Groundhog Day – What do the Raptors and Clippers Have in Common?

sigh....

Hindsight being 20/20, the list of players that realistically could be playing in a Raptors uniform would have us out of the lottery: Andre Iguodala, Danny Granger, Brandon Roy etc.

But when you hire the village idiot of GMs (Rob Babcock) or fall prey to your own bias (BC with the 'Italian' Bargnani selection), you're sort of destined as an organization to become Clippers North.

Geoff,
for complaining you should be bale to say that were you in the position to make hat call you would have gone for those players. Can you?
If you can't please stop complaining, remember there are plenty and too many people who can tell you what one should have done

Pretty scary statistics Franchise, hopefully BC gets this club back on the right path.

The Clippers stat though really bowled me over! I mean, at what point does a fan base completely give up? You should send this article to Bill Simmons.

You know which team really intrigues me right now. OKC Thunder, and how much does that suck for Seattle.

They are well under the cap and can take a legitimate run at Carlos Boozer. 3rd Pick...Thabeet. And all of a sudden that team is looking pretty nice with Thabeet, Boozer, Durant, Green and Westbrook...a bench with Atkins, Kristic, Sefolosha, Collisons.

Thats a nice team! (maybe a better coach needed)

I've noticed a number of people saying that after the first 3 picks that this draft is very low in talent. It's amasing that of all those hundreds of players in the college ranks and the Europe league, that only the top three would have any impact!!

If I was the GM

Instead of Bosh, Araujo, Charlie V, Graham and Barg

we will have
Captain Kirk, Biedrins, Granger, Jarret Jack and Alridge

To me that's a better team....open for discussion.

Really interesting article Franchise. Hard to argue with the facts you presented - getting a high draft pick year after year does not guarantee success.

It also reinforces what a crap shot the draft is. It's really impossible to tell, with a few exceptions (Lebron ...) which players are going to be able to produce at an NBA level based on their college, high school or European experience. We're always going to see players drafted higher than they should have been based on "upside" or potential; as well as multiple GM's passing on players who become great pros - like Brandon Roy.

Leads me to believe that maybe the true test of a GM is how they assemble a team and establish a philosophy through their coaches, trades and free agent signings, rather than unearthing gems in the draft. You do your due diligence and hope for the best when you’re drafting, but really you don't know.

Finding an under utilized NBA player through a trade or free agency ... that seems to be where good GM's can really make a difference. Seems to be what the really progressive GM's, like Daryl Morey are doing well more so than just relying on the draft.

A good article, but a bit one-sided too. I mean, for every Clippers team out there that is constantly lottery bound, there are those teams that enter the lottery once, then immediately become a good/great team. I'm looking at San Antonio, Cleveland, Portland, this years Bulls and on and on... There have been any number of teams who's fortunes have immediately turned around because of the lottery system. I mean, what would have happened to Cleveland if there was no lottery system and the Lakers wound up with the first pick. There isn't much parody in the league as it stands, but a league where Lebron and Kobe could be on the same team, well, as much as it would be awesome to see, would be boring to pay attention to. My complaint about the league is not that there is a dearth of talent in the draft pool, but that there is a dearth of talent in the GM and coaching pool - to me, that's the league's biggest problem, not the draft system.

Basically the main reasons we currently suck are quite simple, I would find it hard for the most ardent Babcock supporter to argue:

The VC trade and the Araujo draft.

The statement speaks for itself, I could go on for days. These were the most Amateurish moves ever made by the franchise, in a history unfortunately full of them.

Oh....and yes, I was a call centre hack back then (still am) not a professional Sports GM.......but I could tell that the Williams boys weren't gonna have the same return as a 26 year old Carter.

And I knew that you NEVER draft for position....all of us wanted Igoudala.

Yes I've posted this once or twice, but I don't let blame be cast in the wrong direction.....6 out of 7 rookie coaches and 3 out of 4 rookie GM's didn't help either of course.

If anything I'd say we are thought of as kind of a minor league squad of the NBA....ouch.

Want to hear something really scary about the clips. Since 1970 they have had 13 top 3 picks, that is exactly 33% of the drafts. Ouch.

As for the Raptors, I have already posted (like a month ago now) that the Raptors track record in drafts have been less then stellar. I think that Toronto's problems stem from a much more complicated dynamic than just simple incompitance. True they have made some head scratching picks and their 2nd round record is a big 0% but the team also has had a bit of a stumbling block in that they are never bad enough to get a high pick when they it most (I think Toronto has had only 3 top 3 picks since they joined the league and their only 1st overall was in a bad draft year).

Some great comments as per usual.

Rahulan - I love what OKC is doing too although still not sold on Jeff Green. I never thought Portland should have taken Oden over Durant so that was a huge big piece. As McGateway alluded to, Toronto's problem is that they rarely have a high enough pick to get an impact Durant type. When they do, they've done pretty well though. Bosh, Camby, Damon...even Vince a little lower.

And GREAT stat on the Clips and the top 3 picks. I was telling someone this morning that I wanted to do that level of research but ran out of time last night. Unreal, what a disaster. I mean, is there ANY sports franchise that even comes close to that level of ineptitude????

Casey - Totally agree on the dearth of quality GM's and you could even say instead of just bad coaches, lack of cohesiveness between GM's and coaches in regards to these matters. However I don't think this piece is so one-sided. People forget just how terrible the Cavs were during the 90's and the same was true of the Bulls post-MJ for almost a decade. And really, aside from Lebron, who like Duncan is a once in a decade if not more type, there are few teams who have been SINGLE-HANDILY saved via the draft. As many have mentioned, it's the free-agent and post-draft moves that usually earn good GM's their stripes.

Before the next season, he installed an ex-model named Patricia Simmons as assistant GM, putting her at Silas' desk while the coach was on an NBA promotional trip to China.

Speaking of the Clips, just one great quote from this fantastic article on their owner:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=4187729

Really interesting info Franchise. Never know those teams are that bad. Think of making playoffs, BC's record was 2 of 3 while before him the record was 2 of 9.

I got the feeling of one of Harden, DeRozen and Evens will be a Danny Granger type player while the other 2 will be a Gerald Green or Joey Grahm. I am also certain Toronto will end up with the Joey Grahm version of that bunch.

The 18th pick by Minnesota was interesting(or any other early 20 picks). If acquired by Toronto, it gives the team a chance to
a) draft a second wing (Sam Young, DeJuan Summers, Wayne Ellington, Chase Budinger, Terrence Williams might be available) as insurance policy to our 9th pick.
b) draft a back-up PG (Jonny Flynn, Jeff Teague, Ty Lawson might be available)
c) add size to Center (not a lot here but BJ Mullens)

It certainly looks like toronto could use another pick. Hope BC can buy the pick and more importantly steal a good player with it.

renato -- although I can comfortably say that I would've gone with Iguodala, Granger (passed on not once but TWICE), and either Roy or Aldridge... that wasn't the point.

My point is that in HINDSIGHT, the Raptors have been in the position to elevate themselves into perennial contenders -- but have failed to do so due to a number of factors.

And you can apply the same thinking to a lot of these other sad sack franchises.

Casey,

I think it's worth mentioning that the Bulls have been in the lottery nine of the last ten times, and they've had some pretty high picks. I think it's a little premature to call them a good/great team. Or to compare them with Cleveland or San Antonio. They're not much better now than they have been in the last ten years. Given the opportunities they've had (draft wise), I would expect them to be in better shape than they are.

Having said that, they did look pretty damn good in the first round of the playoffs this year. They may come out next season and prove me completely wrong.

Wong,

I'll give you Aaujo and maybe even Graham, but Bosh, Charlie V. and Bargs are all solid picks in my estimation. Hindsight being 20/20, I'd make those picks again if I were in that position.