As the decade comes to a close, we look back at the biggest draft mistakes made by the Sacramento Kings over the last ten years.
The Sacramento Kings once again find themselves at the forefront of the conversation about botched and busted draft picks, a conversation that they are very used to. In what could turn out to be one of the biggest draft misses of all time, the Kings are currently being chastised for their selection of Marvin Bagley over Luka Doncic in the 2018 NBA Draft.
While it remains to be seen how the careers of both Bagley and Doncic pan out, the early returns do not bode well for Sacramento.
While it is too early yet to include the Kings’ latest draft gaffe in our list, there was no shortage of silly mistakes and questionable decisions made by the franchise over the last ten years.
#3: Georgios Papagiannis
Kings general manager Vlade Divac had been on the job for just over a year before he made his first inexcusable draft selection. After taking Willie Cauley-Stein in his first draft go-round, Divac opted to select little-known Greek prospect Georgios Papagiannis with the 13th overall pick.
How little known was Papa G? He was a mid-to-late second-round talent at best, and many teams didn’t even have him on their draft board. The pick drew the ire of Kings franchise player DeMarcus Cousins, who sent a cryptic tweet just moments after the pick was announced.
https://twitter.com/boogiecousins/status/746149291249410050
The only reason that the Papagiannis pick is not higher on our list is because of the talent, or lack thereof, taken immediately following the Kings’ selection. Three of the five players that were drafted with the 14th-18th picks played less than 80 career NBA games. The other two players were Denzel Valentine and Juan Hernangomez.
That draft was so bad in fact, that of the seventeen first-rounders taken after Papagiannis, just ten of them played in more than 100 career games, and only one has played more than 200: Pascal Siakam.
There was a silver lining on that draft night, however. The Kings originally had the 8th overall pick, but flipped it to the Phoenix Suns for the 13th and 28th picks, as well as the rights to European prospect Bogdan Bogdanovic.
While Bogdanovic has certainly found a home (for now) in Sacramento, Georgios Papagiannis lasted just two years and played in 39 NBA games. His departure from the NBA was the quickest by a lottery pick in league history.