top 5 and top 10 picks to winning NBA championships?

Here's a great chart/list. Kobe and Dirk being picked overseas is not really accounted for other than Kobe being out of top 10.
I think if Kobe and Dirk were in the USA they would have easily gone top 5 (Kobe's draft was probably the greatest of all time but Kobe being in a different draft after the US college system would have been top 5 easily) Dirk's draft was above average but in the US system he would have killed it.


image hosting

[mmmmm]

The original statement you made was:
3) Only a couple of top-5-drafted players in recent decades have managed to contribute to winning the title on the team that drafted them.

I disagreed with this, saying you need a top 10 draft pick (who eventually beats the odds and does turn into a top 10 player).
I'm saying that a top 5 pick gives you a better shot of getting one of the 10 best players in the draft.(Obviously)

Here is your problem:  You aren't disagreeing with me at all.  You don't get to disagree with that statement of mine anyway because it is not an arguable point.  It is a simple fact.   

You are disagreeing with a completely different contention that nobody made (that you "don't need a top 10 draft pick ... that turns into a top 10 player").

[mmmmm]

Here's a great chart/list. Kobe and Dirk being picked overseas is not really accounted for other than Kobe being out of top 10.
I think if Kobe and Dirk were in the USA they would have easily gone top 5 (Kobe's draft was probably the greatest of all time but Kobe being in a different draft after the US college system would have been top 5 easily) Dirk's draft was above average but in the US system he would have killed it.

Uh?  What are you talking about with Kobe there?

[chambers]

The original statement you made was:
3) Only a couple of top-5-drafted players in recent decades have managed to contribute to winning the title on the team that drafted them.

I disagreed with this, saying you need a top 10 draft pick (who eventually beats the odds and does turn into a top 10 player).
I'm saying that a top 5 pick gives you a better shot of getting one of the 10 best players in the draft.(Obviously)

Here is your problem:  You aren't disagreeing with me at all.  You don't get to disagree with that statement of mine anyway because it is not an arguable point.  It is a simple fact.   

You are disagreeing with a completely different contention that nobody made (that you "don't need a top 10 draft pick ... that turns into a top 10 player").

That's the problem, I'm disagreeing with you because it's not true. It couldn't be further from the truth, and you don't understand the correlation between top 5 picks and championships for the teams that pick them.

We can look at most recent decades if you want. The last 3 decades? 2000's, 1990's and 1980's?

Q: NBA championships won with top 5 draft picks that drafted their best or 2nd best player from 1980 to 2013 (33 years)..


A:25 championships out of 33 seasons.

Q:From 1992 to 2013(See graphic), How many NBA finals appearances have been made by teams with their own top 5 pick as a top 2 player?

A: 33 appearances in 44 finals match ups. That's just back to 1992.

Just from 2013 to the year 2000, there were 6 championships won by teams with their own top 5 pick. If we expanded the filter to top 10 picks, it would be 10 out of 13 years in which the NBA championship winner had their own top 5 or top 10 pick as a top 2 player.

Here's a great chart/list. Kobe and Dirk being picked overseas is not really accounted for other than Kobe being out of top 10.
I think if Kobe and Dirk were in the USA they would have easily gone top 5 (Kobe's draft was probably the greatest of all time but Kobe being in a different draft after the US college system would have been top 5 easily) Dirk's draft was above average but in the US system he would have killed it.

Uh?  What are you talking about with Kobe there?

Sorry I meant if Dirk was in the USA, and Kobe was in the US college system they would probably have gone top 5. Doesn't matter either way though because I don't count them as top 5 picks in my argument.
The graph says something about international heritage but the '*' is on Bryant's name, not Nowitzki's. Not sure why.