Vitaly Potapenko (Cavaliers)

Worst Draft Day Decisions in NBA History

It wasn't that Potapenko was all that bad, it's that the players picked directly after him were so incredibly good. Potapenko went 12th. The next three picks were Kobe Bryant, Peja Stoyakovic, and Steve Nash. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo)

The opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Comcast.

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They Drafted Him... Hindsight can often be a real kick in the tail. Nowhere is this more obvious than at the NBA Draft, where every year some teams will make decisions that five years from now will cause them to be mocked by every single hoops fan in their city. Sometimes that decision is who to pick, other times it is picking a future star and then trading him away before he ever plays a game. Here, then, are the worst 15 NBA Draft decisions of the past 30 years.

(One caveat: there had to have been a better player that could have been taken at that spot. For instance, Charles Washburn was a huge bust as the No. 3 pick of the 1986 draft ... but so was every other player in the first round of that draft other than No. 1 pick Brad Daugherty. So the Warriors don't make the list.) —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Lance Murphey)

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Kwame Brown (Wiz... Before the NBA mandated that players had to play one year in college, the biggest role of the dice in basketball was the selection of high school players. And while there have been some that went on to stardom (Kobe, LeBron and Kevin Garnett), others have been monumental busts (Darius Miles, Sebastian Telfair, and DeSagna Diop).

But there was no bigger high school bust than Kwame Brown. He was the first No. 1 pick taken straight from high school, and he never lived up to expectations. Injuries hampered his progress, as well as what many people perceived as a lack of focus. In the Wizards defense, it was a rather weak draft, though they could have had Pau Gasol or Joe Johnson. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo)

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Jonathan Bender ... In the 1999 draft, the Pacers decided to trade away one of their toughest, most beloved players (Antonio Davis), for a high school superstar (Bender). It was a move that may have cost them a championship. Bender was a non-factor during his time in Indiana, while Davis would make his first and only All-Star game while in Toronto. The Pacers certainly could have used Davis's gritty interior play that year in the NBA Finals, where they fell to Shaquille O'Neal and the Lakers in six games. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Tom Olmscheid)

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Nikoloz Tskitish... With the fifth pick in the 2002 Draft, the Nuggets selected a player they had never seen play live. After a few years, Nuggets fans wished they had never seen him live either. What made matters worse was that they could have picked Amar'e Stoudemire or Caron Butler. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Suzanne Plunkett)

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Darko Milicic (P... This is in the running (along with Sam Bowie) for worst pick ever. At least Bowie put up respectable numbers and would have been a lot better if not for injuries. Milicic just flat out stunk in Detroit. But what really makes this pick sting is the fact that the next four guys picked -- Carmelo Anthony, Chris Bosh, Dwyane Wade, and Chris Kaman -- have all become All-Stars. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)

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Owner Robert Sar... In the mid-2000s, the Phoenix Suns were poised to become the NBA's next dynasty with a core of Steve Nash, Amar'e Stoudamire, and Shawn Marion. All the team needed to do was plug in a couple more pieces and they would be unstoppable.

Sarver decided to use the draft to improve ... his wallet. In 2004, the Suns traded the seventh pick (Luol Deng) to the Bulls for Jackson Vroman, cash, and their first-round pick in 2005. They could have gotten Andre Iguodala, who would have meshed perfectly with the 'Seven Seconds or Less Suns.'

In 2006, in a stroke of genius, they picked superstar Rajon Rondo. However, they quickly turned around and traded him to Boston for more cash and a 2007 first-round pick. In 2007, they took Rudy Fernandez, who they quickly turned around and traded to Portland for, yep, you guessed it, more cash. The Suns essentially drafted nobody in the mid 2000s, and their already rich owner got a little bit richer. Predictably, now they are a bad team with no future. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Matt York)

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Greg Oden (Trail... The Blazers apparently didn't learn anything by picking Sam Bowie over Jordan because in 2007 they were faced with the exact same scenario: big man with health issues or explosive player with superstar written all over him? And once again, they went with the big man with health issues, and again it looks like it's going to bite them. Kevin Durant might soon be the best player in the NBA while Oden's Blazers career appears over. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Colin E Braley)

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Trading Brad Dau... The Sixers were coming off a 54-28 season, had veterans Moses Malone and Dr. J, a promising young star named Charles Barkley, and the No. 1 pick in the 1986 Draft. Hard to screw that up, right? Wrong. In perhaps the most disastrous 30 minutes of Draft Day history, the Sixers traded Daugherty (right) for Roy Hinson, then turned around and traded Moses Malone for Jeff Ruland. Ruland would play five games for the Sixers and Hinson would be traded after a disappointing year and a half. Daugherty, meanwhile, would become the Cavs best player ever until LeBron came along, and Moses would average a double-double for the next four years. Twenty-five years later, and some would say that the Sixers still haven't recovered. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Charles Krupa/Karen Tam)

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Trading Kobe Bry... You have to wonder if the Hornets would be playing in New Orleans these days if not for this deal. The Hornets made a brilliant pick at No. 13, getting high school sensation Kobe Bryant (left), then trading him for Vlade Divac. Had they kept Kobe, it's hard to imagine the team's attendance dropping to last in the NBA, encouraging a move to New Orleans. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Kevork Djansezian/Rusty Kennedy)

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Sam Bowie (Blaze... Of course, we have to put this pick on this list, but I don't think it was nearly as bad as people seem to think it was. The Blazers already had a player in the Jordan mold (Clyde Drexler), and it sounds like the Bulls would have picked Bowie (right), too, if they had had the second pick. After the draft, a disappointed Rod Thorn, the Bulls GM at the time, said of Jordan, "We wish he were seven feet tall, but he isn't. There just wasn't a center available. What can you do?" In other words, the Bulls wished they had had the No. 2 pick, so they could have picked Bowie. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Marty Lederhandler)

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Robert Traylor f... The Mavericks had the No. 6 pick in the 1998 draft, and the Bucks asked them for a favor. "Could you please grab Robert Traylor for us, and we'll give you our No. 9 pick?" The Mavs said yes. They picked Traylor and swapped him for a guy who had a slightly better career than Traylor. Dirk Nowitzki. Of course, the Sixers flopped in that same draft, taking the forgettable Larry Hughes with the No. 8 pick. The No. 9 and No. 10 picks were future Hall of Famers Dirk Nowtizki and Paul Pierce. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Morry Gash/Eric Gay)

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Trading Scottie ... Gary Payton at point, and Pippen (left) and Kemp at forward? Yeah, that Sonics team would have been pretty good. Instead the Sonics picked Pippen at No. 5 and traded him for the Bulls No. 8 pick, Olden Polynice. Pippen became a six-time NBA champion; Polynice became best known for being the only NBA player to ever get arrested twice for impersonating a police officer. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli/Rick Bowmer)

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Every First Roun... It is a track record that defies description. If you put a thousand monkeys in a room with a thousand typewriters, they could have drafted better than the Clippers did over those two decades. Benoit Benjamin (top center), Danny Ferry (who refused to play for them), Bo Kimble, LeRon Ellis, Randy Woods, Terry Dehere, Lamond Murray (top right), Lorenzen Wright (bottom right), Maurice Taylor, Michael Olowokandi (top left), Darius Miles (bottom left), Chris Wilcox (bottom center). Even the rare good players they drafted (Lamar Odom, Antonio McDyess) didn't find success until they were away from that disease of a franchise. It says a lot about the league that they seem to have a bigger problem with Mark Cuban than they do with Clippers owner Donald Sterling. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Victoria Arocho/Damian Dovarganes/Chris Pizzello/Mark Lennihan)

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Shawn Bradley (S... You can't teach height. But as the Sixers learned, you can't teach width either. Their plans to beef up Bradley never worked. But there was a bright side: at least the poster industry prospered, as Bradley was posterized more than any other player in NBA history. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Roberto Borea)

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Hasheem Thabeet ... When you spend a No. 2 pick on a guy who spends much of the season on the Dakota Wizards of the D-League, you've probably made a mistake. I bet the Grizzlies wish they had spent that pick on Tyreke Evans or Brandon Jennings. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo/Jason DeCrow)

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Vitaly Potapenko... It wasn't that Potapenko was all that bad, it's that the players picked directly after him were so incredibly good. Potapenko went 12th. The next three picks were Kobe Bryant, Peja Stoyakovic, and Steve Nash. —Johnny Goodtimes (AP Photo)

The opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Comcast.
Win Some, Lose S... Click here to see a break down of the winners and losers from this year's draft.