4. 2014
The 2014 draft is very interesting. There are a lot of really good players to come out of it, but very few great players. The only two players that as of now, look like they may have a hall of fame case in their future is Joel Embiid (3rd) and Nikola Jokic (41st).
Some of the top picks haven’t really lived up to their hype but are still really good NBA players such as Andrew Wiggins (1st), Jabari Parker (2nd), Aaron Gordon (4th), Dante Exum (5th) and Marcus Smart (6th). These guys are all still awesome NBA players but none of them will likely ever be an all-star and certainly not a hall of famer.
In addition to that, some of the “busts” in this draft aren’t even that bad. The worst picks are guys like Nik Stauskas (8th), Noah Vonleh (9th), Elfrid Payton (10th), Adreian Payne (15th) and James Young (17th). These guys aren’t necessarily bad, but they were just picked far too high.
Some other really solid players to come out of this draft include Julius Randle (7th), Dario Šarić (12th), Zach LaVine (13th), T.J. Warren (14th), Jusuf Nurkic (16th), Gary Harris (19th), Clint Capela (25th), Rodney Hood (23rd), Bogdan Bogdanović (27th), Joe Harris (33rd) and Spencer Dinwiddie (38th).
As mentioned, the top-end talent of this draft doesn’t go much beyond Embiid and Jokić (who is easily the biggest steal of the draft) but the depth of this draft is some of the best ever and that is the reason for it being 4th on this list.