Most of the arguments I've read here are amusing and make absolutely no sense.
The only way Dunn would have been a better pick is if we were certain we wanted to trade it later, but if we want to keep the pick then Brown was among the better prospects that filled a gap for the team. Also please keep in mind Dunn is 22 while Brown is 19, so any comparisons between Brown and Dunn should factor in that one has 3 more years of organized basketball experience and coaching. If you need to compare the two, you should compare 19-year-old Brown with 19-year-old Dunn that averaged 6pts, 3asts and 2turnovers a game.
How can you judge someone's BBIQ in summer league where everyone is playing for very different reasons? Guys aren't passing, not in the right spots, not setting proper screens, etc. Players aren't concerned with the right basketball play, but fighting for their shot. This is not team basketball, but an individual showcase where an individual player goes off. Simmons seems to be the exception, but his job is secured.
He has come in as a rookie, with solid work ethic and natural talent... everything else can be taught.
So these are the reasons:
No one else had him at #3
Most every one else had Dunn at #3
He's incredibly raw -- did he coast through HS and college on his athletic ability? That contradicts his "incredible work ethic." So which is it? He sucks... or he didn't try to develop himself in a basketball player? He would be just as well served in the NFL, as of now.
Dunn proved he can play at a high level in the NBA. He has elite size for his position and quite possibly better than average NBA skill. When was the last time we drafted anyone with possibly higher than average NBA skill?
I want Brown to prove us wrong. There are also a lot of folks here that want us to contend now -- which is silly to me, I'm fine with a slow progression. But at the end of the day, Dunn was a much safer bet than Brown.
I definitely think Dunn was the third best player in the draft (maybe higher), hands down, but anyone who projected him to us at three is simply drafting based on Youtube videos and not based on team personnel needs, unless for the sole purpose was a trade. We simply don't need to draft a starting PG. IT is the face of the franchise and our biggest recruiter. Bringing in Dunn would have screwed with IT because it would have been a clear signal that we brought in your replacement... this is an issue IT has faced before. Then some "wise" GM would say "Just trade IT"... if we do that to our main recruiter this will screw with our image to other top Free Agents especially now when players are looking for "loyalty". So unless there is a big decline in IT, we will not be drafting a top prospect PG any time soon... just our reality. And I'm fine with that... we have so many other needs
To say no one had him at #3 is wrong, several projections had him there, especially as it got closer to the draft and buzz started. I've seen draft projections that even had us taking Chriss at #3... reason being that we are a team that needed a serious jolt of athleticism.
He didn't coast through college, he simply came out of the system 3 years earlier than Dunn. Nothing is wrong with Brown or the college system, he simply made the jump... now if what you were alluding to is that he should have learnt all that college coaches had for him in one year then I think that expectation is unrealistic.
It's definitely been a long time since we've drafted persons that projected as "stars" but we normally draft in the teens... those star-projected players are normally few and don't last past #3. But don't forget that players can also develop into stars and don't have to be drafted as one.