It's almost unfair to judge a draft after one year, but this is what we're going to do. The final edition of our Revisiting the Draft series examines the 2008 Draft and believe or not, there are teams already harboring regrets from their picks.
Despite the extensive scouting, workouts and interviews involved in the draft, teams still make major mistakes and these days, prospects don't get three years to develop. Of the 14 lottery picks in 2006, six have already changed teams and players such as Patrick O'Bryant and Mouhamed Sene are not guaranteed jobs next season.
The NBA waits for no one, especially if they are taking too long to make an impact. So while teams won't freely admit they made mistakes 12 months after draft night, they will privately admit they overestimated talent and heart, and sooner or later, that will cost front-office jobs.
Hard to believe that several NBA general managers can have regrets after two years, but it's true. The results of the 2007 NBA Draft are slowly reaping, which should teach a lesson to their 2009 brethren on Thursday about taking chances on raw college players, international prospects and even those who are allegedly "proven."
The biggest debate two years ago was whether the Portland Trail Blazers should take Greg Oden or Kevin Durant first overall. Oden was a franchise center out of Ohio State while Durant was the smooth scoring swingman from Texas. Durant had the better workout with the Blazers, apparently blowing the mind of coach Nate McMillan. Yet, the Blazers stuck with conventional thinking and took the big man.
It's hard to blame the Toronto Raptors for taking a 7-footer with 3-point range and the ability to play three positions. That's what Andrea Bargnani presented as the No. 1 pick. There was no clear-cut top choice. The 2006 NBA Draft was filled with unproven early entries, a couple of seasoned seniors and raw big men looking for a big payday.
So the Raptors took the player they thought had the best upside. Hey, the NBA Draft is about development these days, right? Nobody in this supposed weak draft was supposed to be an All-Star anyway, right? No one told that to Brandon Roy, who was passed up by five teams and traded by another. Finally, the Portland Trail Blazers, still ringing from a reputation of bad guys, car racers and dog fighters, had a franchise player in their hands, and he was from nearby Seattle.
The 2005 NBA Draft would change the course of the future of two teams -- the Atlanta Hawks and Milwaukee Bucks. There was no clear-cut No. 1 pick, but Utah's Andrew Bogut was big, skilled and NBA ready. He wasn't the most convincing or dominant No. 1 pick, especially with Dwight Howard averaging a double-double in his rookie season, but he appeared to be the best choice for the Bucks.
Meanwhile, the Hawks decided on a player who was a sixth man of his college team. Marvin Williams had all the physical tools to be a star but played just one season at North Carolina. He fed off the Tar Heels' national title run and opted for the draft. It sounded like a good idea, although he was only 19. It's not that these were poor choices. Neither Bogut nor Williams are busts. They are productive NBA players, but when compared with the next two drafted, they are disappointments.
The 2004 NBA Draft marked the biggest influx of high school entries in league history, which resulted in a series of busts, unexpected gems and troublesome stories. Five years ago, the Orlando Magic agonized over the No. 1 pick with high school product Dwight Howard competing with UConn's Emeka Okafor over Orlando's affections. Howard was a rather unknown entity with an amazing body while Okafor just led the Huskies to the NCAA title and had established himself as the most dominant force in college basketball.
Whomever the Magic passed up would land in the lap of a new NBA team, the Charlotte Bobcats. Those two players appeared to be the only sure things in this draft. It was littered with early entries, unproven players and talented youngsters who might have bolted college a year too early. And making decisions more difficult was a slew of high school players who were years away from making an impact.
Well we are here, perhaps the deepest and most pivotal draft in recent NBA memory, filled with so many impact players at the top and some scattered in the middle. This will always be known as the LeBron draft, but its reputation was further enhanced by the stellar careers of Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh and Carmelo Anthony.
The 2002 NBA Draft is filled with what ifs. What if Jason Williams had decided not to jump on that motorcycle? What if DaJuan Wagner had been physically able to withstand the rigors of the NBA? What if NBA scouts weren't so enamored with European prospects?
This is a draft of major successes -- Amare Stoudemire, Yao Ming, Carlos Boozer -- and abject failures -- Marcus Haislip, Nikoloz Tskitishvili, Frank Williams. And the 2002 class will be best known for not being the 2003 class, perhaps the best in league history. Yao was perhaps the most mysterious No. 1 pick of all time. Few knew more than he was 7-foot-6 and from China.
And what followed Yao was a bunch of question marks, kids who left school too early and unknown international players. The result was an uneven draft that will go down more for its misses than hits.
After two putrid drafts, the NBA returned to form in 2001 -- but not right away. This draft will forever be known as the day Michael Jordan transformed from the greatest player on Earth to a below average general manager. With the No. 1 overall pick, Jordan held the fate of the Washington Wizards in the same hands that dunked on many of opponent, and he had a rich variety of players for which to don the savior of the franchise.
And he chose Kwame Brown. It really wasn't Kwame's fault. He was the victim of an amazing workout that impressed Jordan so much -- was this thing on video? -- that Air was convinced Brown would emerge as an All-Star. The brutal truth is that this prep player from Georgia faded into one of the biggest busts in draft history, hanging out in the same club as LaRue Martin, Joe Barry Carroll and Michael Olowokandi.
The term "revisit" might be a little inaccurate for this one. Re-miserating -- if that's a word -- may be more appropriate. The 2000 NBA Draft is perhaps the worst of all time. Of the 13 players picked in the lottery, only one has made an All-Star Team, Kenyon Martin in 2004. Nine years after the draft, four of the 13 lottery picks are out of the NBA, four averaged double figures in points and none has won an NBA title.
It's not as if a number of gems were passed up -- this was just a poor crop players coming out, filled with collegians who made putrid mistakes in leaving school early such as Erick Barkley, Donnell Harvey, Jerome Moiso and Khalid El-Amin.
If that wasn't enough evidence that this was a forgettable draft, the best player in this group was drafted 43rd, Milwaukee's Michael Redd, perhaps the biggest oversight in recent draft history.
It's been 10 years, plenty of time for review, criticism, kudos and scrutiny. As we countdown to the 2009 edition of the NBA Draft, FanHouse will examine the past 10 drafts and what each lottery team should have done in hindsight. Some of the picks will remain the same, others will be completely different. Some second rounders will jump into the lottery while some highly touted picks should have headed for Europe, the CBA or the D-League.
The NBA Draft doesn't bring the unpredictability of the MLB Draft, but upon further examination, it's darn close. Looking back, you wonder how a slew of NBA scouts missed on Michael Redd, Carlos Boozer or Manu Ginobili or what they saw in Rodney White, Stromile Swift or Adam Morrison.
So let's get started with the 1999 Draft, headed by Duke standout Elton Brand and nearly ended with Ginobili, who was the second to final pick. Are you kidding?
FanHouse fixes a decade of draft-day blunders in Revisiting the NBA Draft.
FanHouse fixes a decade of draft-day blunders in 
FanHouse fixes a decade of draft-day blunders in 
FanHouse fixes a decade of draft-day blunders in 
FanHouse fixes a decade of draft-day blunders in 
The term "revisit" might be a little inaccurate for this one. Re-miserating -- if that's a word -- may be more appropriate. The 2000 
It's been 10 years, plenty of time for review, criticism, kudos and scrutiny. As we countdown to the 2009 edition of the NBA Draft, FanHouse will examine the past 10 drafts and what each lottery team should have done in hindsight. Some of the picks will remain the same, others will be completely different. Some second rounders will jump into the lottery while some highly touted picks should have headed for Europe, the CBA or the D-League. 
