Post by eric on Mar 25, 2018 23:37:11 GMT
In this hectic modern workaday dog eat dog world we sometimes forget the bricks that laid the foundation for the base of our storied The Main Board Sim League Five. On this, the 40 day anniversary of our historic founding we at the Monroe Square Garden Company thought we'd offer some edutainment for the young fans who weren't even born and take a trip back through time, all the way back to the hallowed creation draft that started it all. In the words of disgraced former general manager T. "Tim" Pigulski, later convicted of the most flagrant embezzlement two of the erstwhile The Piggy Bank, "What time we trying to start this on Monday? At sign, Odin."
1.1
Thom Tibodeau (Head Coach, Director of Body Deconstruction): "We're sitting at the 5th pick, and all of the sudden we get a call from Curly Neal. The Globetrotters want to deal."
Noah Croom (Assistant General Manager): "Normally I'd be worried about dealing with the Globetrotters. They don't always play by the same rules as the rest of us. But we had a chance to move up to the top spot and have our pick of anybody in the draft. It was too good to pass up."
Thom Tibodeau: "We made the deal, and were locked in on Dolph Schayes. The phone is ringing to Commissioner Odin to make the pick, when all the sudden Ian Boyd bursts into the room."
Noah Croom: "We had tried to distract him by sending him on a WingStop run, but we hadn't counted on the fact that his local store constantly has an order of Mango Habanero at the ready for him any time he walks through the door. Days later, I would ask them why they would waste so many wings on the days he might not stop in. They explained to me that had yet to happen."
Ian Boyd (General Manager): "These n00bs were about to take Dolph Schayes at 1.1! It's like they've never even sim leagued before. I don't even think Croom has written an article yet, there's no way I'm letting him call the shots. We needed to find our Nick Diaz."
Peter Patton (Shooting Coach): "He kept going on about Nick Diaz. He used the same tone to describe him that my old man used to use when talking about the Pope."
Thom Tibodeau: "I pointed out that there WAS a guy named Nick Diaz in the draft, but by then he'd already moved on to the big men."
Beth Amphetimine (Former Nutritionist): "I received a series of documents with in-depth instructions on the diet program for our bigs. It was titled 'ITT They Try To Eat Butter' and was filled with diagrams and dimensions for something called 'Andrew Bynum 2.0'. As a health care professional, I couldn't in good conscience stay with the team. I'm told they hired Chef Boyardee to replace me."
Ian Boyd: "I had our team physician check out everyone on my big board for Maggette Syndrome. 20% of the players in the draft tested positively. God willing, some day they'll find a cure, but until then we couldn't take the risk."
Mike Scholls (team physician): "Maggette Syndrome is not a recognized medical condition, so I just had some guys run on a treadmill and marked every 5th one as 'infected'."
Noah Croom: "Boyd had settled on Collin Sexton as the pick. He swore that Sexton had the Bama Bump."
Mike Scholls: "Have you ever heard of Phrenology? Where they say the shape of your skull determines the kind of person you are? Whacko stuff, right? Well that's what we were supposed to be looking for with Sexton."
Grant Hill (consultant): "They brought me in the week before to work out with a few of the prospects. They wanted to run a few handling drills. I thought they wanted me to teach them a few things, but it was the opposite. Any time I took a dribble with my right hand, the coaches made them dribble with their left. If I dribbled low, the coaches made them bounce the ball up to their eyes. I don't see how that's supposed to help them develop, but apparently management was not a fan of my style."
Thom Tibodeau: "Sexton was a homerun pick. The kid had everything: moxie, pizzazz, and a great deal of want-to. I can't wait to run him until his knees explode."
Ian Boyd: "Who else was it gonna be? RJ Barrett? That was never an option. I mean, what can I say about RJ Barrett that hasn't been said about Terry Mills?"
Cricket (insect): *crickets*
Timberwolves (from Globetrotters) draft Collin Sexton SG 6'1'' 190 19 B C+ C+ B C+ A (3 years)
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1.2
Rich Cho (associate general manager): "We had just finished our sun salutes and morning meditation when news of the 1.1 pick came in, so we were in great shape. Or so we thought."
Dan Cortese (all time TMBSL leader in minutes played by Hornets players named Dan Cortese): "As usual Fecta went around the table to exchange affirmations, and each person also threw in a prospect to the mutual brainstorm. Little did we know that storm was going to turn into a storm. But like a real storm."
Rich Cho: "Looking back it was our own fault. We never should have had that intern at a high level meeting before he had learned all the history. I don't think they even knew about the Randle trade."
Buzz 'Bob The Hornet' Peterson (interim head coach): "It's one of those crystal moments that are fixed in your mind forever. Where were you on June 11th, 2003? November 22nd, 1963? I'll never forget where I was when that intern said 'how about Tim O'Cruz?'. We all immediately looked to Fecta."
Rich Cho: "His face went red."
Dan Cortese: "His hair went red. Granted it was already a burnt ochre but trust me, if you were there you could tell."
Rich Cho: "You could have heard a pin drop in the silence. I wish it had been a pin."
Buzz Peterson: "Somebody, and we never found out who, inadvertently tipped over the sustainably sourced wicker kale hamper. I can still see those beautiful leaves tumbling up to the edge in slow motion."
Rich Cho: "You can never unhear the sound of kale hitting a 100% recycled balsa conference table."
Dan Cortese: "Phleh. Or kind of a pleph. Look, they don't train you in poetry at middling combo guard school."
Fecta Fectington, general manager (profanely turned down repeated requests to be interviewed for this piece, quoted from a later Charlotte Observer interview): "I don't know anyone named Tim. I've never heard the name Tim. As far as I'm concerned that part of me died when I went back to mother Africa. No more questions."
Buzz Peterson: "I looked around the table and saw the same thought behind everyone's dead eyed thousand yard stare: this is it. We're not going to make it out of this conference room alive. I'll never bail my daughter out after she's unjustly arrested for a sit-in protesting the military industrial complex. I'll never teach my son how to be wracked with guilt over his unconscious biases. I've never yearned."
Rich Cho: "Maybe it was the fair trade quinoa smoothie, maybe it was the guiding hand of the triple goddess, maybe it was pure luck. I don't know what came over me, although it was a two thirds waxing moon, but it suddenly all made sense. Sunlight is the best alternative disinfectant, and laughter is the best alternative medicine. What did I have to lose? So I said, 'boss, what if we drafted Gary Bossert?'"
Dan Cortese: "Gary Bossert! He wasn't even in the top six hundred on our Big Board, sponsored by Whole Foods! Whole Foods, your one stop shop for all things natural! Whole Foods!"
Buzz Peterson: "For the second time in as many minutes, silence. None of us even breathed. I pictured my wife's face for what I was sure was the last time. And then..."
Dan Cortese: "GM Fecta just busts out laughing. We of course all immediately join in, the rictus cackling of the condemned. Even the intern managed a titter."
Rich Cho: "I burn incense every day to whichever ancestral spirit brought me that idea. I honestly believe I wouldn't be here talking to you today otherwise."
Bill Simmons (notable sports commentator): "Any time you score huge and get the 2nd pick in the creation draft, and have a shot at a middling teenage player with tremendous boom or bust potential while also passing on a sure fire hall of famer in Gary Bossert, you have to do it. Fecta has the bold strategy of trying to build a G-League dynasty but forgot about the $15 mil cap. I see no way this becomes a Sam Bowie/Michael Jordan situation. As if the people of Charlotte didn't have it bad enough with Billy living in their city. It's entirely possible that Fecta thought he was texting his girlfriend about a rim job but I'm not sure if that counts as eating meat?"
Hornets draft RJ Barrett SF 6'7'' 200 19 B- B- C B- C+ A (4 years)
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1.3
Sean P. Lavs (general manager): "Let's throw it to uh... to uh... to uh... God this Jameson's is hitting me hard."
Leon Beiderbecke (associate head coach, doing a beer run): "The Jazz are all about improvisation, random cuts, screen the screener action. A little casual drinking never hurt anyone, and it greases those wheels, you know? But every big band needs a conductor, and every team needs a boss. A 4.0 legend, the best shooter in the world, an absolutely elite scorer. But Rory Lavs wasn't available, so the top of our big board was Gary Bossert."
Robert McElhiney James (head scout): "I shared a taxi with Lavs one time after a night of crawling the bars and all he could talk about was the touchdown he was about to score in the draft. I figured he was just drunk, but next thing I know I've got a job offer from an actual basketball team. Sign of the times, huh?"
Leon Beiderbecke: "We weren't worried about the Globetrotters. Those cats up in Harlem couldn't be more square if you put my cornet case on top a Victrola! We were a little worried when the Timberwolves traded up, that St. Paul nightclub scene doesn't even get started until three in the morning, daddy-o."
Robert McElhiney James: [keyboard solo]
Leon Beiderbecke: "Then it was up to the bees down Carolina way, and... well..."
Sean P. Lavs: "RJ Barrett? I mean... what the [EXPLETIVE]!"
Jazz draft Gary Bossert SG 6'5'' 195 26 C A+ C- B+ C C (5 years)
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1.4
Rabbi Goldfaurb, Temple Beth Tov-Ahavat Shalom Synagogue: "Here was a pick with some chutzpah. Finally, the retirees of our community have a basketball player they can rally behind. And so young! Our own little bubbeleh to pressure and nag into becoming a star."
DJ Khaled, Courtside Jester: "W-E H-A-D T-O P-I-C-K A P-L-A-Y-E-R W-H-O A-P-P-E-A-L-E-D T-O B-O-T-H T-H-E S-O-C-I-A-L M-E-D-I-A C-O-N-S-C-I-O-U-S Y-O-U-T-H A-N-D T-H-E L-A-R-G-E C-O-N-T-I-N-G-E-N-T O-F O-L-D J-E-W-I-S-H R-E-T-I-R-E-E-S. It was a major key. Tell'em, Asahd!"
Asahd Khaled, baby: drools
James H. Beard, Executive VP of Basketball Operations (Atlanta Hawks): "Yeah their GM kept texting me asking where I had Zion on my board and I finally told him ‘we have him pretty high for a teenager’. Like two minutes later the pick was in.”
El Guapo Jr., Shirtless Roller-blader: "The city was positively electric with the news that we were taking Zion's talents to South Beach. We were even talking about showing up to the games BEFORE halftime this year."
Heat draft Zion Williamson PF 6'6'' 275 18 A- C C C+ B A (3 years)
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1.5
Curly Neal (associate general manager): "Sure we wanted to trade down. It's all well and good to have 1.1 when Connie Hawkins is eligible, but we couldn't even reach a consensus among each other. Abe Saperstein's disembodied head was dead set on Dolph Schayes, but opinions varied strongly."
Meadowlark Lemon (crown prince): [spins ball on finger]
Wilt Chamberlain (vice president of women's outreach): "I could still whip Dolph Schayes, and I've been dead for fifteen years. Are you kidding me? My third game in the NBA I put up 41 and 40 on his left hand set shot shooting @$$."
Louis "Red" Klotz (general): "I lobbied hard for a young star I saw with the Southern Philadelphia Hebrew Association by the name of Lasto Picko but Meadowlark just kept dumping confetti on me and singing about Zion."
Curly Neal: "So we figured why not pick up some assets and let the chips fall where they may? What's the worst thing that can happen, we build a team in Harlem around a goofy looking white boy literally named Adolph?"
Globetrotters (from Timberwolves) draft Dolph Schayes PF 6'9'' 215 25 B B+ B B A B (2 years)
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1.6
Patrick F. Catrickface, Warriors Owner: "When Truck showed me the draft board I was admittedly nervous. My contacts in Europe told me some pretty shocking things about the on-goings at Real Madrid. After some thought about the parallels between RM and the Bay Area culturally I thought Luca might feel a little too much at home."
Taco "Truck" Ensalada, Warriors General Manager: "Yeah I know about Real, everyone knows about Real. But this kid had something we couldn't pass on. He was 3rd on my board with the only flaw in his game on defense. Now if you can't teach a guy about D in San Francisco, where can you?"
Greg Louganis, Real Madrid Strength and Conditioning Coach: "Golden State is where Luca has wanted to be since he came up in our system. We've put in countless hours preparing him for this opportunity. A lot of private workouts at all hours of the day. He's ready to be the guy and this is the city he wants behind him."
Patrick F. Catrickface: "Maybe Luca will be more comfortable here, I'm not sure. I just know if we missed on this pick we'll be the butt of a lot of jokes around the league."
Taco Ensalada: "Luca just felt familiar, like an old friend. He's young, and he'll stumble I'm sure, but he's my guy. I couldn't have more faith in Luca if I was George Michael."
Warriors draft Luka Doncic SG 6'8'' 230 19 B B- B- C C+ A (3 years)
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1.7
Tony Ressler, Principal Owner and Chairman (Atlanta Hawks): "Everyone here is probably aware of some of the past missteps we've had from our front office in regards to racial and general social 'awareness', so my main goal was to just get through the draft without someone making a stupid ass comment like referring to the amount of African in a player or using their biracial family as a punchline to try and release the tension in a room full of angry ticket-holders."
Bomani Jones, Sports and Social Commentator (ESPN): "Those guys in Atlanta are total idiots."
Steve Koonin, CEO (Atlanta Hawks): "To Tony's point, we bolstered the Front Office guys...er....and gals from organizations with a history of success and a lack of horrifying social missteps. We were really happy to bring in Travis Schlenk who was with the Warriors and of course Coach Bud who was already here but previously from the Spurs. We had a lot of faith that these guys would be able to execute our vision of being good on the court but also good at not embarrassing ourselves in the press."
Travis Schlenk, GM (Atlanta Hawks): "Hi, I'm Travis. I used to be the Golden State coffee guy and my title was Executive Assistant, but I think Steve got confused and thought I was the an executive and an assistant GM. He hired me without asking for references or interviewing me because I was working for the Warriors. So now I'm just trying to sit in on meetings and sound smart enough to not get fired. And definitely not say anything racist to the press, Tony and Steve were very clear about that."
Mike Budenholzer, Head Coach (Atlanta Hawks): "So we get into the war room on draft day and everyone around here keeps looking at me like I have the secret sauce to winning because I was with the Spurs for awhile. Everyone is expecting me to wave my magic wand and pull a rabbit out of the hat because no one really knows Travis yet and the VP of Basketball Operations is some fat nerd nobody likes. But listen, I was just an assistant coach in San Antonio. And as far as I know, their organizational strategy was to just draft good basketball players. Like, you know, folks who can shoot, dribble, pass, defend, rebound, do general basketball things. It's not that difficult."
Adrian Wojnarowski, Basketball Reporter (ESPN): "Yeah, that draft room was a disaster. Nobody really knew who was in charge and it seemed like everyone was afraid to say anything."
James H. Beard, VP of Basketball Operations (Atlanta Hawks): "So we get on the clock and The Big BoardTM says that the clear choice is Gerald Martin Johanssen. I'm ready to send the pick into the league but at that point, Travis pipes up for the first time and says to no one in particular, 'They hired me to think outside the box since I came from the Warriors, right? But what if the most outside the box thinking is to think inside THE BOX.'
Adrian Wojnarowski: "Yeah so then we got word that the Hawks had selected Elvis Delle Donne."
Travis Schlenk: "I was really proud of that comment. I had no idea what I was saying, but I think I have them fooled."
Tony Ressler: "I was very happy with the pick as it made us look like progressives and that we might not even be totally socially incompetent."
Ian Boyd, General Manager (Minnesota Timberwolves): "The ladyboys are a trap, trust me."
Hawks draft Elvis Delle Donne SF 6'10'' 225 24 A- B D B B B (1 year)
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1.8
Bill Simmons (notable sports commentator): "The body language doctor Picasso of the Trade Machine is in, the operation was a success, and Conspiracy Bill got fired. A bunch of times. Just look at this body language. It's obvious he's going to the Lakers, just like Westbrook, Love, LeBron before him. Sure he can space the floor and defend and he's got great stats, but where's the warrior winner killer Allen Iverson mentality? Sure AI only won six playoff series in his entire career if you want to be technical about it, but one time I saw him yell at a ref, that might not be good enough for the Bucks but it's good enough for top forty player ever in my book. (The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to the Sports Guy, available at bargain bin prices wherever books are sold.) Look, any time you can draft the star of a team that got bounced in the round of 64 by the MAC champion you've gotta do it. Holy Cross should keep their mascot, I've in no way become the out of touch old white guy I used to mock."
Bucks draft DeAndre Ayton C 7'1'' 250 20 B+ C+ C- B- B A (5 years)
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1.9
Rutherford "Great" Odin (commissioner): "With the ninth pick of the draft, the New York Knicks select Firsto Picko. Uh, his name was Firsto. Firsto, like first. Like he gets drafted first."
Bruce Koplow (vice general manager of drafting, player development, and lead guitaristry): "Were we concerned when Big 'Chuck' Dolan decided to hand over the team the day before a creation draft to someone who had never at any level managed, coached, played, watched, or even heard the word basketball?" [long pause] "No. I am not contractually obligated to say no, I genuinely believe it. And at least we still had coach Lapchick, who had stewarded the Knicks to multiple wins in the last BAA season, his sixtieth consecutive on the job. From the first day in the war room he was h*ck bent on Chris "The Ball Dribbler" Steinmetz, but after we told coach that not only had Steinmetz retired in 1905 he was in fact deceased, he was h*ck bent on Firsto Picko."
Joe Lapchick (head coach): "Just call me a stool pigeon 'cuz this birdie's about to sing."
Joe Lapchick (stool pigeon): "I seen my share of grifters goons and gumshoes. Yeah I been coaching since the Boys Reformatory days, when ol' Doc Naismith put up the peach baskets for whatever cabbage we could scrape so long as the Spanish Flu wasn't running amok. Can the simoleons talk, poindexter, when we're talking basketball we're talking baskets. When we're talking baskets we're talking buckets. When we're talking buckets we're talking bucket-getters, see? Look at the gams on this tall drink of water. You don't need a talking picture to tell you which way's the scratch and which way's a long walk off a short pier courtesy of an old fashioned Chicago overcoat! Gimme a Picko and make it snappy, see?"
Bruce Koplow: "Coach was convinced and since nobody in the war room thought a guy named First Pick would be there at nine and since nobody in the war room wanted to argue with a guy who couldn't or wouldn't keep his dentures from falling out when he shouted we humored the old crank. We'd had high hopes for a new Windows 95 killer app by the name of CompuGM, but the boss wouldn't spring for dial-up so we had to have a tech come in and enter each prospect's information by hand."
Joe Lapchick: "This young whippersnapper. 'Don't worry fellow very good apes,' he says, 'all we have to do is push one button with our fingers,' he says, 'I've got a 100% reliable macro,' he says. Huh! I says to him I says 'if ol' Doc Naismith wanted us to play Marco Polo he wouldn't have-' and all of a sudden he cuts me off, he says to me he says 'oh God the spiders, why are there spiders coming out of the floppy disk drive, oh God my flesh, my beautiful human flesh.'"
Bruce Koplow: "So CompuGM was out."
Bob Zuppke (advance scout): "I remember the spiders dragging that definitely human and not a robot away and the general manager pulling on my sleeve, which was weird since we were already making eye contact and having a conversation. 'Bill-' He called me Bill. 'Bill, I need you to get me everything on Steph Templeton and Jesse Epstein. Do they like to go left. What kind of handles are we talking. What do their teammates think of them, none of this numbers b***crap. Are they married. Especially that second guy.' I'll never forget it. He looked me in the eye, shook my hand for some reason, and said 'There's no way Firsto Picko is falling to us.'"
James Dolan (executive general manager): "Oh yeah, I knew all along my close personal friend Firsto would fall to us. Whaddaya think, I sacrificed all those goats for fun? You think I get off on the stink of blood matted hair burning in a painstaking and wildly over budget reproduction of Metropolis's' Moloch? You wanna prove it with pictures of my boner, smart guy? You think you're better than me? My dad owns a dealership! These views and opinions necessarily reflect those of the company and its management!"
(ed. note: These views and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of the company and its management.)
Bill Walton (television commentator): "Whooooaa! Firsto Pickoooo! I'm told he's not related to Lasto Picko or Jean-Luc Picardo or Wilson Picketto, pico de gallo, picking the banjo, PIX eleven oh, New York's ooooonly classic rock AM station. I love picks. Who are you again? It was a hundred and fifty three years ago today, Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody number two in C plus minor, I'm hung-a-ry for this guy's C sharp outside shooting. That's a terrrrrrrible draft from everyone else, terrrrrrrible."
James Dolan: "And you can tell Bill [expletive] Walton to [continued expletives]."
Knicks draft Firsto Picko C 6'10'' 220 23 A C+ B B- B- C (3 years)
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1.10
Ernie Grunfeld (alleged general manager): "We can't let Harlem steal a march on us with their Romanian-Jewish superman. Chocolate City will build around someone even whiter! Get me the guy who makes Doug Funnie look like Malcolm X! Get me Chalky Studebaker!"
Wizards fans:
Wizards draft Chalky Studebaker SF 6'7" 220 28 B+ B D+ A- B- C (2 years)
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1.11
Andrew Luck (frequent Men in Blazers guest): ask pete or someone what football is. throw in something about horses? DO NOT POST THIS
Suns draft Marvin Bagley III C 6'11 235 19 B+ C+ D+ C B A (3 years)
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1.12
Tim Pigulski (general manager): "Look at all the great champions. Edmonton. Montreal. Long Island. What don't you see? That's right, Africans. Sorry if that gets me a fine from the PC police. Our great fans deserve championships, not chamPConships."
Denis Lemiux (defensive coordinator): "Bad draft happen when the guy take the stick comme ça, you know, and he go like that [mimes indecipherably] you know, you don't do that. Never, never. You know, you're stupid when you do that, fils de taupe. Just some English pig with no brains, you know. Two minutes, you know and you feel shame, you know."
Terrance Stoot (co-chief of blue line defence): "Even when you're late in the lotto you can still look for treasha. So I said 'Let's look for treasha, Phillip.'"
Phillip Argyle (co-chief of blue line defence): "Everyone knows the great teams are built on the checking line, eh? Winning the neutral face off zone is one thing but you can't lose if the icing never pucks the back of your net, eh? We wanted a defender to build around for kiloseconds to come, eh? Romée l'Angfôrt was the only real choice, and as each team passed on him our excitement grew to fevre pitch, eh?"
Tim Pigulski: "We could barely see the telly through the cigarette smoke and maple syrup fumes. I must have re-laced my skates ten times. At last it all came down to the lucky Soleils. Our un de un was just one team away. I told Messier I wouldn't cry."
Denis Lemiux: "Alors, we give 'em blouse. White red, you know, les bonnes couleurs."
Tim Pig: "Was it a reach? Hey, you miss a hundred percent of the shots you don't take. I found out later our good French Canadian boy even spent his major junior bantam mite years in a town named New Albany. Albany - in langues d'oïl, 'the white city'! Mark my words, this kid will have a C on his sweater in no time. We're just gonna take it one shift at a time, but the Metropolitan Prince of Norris subdivision better watch out."
Bulls (from Cavaliers) draft Romeo Langford SG 6'5'' 190 18 B- B B- C C- A (3 years)
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1.13
Clay Bennett (SuperSonics owner): "It's no secret our relationship with the city of Sea Turtle has been strained recently. There's one way I know for sure to rally the fans around a franchise, and that's to draft an all time great player. Selvy's the kind of player that will keep the team here for decades to come." [laughs so hard he drools on himself]
SuperSonics draft Frank Selvy SG 6'5'' 220 29 B B+ B- B+ C C (3 years)
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1.14
Herb Simon (general manager): "...but Tom Van Arsdale played more games without making the playoffs than anyone in NBA history, and he's got a cult following. They follow him like a cult! He can't even walk down the street in Indianapolis! Some might say that's because of the cows and other livestock, but I say it's good old fashioned small town loyalty to and reverence for easily the greatest player in NBA history whose identical twin brother was the original Sun."
Quinn Buckner (head coach): "You just need to let him finish. We spend probably six hours a day hearing about the good old days and another two rewatching Hoosiers. I'm surprised we successfully made any draft picks working in that pigsty. That's not a euphemism, our war room was literally in an enclosed pig habitat."
William Leonard (lead play by play announcer): "Hey, in forty nine other states, it's basketball. In Indiana, we elected Mike Pence to two separate offices. So probably go with what the other forty nine states are doing."
Herb Simon: "These young kids today with their 'three pointers' and their 'televisions' can't hold a candle to the old cream and crimson stars. Now Jon McGlocklin, there was a player!"
Quinn Buckner: "Top of our big board was Romeo Langford."
Herb Simon: "Go IU! Fight! Fight! Fight!"
Quinn Buckner: "When we found out he'd been drafted to another country, Mr. Simon was dumbstruck. He kept mumbling 'fists and blades, fists and blades' and even stopped stroking his rooster. Again, not a euphemism, we were getting eggs from the hen house at the time."
Branch McCracken (deceased): "Talk about a blessing in disguise. With only nine Hoosier alumni in the draft we didn't have enough players to make it ten rounds anyway, but we realized all we had to do was tell Mr. Simon we had just missed on one and then we could focus on you know basketball talent, contract situation, marginalia like that."
Quinn Buckner: "Worked with Romeo, worked with Devonte Green, heck we kept the charade up into the eighth with Aljami Durham. What do you expect from a bunch of farm boys?"
William Leonard: "Pretty slick!"
Pacers draft Daniel Taurasi SG 6'5'' 200 25 B B+ B- B- C B (5 years)
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1.15
Suge "Knight" R. Shaun (general manager): "We know the only way to win a championship in Cleveland is to draft LeBron James, so we're pretty much hoping to field a roster of stiffs until his class becomes available. Benji's the kind of player who can really take some shots, and we're confident under his leadership our place in the standings will just about drop dead."
Cavaliers (from Bulls) draft Benji Wilson SF 6'8'' 215 24 B- B+ C+ B C+ B (3 years)
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1.16
Greg Pikitis, Assistant to the General Manager: "At this point, the teenage run was on. I hadn't seen this many teens get snatched up since the Manson family was holding tryouts."
Chris Shortman, Director of Player Embiggenment: "We thought about following the trend, but we couldn't afford to hire a baby sitter for the team, so we decided to focus on someone who could at least rent a car."
Hans Omepete, General Manager: "We were down to two guys we thought would've been long gone: George Mikan and Jesus Shuttlesworth. Now, I'll be honest here. Me and Jesus's father go way back. We came up together and used run hustles out on the streets, ripping off big town Miami saps who thought they could get rich quick. So when we were looking into who to draft, Chris and I paid him a visit."
Warden Wyatt, Attica Correctional Facility: "Jake was as smooth as they come, and awhile ago had sweettalked his way into a deal with the governor to go play his son in a game of one-on-one, loser goes back to prison. No one knew Jesus better than Jake."
Hans Omepete: "I pop in to Attica during visiting hours and get Jake to give me the scoop. He tells me, 'Jesus is a good player. He's got game. But don't bullshit the bullshitter. Either you're somebody...or you're nobody. We didn't land on Plymouth Rock. Plymouth Rock landed on us! I'm not going to bury my son, my son is going to bury me! KING KONG AIN'T GOT SHIT ON ME!'"
Warden Wyatt: "Jake was so smooth in that meeting I suddenly had to release him from prison. How could I deny the world that gift?"
Chris Shortman: "His CPS [catchphrase-per-syllable] was through the roof. I'd never seen such efficient smoothocity. I said to Hans, 'Forget Jesus. This is the Shuttles who is Worth a damn.' But he wouldn't listen."
Hans Omepete: "Listen, I wanted to take Jake. But he was too much of a liability. And have you seen the guy? Could you imagine building a marketing campaign around Jake Shuttlesworth? Yikes..."
Rockets draft Jesus Shuttlesworth SG 6'5'' 200 26 C+ A- B- B- C+ C (5 years)
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1.17
Ernie Grunfeld (general manager of the Bullets too): "That's right! You can't even get rid of me in sim life! Nyah ha hah!!!" [twirls mustache]
Bullets fans:
Bullets draft Trae Young SG 6'2'' 180 19 C A- B C+ D+ B (3 years)
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1.18
Lester B. Pearson (scholar, statesman, soldier, stenographer): "We weren't sure what was going on in Washington. Sorry."
Captain Sir John Franklin (westward scout, hand reaches for the Beaufort Sea): "Sorry."
Rachel McAdams (I like Rachel McAdams, so what, you wanna fight about it?): "I'm sorry."
Lester B. Pearson: "As a fellow quiet, tall, bespectacled man, I felt a real kinship with young George. We were delighted to learn he went to school in one of Canada's finest universities DePaul, just down the street from the Suez Canal where I had contributed to solving a bit of a kerfuffle, and so we brought him in for a sit down."
George Mikan (quiet, tall, bespectacled man): "I never thought a 'long fellow' could succeed in the basket-ball. To be honest I only played to practice goaltending for what I naturally assumed would be a long ice hockey career. I was humbled by the invitation, but there was one stumbling block."
Lester B. Pearson: "I introduced myself as Lester B. Pearson."
George Mikan: "I apologized."
Lester B. Pearson: "I apologized."
Captain Sir John Franklin: "I also apologized."
George Mikan: "It's just that 'Lester' really isn't much of a name for a general manager. Don't you think so? I don't want to cause any trouble."
Mike Pearson: "Once that was settled we really sold him on our universal health care, the passage of which I had also contributed to, to some extent. I was in charge at the same time as JFK. Sorry. Anyway, he humbly accepted our humble offer to join the humble Couv."
Grizzlies draft George Mikan C 7'0'' 265 26 A+ C C- C A- C (2 years)
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1.19, 1.20
Danny Ainge (President of Basketball Operations): "When Austin and I heard this young Harvard hot shot had bought the team, we assumed it'd just be more of the same hands-off style ownership."
Austin Ainge (Director of Player Personnel): "Little did we know this guy is a transplant from Tennessee who had no idea about the culture or tradition of this organization."
Clyde Parks (Local fan, plumber): "Everybody in Boston agrees that white dudes look wicked good in the green, always have always will."
Russell Vanderpump XII (Celtics Owner): "Honestly I just love the mascot guy, can't get enough of him."
Danny Ainge: "So we're sitting in the war room, Austin and I are shuffling scouting reports preparing to be on the clock. Russell is nowhere to be found so we're hung ho ready to make our pick. Austin answers, and all I can hear is a bunch of commotion."
Austin Ainge: "It was Russell, apparently he was on vacation. The most important event for our franchise and this guy is gone. Anyways, we're talking about the pick and who we're looking at, and I hear Russell say 'double it up' So I ask what he means and he goes 'Yeah I need two, two for sure. I don't care what it costs just get them.' I told him alright and hung up the phone."
Russell Vanderpump XII: "Whoops."
Austin Ainge: "Pops and I are pretty shocked, but happy. Our staff loved Wendell Carter, and we figured we could pair him with Gerald who we saw as a dominant scorer. We phone in the Carter pick and I get a text from Russell 'I love France, give me the french all day' so now we're scouring our lists for this Frenchman Russell is talking about. We find Doumbouya and come to the realization that we've got to change our entire plan and build around two teenagers."
Clyde Parks: "The fuck is a Wendell Cahtah? You got Bobby McDermott sitting on the board and we get this guy and an African? That'll play well in Beantown, good luck selling tickets."
Danny Ainge: "Russell gets back in town after a week in Paris and asks us why we traded up and took Sekou. Turns out he was negotiating at a brothel while he was on the phone with Austin. I'll leave it up to you to interpret what the text meant. The good news is Simmons is on suicide watch so maybe he'll leave me alone."
Austin Ainge: "After the miscommunication Russell all but disappeared for what seemed like days. We're told the Boston public isn't very happy with 'that damn african' and Russell is letting the situation cool down before coming back."
Celtics draft Wendell Carter Jr. C 6'10'' 260 19 B- B- C- B- C+ A (5 years)
Celtics (from Lakers) draft Sekou Doumbouya SF 6'9'' 227 18 B C+ C- B- B- A (4 years)
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1.21
Steve Ballmer (owner, staring unnervingly): "After the unpleasantness with Donald Sterling we needed a top to bottom culture refresh."
Ralph Lawler (announcer, standing politely): "He broke Lawler's law! Lawyers aren't worth a lolling lily once you've lost to Lawler's law, lol!"
Steve Ballmer: "Who better to tear it down to the studs, scorch the earth, scorch the studs, pile all the ashes together and scour them with some sort of dissolving reagent than Fason?"
Inur Fason (general manager, sim league and Drag Race champion): "Do I hear the whispers about how I went out of my way multiple times to destroy 4.0? Honey, that's just water off a duck's back. What I love about what I do is expanding people's minds on the topics of gender expression, gay rights, and most of all, having absolutely no one under contract when I start a rebuild."
Steve Ballmer: "Mike Conley. Tyus Edney. Rowdy Eavenson. Eric Hofmann. When you think great Fason squads, you think great point guards, and so we painstakingly compiled a big board of the top twenty one point guards in the draft. Twenty picks later, not a single point guard had been drafted."
Ralph Lawler: "The team that wins the tip gets the ball again to start the fourth quarter. Lawler's law cannot be broken!"
Inur Fason: "I didn't become Seattle's premier Jewish narcoleptic drag queen by not sticking to my guns. If the perimeter oriented style doesn't work out, I'll trade every last Clipper so fast their wigs will be snatched clean off. If the next core doesn't work out, I'll burn that runway when I come to it. If that doesn't work out either, I'll 'helpfully' volunteer to 'assist' the league directly off a cliff and it'll be 6.0 time. Can I get an amen?"
Ralph Lawler: "Bingo!"
Clippers draft Bobby McDermott PG 6'0'' 190 26 B B+ B C+ C- B (3 years)
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1.22
Rory Delap (throws): "Oy, ain't only one Rory in sim league, guv."
Tony Pulis (grizzled gristle): "Pêl-droed rwy'n gwybod. Pêl-fasged, blood fam?" [dons tracksuit on top of tracksuit he was already wearing]
Rory Delap: "Gaffer's totted forty points a campaign long as tuppence up the wickersham, or I inn't the pride of the Royal bloody Town of Suttonfolkshire Coldfield and all the West Midlands, I inn't."
Robbie Earle (pie-rejector): "Sexy, sexy basketball is back in Dallas-on-Trinity!"
Mavericks draft Cameron Reddish SF 6'7'' 210 19 B- B C+ C+ C+ B (3 years)
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1.23
Billy King (talking on two phones at once): "Buy! Sell! Batteries! Bit coin! Battlestar Galactica!"
Killy Bing (not Billy King ;)): "Open Uke Case for what a great GM Billy King is."
The Jester (punctuation enthusiast‽): "Fifty quickness! Dee arr big! Anthony Mason!"
Billy King: "When my league did a mock oral history we all bought Dictaphones and recorded ourselves, then I wrote a Python script to splice them all together and we listened to them during our All-Star break, which is actually a week long. You think this is long? This isn't long."
Killy Bing: "This pick on the block for future firsts."
Billy King: "Looking to buy into the draft, future firsts available."
Kings draft Gerald Martin Johanssen SF 6'6'' 210 27 B A- C B- B- C (2 years)
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1.24
(editor's note: Em Jay's media relations director did not return repeated inquiries to be interviewed for this piece, or to address rumors first reported by Adrian Wojnarowski that the GM left draft headquarters for a night of alcohol fueled debauchery at a local music festival. His commentary has been reconstructed from media appearances around the time of the draft.)
Magic Johnson (mogul): "Back when we won the title it was all about the big fellas. Greg "The Arena" Monroe, Dr. Rounds at the power forward. You gotta feed the dog to protect the yard!" [raucous laughter]
Billy Joe "Red" McCombs (Spurs board member, Texan, Jesus enthusiast): "Even back in the Dallas Chaparral days, the extent of the draft guidance we got from our GM was a crumpled up Post-It with the phrase "bigs no blocks" written on it. So it came as a shock to myself and the rest of the board when GM Jay not only showed up on the day of the draft but was actively engaged in the discussion."
Em Jay (general manager): "WHERE IS MY GAMBLING STUFF"
Jerry Tarkanian (head coach): "We thought this was draft was tailor made for our player style. A 6'6" big with C+ defense in the top five? You don't need a tiger to tell you that Kellogg is going to frost some flakes. Good thing, since we've hunted all local wildlife larger than a breadbox to extinction."
Red McCombs:
Jerry Tarkanian: "So the draft is going on and no-defense big after no-defense big is flying off the board, and I can tell Em Jay is getting hotter and hotter. I remember it was just after Mikan goes to the Couv, Jay pulls me aside."
Em Jay: "Thought qrong"
Jerry Tarkanian: "That really made me stop and think 'what?' but I relayed the message to the rest of the brain trust. Eventually we decided to flip the big board. Keep Austin weird, you know?"
Em Jay: "Alright, way to go donnie!"
Red McCombs: "We took that as a yes. So what's the opposite of a young big with no defense? The oldest wing we could find, all our scouts agreed he was a plus defender at minimum. Sure he was demanding a five year deal, but compared to paying Draymond Green six mil a year for six years he was a bargain."
Magic Johnson: "The Spurs just acquired the next Magic Johnson in Nick Diaz. If the Spurs players play well, they'll have a chance of winning!"
Em Jay: Sheesh
Spurs draft Nick Diaz SG 6'7'' 245 35 A- B+ B+ B+ C F (5 years)
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1.25
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse, Owner (Orlando Magic): "I've always had two main passions in life, skateboarding and basketball. It was exciting to be able to finally buy a team and do the basketball professionally, but I also thought that this could be a great opportunity to bring some of the mindset of the skatepark to the basketball court and give a fresh take on how a basketball team should be run."
John Hammond, General Manager (Orlando Magic): "Skateboard is a nice enough guy, but we were used to having an absentee owner (Em Jay) who was at music festivals and just let us just do our thing during drafts like this. So we prepared like normal. We had our board together, everyone was excited as some of our big targets fell down the board to us, we were all raring to pick Brain Winter when Skateboard made an appearance in the draft room right before we got on the clock."
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse: "Look, I understand that I'm just some guy who bought a basketball team and I don't really know what I'm doing. But I do know that you have to have a brand, an identity, something that people know you by so they know you're rad AF or your just some some stiff on a skateboard that most definitely cannot shred it. So I made the executive decision we were going to be a team full of Grinders. Grind it out. Grind City. I was pretty sure that term could be applied to basketball and it is familiar to me as a skater, so I figured it was a good starting point."
John Hammond: "So at that point we get on conference with the league to make our pick and Skateboard presents his "Grind" brand idea to us. Totally throws everyone off their game. We were ready to put in the pick for Brain Winter but all of a sudden Skateboard starts yelling in the corner."
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse: "GRINDER! GRINDER! GRINDER! GRINDER! GRINDER!"
Odin, Commissioner of TMBSL: "So all I can hear is chanting on the other end of the line and it sounds like they are repeatedly yelling "Griner". I ask for clarification but all I get back is chanting. Time is running down on the clock, so finally I just put the pick in for Brandon Griner."
John Hammond: "Fuck me."
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse: "I was really pleased with how the first round played out. We got our Grinder...wait, what? It's just Griner? Uh..........*muttering*.....fuck it...CLOSE ENOUGH. GOT OUR GRINDER"
John Hammond, Former GM (Orlando Magic): "I tendered my resignation before the start of the second round and they named Tony Hawk the new GM of the Magic. Tony Hawk."
Magic draft Brandon Griner C 7'2'' 240 26 A- C D A C C (4 years)
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1.26
Paul Allen (Trailblazers co-owner, Microsoft co-founder, co-biggest fan of Co-co): "We knew we were in for a bumpy ride when the GM walked in and asked how many guys he could take with his draft pick."
Jon-Michael Majkut (general manager): "Look, you try organizing thirty four guys into the Ohio ice hockey champions and then we'll see how well you keep all the 'rules' straight for your side gig."
Neil Olshey (senior vice president, basketball operations): "Somehow it went even further downhill after that. Our main criteria were a wing who was strong on defense and outside shooting. Senior staff were alternating writing names on a white board since the GM was still in uniform and couldn't pick up the marker, and a certain head coach who shall remain nameless saunters up and writes Eligin Baylor."
Doctor Jack Ramsay (head coach): "I just thought he was eligible to bayl us out of our poor luck in draft placement. Everyone loved my name based puns in hockey hotbed Miami, I was just trying to break the ice."
Doctor Jack Ramsay (still talking): "Break the ice, you get it? They play hockey on ice."
Paul Allen: "One thing leads to another and our GM and head coach have dropped the gloves literally and metaphorically speaking respectively. Jack's yelling that Jon-Michael wouldn't know a basketball if it was painted on his helmet, Jon-Michael's yelling that Jack's not even a real doctor, Gilbert Arenas is over in the corner grilling burgers on a hibachi, absolute bedlam."
Doctor Jack Ramsay (not a real doctor): "The guy loves hockey so much, why doesn't he GM a hockey team? And as a matter of fact I earned a doctorate in education at the University of Pennsylvania. I'm not saying you should ask me about your gall bladder but it's not like I'm one of those lawyers who insist on going by doctor out here."
Jon-Michael Majkut: "Look, you live by a code in the boardroom. A guy tries to skate by with his head down, you put him on his golden parachute. Someone rides you all period, you circle back and settle it man to man by drilling down on the synergy of some rebranding action items. Doesn't matter if he's your best friend or an eighty five year old man off the ice, when you're between the lines sometimes you've got to hostile takeover some goon."
Neil Olshey: "I often think that Gil could still play point today. His timing remains spot on, each burger flipped back onto the grill at the moment Jon-Michael's knuckles thudded into Jack's leathery face, like a cosmic ballet. A cosmic, gruesome ballet, where the dancers get into bloody fist fights. So I guess not like a ballet at all."
Paul Allen: "If it hadn't been for the blinding plaid throwing his aim off we'd probably be looking at Jail Blazers 2.0, and wouldn't you know it but the commish picks that exact moment to ring in for our pick."
Jon-Michael Majkut: "I was shouting 'talk some more! talk some more!' because while communicating with your fists is all well and good they don't enunciate and I needed the so-called 'Doctor' to be clear on where we stood. I didn't realize the league office had been on speakerphone until I'd skated over to the penalty box, and by that point we'd already drafted Malcolm Moore."
Neil Olshey: "Some people might say that drafting based on the vague aural resemblance between their name and the taunts you levy on a geriatric you're pummeling is no way to run a team. I say to those people, are you hiring?"
Trailblazers draft Malcolm Moore SF 6'5'' 210 25 B+ B- C+ A- C+ C (1 year)
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1.27
Stan Van Gundy (head coach, chief usher, vice president of disheveledry): "I've been part of some uncomfortable exchanges. But I know that sometimes to climb that mountain you do what you gotta do. The GM wanted to bring in each player for one on one interviews and to this day I'm not sure if it made things better or worse that I insisted on being there too."
D. Ump Thyme (a successful and wealthy entrepreneur): "I could watch you sleep forever, Shamorie. I want you to willingly surrender yourself to me. Roll your eyes at me again and I will put you across my knee! Do you want more? Welcome to my world."
Shamorie Ponds (fresh faced college graduate): "I don't know if I can be with him the way he needs me to."
Stan Van Gundy: "Dump laughs and then is distracted by his BlackBerry, which must be on vibrate because it doesn't ring."
D. Ump Thyme: "Oh, I exercise control in all things, Ponds. But your body tells me something different. Your legs, for instance. The way you're pressing your thighs together under the table. And the change in your breathing. And in your complexion."
Shamorie Ponds: "That is not the reaction I expected. I was anticipating full-scale Armageddon."
D. Ump Thyme: "Can I just say how impressed I am with your commitment to this meeting? And in that spirit, I'm going to throw in a sweetener. When I tell you to come into this room this is how you'll be. You'll wait for me kneeling by the door. Hands flat on your thighs."
Stan Van Gundy (increasingly concerned): "I don't think my heart could stand the strain of another exchange like that, or my pants for that matter."
D. Ump Thyme: "Shamorie, you're like a fallen ethereal wraith." [readies riding crop]
Stan Van Gundy: "I knew then and there we had to build a f***ing wall to limit our civil and criminal liability, and that it was probably too late."
D. Ump Thyme (snarling, emphasizing each word): "You. Are. Mine."
Pistons draft Shamorie Ponds PG 6'1'' 170 21 B B- B B C C (5 years)
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1.28
Mike Malone, Head Coach: "The night before the draft, we're all putting in late hours in the conference room putting together our big board. We'd been at it for hours, going back and forth on what we were going to do. Building a team from scratch is no small task, and we were really trying to find a way to create an identity."
S. Lou Tang, General Manager: "We were getting nowhere. Half of the group wanted to go for developmental players, the other half wanted players we wouldn't need to wait on. We were at a stalemate, and we were running out of time."
Mike Malone: "We turned to our rock in these kinds of circumstances. The person who always has a way of bringing clarity to any problem we faced: our in-house horticulturist."
"Doctor" Tommy Chong, Horticulturist: "We had been working on something for this kinda thing for months. We started with a nice indica sativa, grown in the hydroponics farm in the basement of the Pepsi Center. We cross-bred that strain with a little something I picked up on my travels through Asia, which the locals refer to as "The Flame of Reckoning". Or maybe it was "the Spark of Knowledge". Anyway, we took a bit of that and increased the nitrates while playing nothing but Careless Whisper by George Michael, which really gives it a mellow finish. We took that new hybrid, which we called The Careless Flame of Sativa, mixed in a little bit of cardamom and a dash of nutmeg, and distilled it into a purely concentrated liquid form. Then we made brownies."
S. Lou Tang: "After we shared some brownies with Dr. Chong, the whole draft board seemed boring. We decided to bag it altogether and just watch some TV. Someone, I think it might have been Ted, was like 'Have you guys ever seen that movie where Arnold Schwarzenegger gets pregnant?'"
Ted, Someone: "I asked them how can mirrors be real if our eyes aren't real."
Mike Malone: "So we're watching Junior, and Arnold is running around with his crazy accent and a baby growing inside him. Can you imagine? A baby inside a MAN? And Danny DeVito as a doctor? It was too perfect. Tang and I looked at each other and at the same time, we both said 'THIS IS THE TEAM'. We had found our direction."
F. "Junior" Bankz, Vice President of Basketball Operations, former pizza man: "I showed up at about 3 in the morning with a stack of pizzas and found all three of them giggling and talking about starting a band. The next thing I know, I've got a 6 figure job offer and a corner office. The only thing I had to do was start going by "Junior" and bring pizzas to every future meeting."
S. Lou Tang: "We didn't stop there. We started calling up every Jr in our rolodex and offering them jobs in the organization. Odell Beckham Jr? Name your price. Dale Earnhardt Jr? Welcome aboard. The band Jr Jr? When can you start? We hired the entire junior class of Fairview High to be our marketing department."
Ted: "Really though, how CAN mirrors be real if our eyes aren't real?"
Mike Malone: "Once we locked into the culture of the organization, the rest of it was easy as pie. Or cake. Or brownies. Or tootsie rolls, but you've gotta be careful with those, because even though they're technically smaller, they can be just as potent."
Nuggets draft Michael Porter Jr. PF 6'10'' 215 20 B- B C- C+ B- A (3 years)
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1.29
(editor's note: the publishers would like to stress that general manager Val Venis was very enthusiastic about participating in this oral history even after he was informed what oral history actually meant, and insisted his remarks and gestures be transcribed verbatim. Readers with young children or sensitive dispositions should close the article now.)
Bryan Colangelo (chief executive officer): "You know that awkward moment when you see a co-worker after you've already been through the pleasantries that day? Hello, how you doing, see you later. Do you say them again? Do you try to go more in depth conversation? We didn't have that particular problem in Toronto."
Val Venis (general manager): "Hello, ladies!!!" [suggestive leering]
Bryan Colangelo: "Every. Time. Every time you'd see him, it didn't matter if you were coming back from lunch, the bathroom, maternity leave... if you were out of eyeshot for five minutes you'd get another taste."
Val Venis: [continues leering]
Kristaps Porzingis (Raptor ambassador and cosplayer extraordinaire): "To have fairness, also there were hard times under GM Hans Omepete. There was year in playoffs he shout 'do-over' every time we lose. Somehow it work, but is believed by me having playoffs ten and six times shorten career of all comrades. You can look up, Priest of Lauderdale's field goal percentage decline five straight years. Walter McCarty on track to be glorious hero of proletariat, one year later, gone. Still I can't look young children of McCarty in eye. Mostly because height only one meter. But also shame. I could have stop it. I could have refuse to play shooting guard of capitalist pig dog. I wear ears of dead donkey."
Val Venis: "Ooooooooo, that's the Money Shot!" [grinds hips lewdly]
Bryan Colangelo: "Early on we made the decision to favor potential over established talent. With a few notable exceptions the rest of the league was going the other way."
Val Venis: "Looks like they fell right into... the Venis Flytrap! Yes, I had some actual wrestling moves. Okay I had one actual wrestling move. Let me show you some literature about cannabis legalization. Yes, this is also somehow a real thing I'm into."
Bryan Colangelo: "This is Canada. We've got a rep as nice guys but don't forget we're a Dominion of the British Empire. We have the right to censor any Canadians who criticize our decisions, be they in Toronto, Ottawa, Buffalo, you name it. There's nowhere to hide from the Mounties..."
Val Venis: "Did someone say the mounted punches with theatrics, ladies???" [holds up flipbook of suggestive drill and train imagery]
Bryan Colangelo: [sighs quietly] "So we went with a guy whose highest grade was a B- and a middling 4.0 Raptor and called it a day. Who cares? Even if we had good publicity, a Canadian dollar is only worth six cents. Forget this. I'm gonna go ruin Markelle Fultz's career."
Raptors draft Devonte Green PG 6'3'' 185 21 C B- C+ C+ C- A (3 years)
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We hope you've enjoyed this littlestroll ultramarathon down memory lane. Thanks for reading. We all have huge dongers. Vote 5.
Dictated, not read
Druce, Eric, JHB, and Pete
1.1
Thom Tibodeau (Head Coach, Director of Body Deconstruction): "We're sitting at the 5th pick, and all of the sudden we get a call from Curly Neal. The Globetrotters want to deal."
Noah Croom (Assistant General Manager): "Normally I'd be worried about dealing with the Globetrotters. They don't always play by the same rules as the rest of us. But we had a chance to move up to the top spot and have our pick of anybody in the draft. It was too good to pass up."
Thom Tibodeau: "We made the deal, and were locked in on Dolph Schayes. The phone is ringing to Commissioner Odin to make the pick, when all the sudden Ian Boyd bursts into the room."
Noah Croom: "We had tried to distract him by sending him on a WingStop run, but we hadn't counted on the fact that his local store constantly has an order of Mango Habanero at the ready for him any time he walks through the door. Days later, I would ask them why they would waste so many wings on the days he might not stop in. They explained to me that had yet to happen."
Ian Boyd (General Manager): "These n00bs were about to take Dolph Schayes at 1.1! It's like they've never even sim leagued before. I don't even think Croom has written an article yet, there's no way I'm letting him call the shots. We needed to find our Nick Diaz."
Peter Patton (Shooting Coach): "He kept going on about Nick Diaz. He used the same tone to describe him that my old man used to use when talking about the Pope."
Thom Tibodeau: "I pointed out that there WAS a guy named Nick Diaz in the draft, but by then he'd already moved on to the big men."
Beth Amphetimine (Former Nutritionist): "I received a series of documents with in-depth instructions on the diet program for our bigs. It was titled 'ITT They Try To Eat Butter' and was filled with diagrams and dimensions for something called 'Andrew Bynum 2.0'. As a health care professional, I couldn't in good conscience stay with the team. I'm told they hired Chef Boyardee to replace me."
Ian Boyd: "I had our team physician check out everyone on my big board for Maggette Syndrome. 20% of the players in the draft tested positively. God willing, some day they'll find a cure, but until then we couldn't take the risk."
Mike Scholls (team physician): "Maggette Syndrome is not a recognized medical condition, so I just had some guys run on a treadmill and marked every 5th one as 'infected'."
Noah Croom: "Boyd had settled on Collin Sexton as the pick. He swore that Sexton had the Bama Bump."
Mike Scholls: "Have you ever heard of Phrenology? Where they say the shape of your skull determines the kind of person you are? Whacko stuff, right? Well that's what we were supposed to be looking for with Sexton."
Grant Hill (consultant): "They brought me in the week before to work out with a few of the prospects. They wanted to run a few handling drills. I thought they wanted me to teach them a few things, but it was the opposite. Any time I took a dribble with my right hand, the coaches made them dribble with their left. If I dribbled low, the coaches made them bounce the ball up to their eyes. I don't see how that's supposed to help them develop, but apparently management was not a fan of my style."
Thom Tibodeau: "Sexton was a homerun pick. The kid had everything: moxie, pizzazz, and a great deal of want-to. I can't wait to run him until his knees explode."
Ian Boyd: "Who else was it gonna be? RJ Barrett? That was never an option. I mean, what can I say about RJ Barrett that hasn't been said about Terry Mills?"
Cricket (insect): *crickets*
Timberwolves (from Globetrotters) draft Collin Sexton SG 6'1'' 190 19 B C+ C+ B C+ A (3 years)
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1.2
Rich Cho (associate general manager): "We had just finished our sun salutes and morning meditation when news of the 1.1 pick came in, so we were in great shape. Or so we thought."
Dan Cortese (all time TMBSL leader in minutes played by Hornets players named Dan Cortese): "As usual Fecta went around the table to exchange affirmations, and each person also threw in a prospect to the mutual brainstorm. Little did we know that storm was going to turn into a storm. But like a real storm."
Rich Cho: "Looking back it was our own fault. We never should have had that intern at a high level meeting before he had learned all the history. I don't think they even knew about the Randle trade."
Buzz 'Bob The Hornet' Peterson (interim head coach): "It's one of those crystal moments that are fixed in your mind forever. Where were you on June 11th, 2003? November 22nd, 1963? I'll never forget where I was when that intern said 'how about Tim O'Cruz?'. We all immediately looked to Fecta."
Rich Cho: "His face went red."
Dan Cortese: "His hair went red. Granted it was already a burnt ochre but trust me, if you were there you could tell."
Rich Cho: "You could have heard a pin drop in the silence. I wish it had been a pin."
Buzz Peterson: "Somebody, and we never found out who, inadvertently tipped over the sustainably sourced wicker kale hamper. I can still see those beautiful leaves tumbling up to the edge in slow motion."
Rich Cho: "You can never unhear the sound of kale hitting a 100% recycled balsa conference table."
Dan Cortese: "Phleh. Or kind of a pleph. Look, they don't train you in poetry at middling combo guard school."
Fecta Fectington, general manager (profanely turned down repeated requests to be interviewed for this piece, quoted from a later Charlotte Observer interview): "I don't know anyone named Tim. I've never heard the name Tim. As far as I'm concerned that part of me died when I went back to mother Africa. No more questions."
Buzz Peterson: "I looked around the table and saw the same thought behind everyone's dead eyed thousand yard stare: this is it. We're not going to make it out of this conference room alive. I'll never bail my daughter out after she's unjustly arrested for a sit-in protesting the military industrial complex. I'll never teach my son how to be wracked with guilt over his unconscious biases. I've never yearned."
Rich Cho: "Maybe it was the fair trade quinoa smoothie, maybe it was the guiding hand of the triple goddess, maybe it was pure luck. I don't know what came over me, although it was a two thirds waxing moon, but it suddenly all made sense. Sunlight is the best alternative disinfectant, and laughter is the best alternative medicine. What did I have to lose? So I said, 'boss, what if we drafted Gary Bossert?'"
Dan Cortese: "Gary Bossert! He wasn't even in the top six hundred on our Big Board, sponsored by Whole Foods! Whole Foods, your one stop shop for all things natural! Whole Foods!"
Buzz Peterson: "For the second time in as many minutes, silence. None of us even breathed. I pictured my wife's face for what I was sure was the last time. And then..."
Dan Cortese: "GM Fecta just busts out laughing. We of course all immediately join in, the rictus cackling of the condemned. Even the intern managed a titter."
Rich Cho: "I burn incense every day to whichever ancestral spirit brought me that idea. I honestly believe I wouldn't be here talking to you today otherwise."
Bill Simmons (notable sports commentator): "Any time you score huge and get the 2nd pick in the creation draft, and have a shot at a middling teenage player with tremendous boom or bust potential while also passing on a sure fire hall of famer in Gary Bossert, you have to do it. Fecta has the bold strategy of trying to build a G-League dynasty but forgot about the $15 mil cap. I see no way this becomes a Sam Bowie/Michael Jordan situation. As if the people of Charlotte didn't have it bad enough with Billy living in their city. It's entirely possible that Fecta thought he was texting his girlfriend about a rim job but I'm not sure if that counts as eating meat?"
Hornets draft RJ Barrett SF 6'7'' 200 19 B- B- C B- C+ A (4 years)
.
1.3
Sean P. Lavs (general manager): "Let's throw it to uh... to uh... to uh... God this Jameson's is hitting me hard."
Leon Beiderbecke (associate head coach, doing a beer run): "The Jazz are all about improvisation, random cuts, screen the screener action. A little casual drinking never hurt anyone, and it greases those wheels, you know? But every big band needs a conductor, and every team needs a boss. A 4.0 legend, the best shooter in the world, an absolutely elite scorer. But Rory Lavs wasn't available, so the top of our big board was Gary Bossert."
Robert McElhiney James (head scout): "I shared a taxi with Lavs one time after a night of crawling the bars and all he could talk about was the touchdown he was about to score in the draft. I figured he was just drunk, but next thing I know I've got a job offer from an actual basketball team. Sign of the times, huh?"
Leon Beiderbecke: "We weren't worried about the Globetrotters. Those cats up in Harlem couldn't be more square if you put my cornet case on top a Victrola! We were a little worried when the Timberwolves traded up, that St. Paul nightclub scene doesn't even get started until three in the morning, daddy-o."
Robert McElhiney James: [keyboard solo]
Leon Beiderbecke: "Then it was up to the bees down Carolina way, and... well..."
Sean P. Lavs: "RJ Barrett? I mean... what the [EXPLETIVE]!"
Jazz draft Gary Bossert SG 6'5'' 195 26 C A+ C- B+ C C (5 years)
.
1.4
Rabbi Goldfaurb, Temple Beth Tov-Ahavat Shalom Synagogue: "Here was a pick with some chutzpah. Finally, the retirees of our community have a basketball player they can rally behind. And so young! Our own little bubbeleh to pressure and nag into becoming a star."
DJ Khaled, Courtside Jester: "W-E H-A-D T-O P-I-C-K A P-L-A-Y-E-R W-H-O A-P-P-E-A-L-E-D T-O B-O-T-H T-H-E S-O-C-I-A-L M-E-D-I-A C-O-N-S-C-I-O-U-S Y-O-U-T-H A-N-D T-H-E L-A-R-G-E C-O-N-T-I-N-G-E-N-T O-F O-L-D J-E-W-I-S-H R-E-T-I-R-E-E-S. It was a major key. Tell'em, Asahd!"
Asahd Khaled, baby: drools
James H. Beard, Executive VP of Basketball Operations (Atlanta Hawks): "Yeah their GM kept texting me asking where I had Zion on my board and I finally told him ‘we have him pretty high for a teenager’. Like two minutes later the pick was in.”
El Guapo Jr., Shirtless Roller-blader: "The city was positively electric with the news that we were taking Zion's talents to South Beach. We were even talking about showing up to the games BEFORE halftime this year."
Heat draft Zion Williamson PF 6'6'' 275 18 A- C C C+ B A (3 years)
.
1.5
Curly Neal (associate general manager): "Sure we wanted to trade down. It's all well and good to have 1.1 when Connie Hawkins is eligible, but we couldn't even reach a consensus among each other. Abe Saperstein's disembodied head was dead set on Dolph Schayes, but opinions varied strongly."
Meadowlark Lemon (crown prince): [spins ball on finger]
Wilt Chamberlain (vice president of women's outreach): "I could still whip Dolph Schayes, and I've been dead for fifteen years. Are you kidding me? My third game in the NBA I put up 41 and 40 on his left hand set shot shooting @$$."
Louis "Red" Klotz (general): "I lobbied hard for a young star I saw with the Southern Philadelphia Hebrew Association by the name of Lasto Picko but Meadowlark just kept dumping confetti on me and singing about Zion."
Curly Neal: "So we figured why not pick up some assets and let the chips fall where they may? What's the worst thing that can happen, we build a team in Harlem around a goofy looking white boy literally named Adolph?"
Globetrotters (from Timberwolves) draft Dolph Schayes PF 6'9'' 215 25 B B+ B B A B (2 years)
.
1.6
Patrick F. Catrickface, Warriors Owner: "When Truck showed me the draft board I was admittedly nervous. My contacts in Europe told me some pretty shocking things about the on-goings at Real Madrid. After some thought about the parallels between RM and the Bay Area culturally I thought Luca might feel a little too much at home."
Taco "Truck" Ensalada, Warriors General Manager: "Yeah I know about Real, everyone knows about Real. But this kid had something we couldn't pass on. He was 3rd on my board with the only flaw in his game on defense. Now if you can't teach a guy about D in San Francisco, where can you?"
Greg Louganis, Real Madrid Strength and Conditioning Coach: "Golden State is where Luca has wanted to be since he came up in our system. We've put in countless hours preparing him for this opportunity. A lot of private workouts at all hours of the day. He's ready to be the guy and this is the city he wants behind him."
Patrick F. Catrickface: "Maybe Luca will be more comfortable here, I'm not sure. I just know if we missed on this pick we'll be the butt of a lot of jokes around the league."
Taco Ensalada: "Luca just felt familiar, like an old friend. He's young, and he'll stumble I'm sure, but he's my guy. I couldn't have more faith in Luca if I was George Michael."
Warriors draft Luka Doncic SG 6'8'' 230 19 B B- B- C C+ A (3 years)
.
1.7
Tony Ressler, Principal Owner and Chairman (Atlanta Hawks): "Everyone here is probably aware of some of the past missteps we've had from our front office in regards to racial and general social 'awareness', so my main goal was to just get through the draft without someone making a stupid ass comment like referring to the amount of African in a player or using their biracial family as a punchline to try and release the tension in a room full of angry ticket-holders."
Bomani Jones, Sports and Social Commentator (ESPN): "Those guys in Atlanta are total idiots."
Steve Koonin, CEO (Atlanta Hawks): "To Tony's point, we bolstered the Front Office guys...er....and gals from organizations with a history of success and a lack of horrifying social missteps. We were really happy to bring in Travis Schlenk who was with the Warriors and of course Coach Bud who was already here but previously from the Spurs. We had a lot of faith that these guys would be able to execute our vision of being good on the court but also good at not embarrassing ourselves in the press."
Travis Schlenk, GM (Atlanta Hawks): "Hi, I'm Travis. I used to be the Golden State coffee guy and my title was Executive Assistant, but I think Steve got confused and thought I was the an executive and an assistant GM. He hired me without asking for references or interviewing me because I was working for the Warriors. So now I'm just trying to sit in on meetings and sound smart enough to not get fired. And definitely not say anything racist to the press, Tony and Steve were very clear about that."
Mike Budenholzer, Head Coach (Atlanta Hawks): "So we get into the war room on draft day and everyone around here keeps looking at me like I have the secret sauce to winning because I was with the Spurs for awhile. Everyone is expecting me to wave my magic wand and pull a rabbit out of the hat because no one really knows Travis yet and the VP of Basketball Operations is some fat nerd nobody likes. But listen, I was just an assistant coach in San Antonio. And as far as I know, their organizational strategy was to just draft good basketball players. Like, you know, folks who can shoot, dribble, pass, defend, rebound, do general basketball things. It's not that difficult."
Adrian Wojnarowski, Basketball Reporter (ESPN): "Yeah, that draft room was a disaster. Nobody really knew who was in charge and it seemed like everyone was afraid to say anything."
James H. Beard, VP of Basketball Operations (Atlanta Hawks): "So we get on the clock and The Big BoardTM says that the clear choice is Gerald Martin Johanssen. I'm ready to send the pick into the league but at that point, Travis pipes up for the first time and says to no one in particular, 'They hired me to think outside the box since I came from the Warriors, right? But what if the most outside the box thinking is to think inside THE BOX.'
Adrian Wojnarowski: "Yeah so then we got word that the Hawks had selected Elvis Delle Donne."
Travis Schlenk: "I was really proud of that comment. I had no idea what I was saying, but I think I have them fooled."
Tony Ressler: "I was very happy with the pick as it made us look like progressives and that we might not even be totally socially incompetent."
Ian Boyd, General Manager (Minnesota Timberwolves): "The ladyboys are a trap, trust me."
Hawks draft Elvis Delle Donne SF 6'10'' 225 24 A- B D B B B (1 year)
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1.8
Bill Simmons (notable sports commentator): "The body language doctor Picasso of the Trade Machine is in, the operation was a success, and Conspiracy Bill got fired. A bunch of times. Just look at this body language. It's obvious he's going to the Lakers, just like Westbrook, Love, LeBron before him. Sure he can space the floor and defend and he's got great stats, but where's the warrior winner killer Allen Iverson mentality? Sure AI only won six playoff series in his entire career if you want to be technical about it, but one time I saw him yell at a ref, that might not be good enough for the Bucks but it's good enough for top forty player ever in my book. (The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to the Sports Guy, available at bargain bin prices wherever books are sold.) Look, any time you can draft the star of a team that got bounced in the round of 64 by the MAC champion you've gotta do it. Holy Cross should keep their mascot, I've in no way become the out of touch old white guy I used to mock."
Bucks draft DeAndre Ayton C 7'1'' 250 20 B+ C+ C- B- B A (5 years)
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1.9
Rutherford "Great" Odin (commissioner): "With the ninth pick of the draft, the New York Knicks select Firsto Picko. Uh, his name was Firsto. Firsto, like first. Like he gets drafted first."
Bruce Koplow (vice general manager of drafting, player development, and lead guitaristry): "Were we concerned when Big 'Chuck' Dolan decided to hand over the team the day before a creation draft to someone who had never at any level managed, coached, played, watched, or even heard the word basketball?" [long pause] "No. I am not contractually obligated to say no, I genuinely believe it. And at least we still had coach Lapchick, who had stewarded the Knicks to multiple wins in the last BAA season, his sixtieth consecutive on the job. From the first day in the war room he was h*ck bent on Chris "The Ball Dribbler" Steinmetz, but after we told coach that not only had Steinmetz retired in 1905 he was in fact deceased, he was h*ck bent on Firsto Picko."
Joe Lapchick (head coach): "Just call me a stool pigeon 'cuz this birdie's about to sing."
Joe Lapchick (stool pigeon): "I seen my share of grifters goons and gumshoes. Yeah I been coaching since the Boys Reformatory days, when ol' Doc Naismith put up the peach baskets for whatever cabbage we could scrape so long as the Spanish Flu wasn't running amok. Can the simoleons talk, poindexter, when we're talking basketball we're talking baskets. When we're talking baskets we're talking buckets. When we're talking buckets we're talking bucket-getters, see? Look at the gams on this tall drink of water. You don't need a talking picture to tell you which way's the scratch and which way's a long walk off a short pier courtesy of an old fashioned Chicago overcoat! Gimme a Picko and make it snappy, see?"
Bruce Koplow: "Coach was convinced and since nobody in the war room thought a guy named First Pick would be there at nine and since nobody in the war room wanted to argue with a guy who couldn't or wouldn't keep his dentures from falling out when he shouted we humored the old crank. We'd had high hopes for a new Windows 95 killer app by the name of CompuGM, but the boss wouldn't spring for dial-up so we had to have a tech come in and enter each prospect's information by hand."
Joe Lapchick: "This young whippersnapper. 'Don't worry fellow very good apes,' he says, 'all we have to do is push one button with our fingers,' he says, 'I've got a 100% reliable macro,' he says. Huh! I says to him I says 'if ol' Doc Naismith wanted us to play Marco Polo he wouldn't have-' and all of a sudden he cuts me off, he says to me he says 'oh God the spiders, why are there spiders coming out of the floppy disk drive, oh God my flesh, my beautiful human flesh.'"
Bruce Koplow: "So CompuGM was out."
Bob Zuppke (advance scout): "I remember the spiders dragging that definitely human and not a robot away and the general manager pulling on my sleeve, which was weird since we were already making eye contact and having a conversation. 'Bill-' He called me Bill. 'Bill, I need you to get me everything on Steph Templeton and Jesse Epstein. Do they like to go left. What kind of handles are we talking. What do their teammates think of them, none of this numbers b***crap. Are they married. Especially that second guy.' I'll never forget it. He looked me in the eye, shook my hand for some reason, and said 'There's no way Firsto Picko is falling to us.'"
James Dolan (executive general manager): "Oh yeah, I knew all along my close personal friend Firsto would fall to us. Whaddaya think, I sacrificed all those goats for fun? You think I get off on the stink of blood matted hair burning in a painstaking and wildly over budget reproduction of Metropolis's' Moloch? You wanna prove it with pictures of my boner, smart guy? You think you're better than me? My dad owns a dealership! These views and opinions necessarily reflect those of the company and its management!"
(ed. note: These views and opinions do not necessarily reflect those of the company and its management.)
Bill Walton (television commentator): "Whooooaa! Firsto Pickoooo! I'm told he's not related to Lasto Picko or Jean-Luc Picardo or Wilson Picketto, pico de gallo, picking the banjo, PIX eleven oh, New York's ooooonly classic rock AM station. I love picks. Who are you again? It was a hundred and fifty three years ago today, Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody number two in C plus minor, I'm hung-a-ry for this guy's C sharp outside shooting. That's a terrrrrrrible draft from everyone else, terrrrrrrible."
James Dolan: "And you can tell Bill [expletive] Walton to [continued expletives]."
Knicks draft Firsto Picko C 6'10'' 220 23 A C+ B B- B- C (3 years)
.
1.10
Ernie Grunfeld (alleged general manager): "We can't let Harlem steal a march on us with their Romanian-Jewish superman. Chocolate City will build around someone even whiter! Get me the guy who makes Doug Funnie look like Malcolm X! Get me Chalky Studebaker!"
Wizards fans:
Wizards draft Chalky Studebaker SF 6'7" 220 28 B+ B D+ A- B- C (2 years)
.
1.11
Andrew Luck (frequent Men in Blazers guest): ask pete or someone what football is. throw in something about horses? DO NOT POST THIS
Suns draft Marvin Bagley III C 6'11 235 19 B+ C+ D+ C B A (3 years)
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1.12
Tim Pigulski (general manager): "Look at all the great champions. Edmonton. Montreal. Long Island. What don't you see? That's right, Africans. Sorry if that gets me a fine from the PC police. Our great fans deserve championships, not chamPConships."
Denis Lemiux (defensive coordinator): "Bad draft happen when the guy take the stick comme ça, you know, and he go like that [mimes indecipherably] you know, you don't do that. Never, never. You know, you're stupid when you do that, fils de taupe. Just some English pig with no brains, you know. Two minutes, you know and you feel shame, you know."
Terrance Stoot (co-chief of blue line defence): "Even when you're late in the lotto you can still look for treasha. So I said 'Let's look for treasha, Phillip.'"
Phillip Argyle (co-chief of blue line defence): "Everyone knows the great teams are built on the checking line, eh? Winning the neutral face off zone is one thing but you can't lose if the icing never pucks the back of your net, eh? We wanted a defender to build around for kiloseconds to come, eh? Romée l'Angfôrt was the only real choice, and as each team passed on him our excitement grew to fevre pitch, eh?"
Tim Pigulski: "We could barely see the telly through the cigarette smoke and maple syrup fumes. I must have re-laced my skates ten times. At last it all came down to the lucky Soleils. Our un de un was just one team away. I told Messier I wouldn't cry."
Denis Lemiux: "Alors, we give 'em blouse. White red, you know, les bonnes couleurs."
Tim Pig: "Was it a reach? Hey, you miss a hundred percent of the shots you don't take. I found out later our good French Canadian boy even spent his major junior bantam mite years in a town named New Albany. Albany - in langues d'oïl, 'the white city'! Mark my words, this kid will have a C on his sweater in no time. We're just gonna take it one shift at a time, but the Metropolitan Prince of Norris subdivision better watch out."
Bulls (from Cavaliers) draft Romeo Langford SG 6'5'' 190 18 B- B B- C C- A (3 years)
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1.13
Clay Bennett (SuperSonics owner): "It's no secret our relationship with the city of Sea Turtle has been strained recently. There's one way I know for sure to rally the fans around a franchise, and that's to draft an all time great player. Selvy's the kind of player that will keep the team here for decades to come." [laughs so hard he drools on himself]
SuperSonics draft Frank Selvy SG 6'5'' 220 29 B B+ B- B+ C C (3 years)
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1.14
Herb Simon (general manager): "...but Tom Van Arsdale played more games without making the playoffs than anyone in NBA history, and he's got a cult following. They follow him like a cult! He can't even walk down the street in Indianapolis! Some might say that's because of the cows and other livestock, but I say it's good old fashioned small town loyalty to and reverence for easily the greatest player in NBA history whose identical twin brother was the original Sun."
Quinn Buckner (head coach): "You just need to let him finish. We spend probably six hours a day hearing about the good old days and another two rewatching Hoosiers. I'm surprised we successfully made any draft picks working in that pigsty. That's not a euphemism, our war room was literally in an enclosed pig habitat."
William Leonard (lead play by play announcer): "Hey, in forty nine other states, it's basketball. In Indiana, we elected Mike Pence to two separate offices. So probably go with what the other forty nine states are doing."
Herb Simon: "These young kids today with their 'three pointers' and their 'televisions' can't hold a candle to the old cream and crimson stars. Now Jon McGlocklin, there was a player!"
Quinn Buckner: "Top of our big board was Romeo Langford."
Herb Simon: "Go IU! Fight! Fight! Fight!"
Quinn Buckner: "When we found out he'd been drafted to another country, Mr. Simon was dumbstruck. He kept mumbling 'fists and blades, fists and blades' and even stopped stroking his rooster. Again, not a euphemism, we were getting eggs from the hen house at the time."
Branch McCracken (deceased): "Talk about a blessing in disguise. With only nine Hoosier alumni in the draft we didn't have enough players to make it ten rounds anyway, but we realized all we had to do was tell Mr. Simon we had just missed on one and then we could focus on you know basketball talent, contract situation, marginalia like that."
Quinn Buckner: "Worked with Romeo, worked with Devonte Green, heck we kept the charade up into the eighth with Aljami Durham. What do you expect from a bunch of farm boys?"
William Leonard: "Pretty slick!"
Pacers draft Daniel Taurasi SG 6'5'' 200 25 B B+ B- B- C B (5 years)
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1.15
Suge "Knight" R. Shaun (general manager): "We know the only way to win a championship in Cleveland is to draft LeBron James, so we're pretty much hoping to field a roster of stiffs until his class becomes available. Benji's the kind of player who can really take some shots, and we're confident under his leadership our place in the standings will just about drop dead."
Cavaliers (from Bulls) draft Benji Wilson SF 6'8'' 215 24 B- B+ C+ B C+ B (3 years)
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1.16
Greg Pikitis, Assistant to the General Manager: "At this point, the teenage run was on. I hadn't seen this many teens get snatched up since the Manson family was holding tryouts."
Chris Shortman, Director of Player Embiggenment: "We thought about following the trend, but we couldn't afford to hire a baby sitter for the team, so we decided to focus on someone who could at least rent a car."
Hans Omepete, General Manager: "We were down to two guys we thought would've been long gone: George Mikan and Jesus Shuttlesworth. Now, I'll be honest here. Me and Jesus's father go way back. We came up together and used run hustles out on the streets, ripping off big town Miami saps who thought they could get rich quick. So when we were looking into who to draft, Chris and I paid him a visit."
Warden Wyatt, Attica Correctional Facility: "Jake was as smooth as they come, and awhile ago had sweettalked his way into a deal with the governor to go play his son in a game of one-on-one, loser goes back to prison. No one knew Jesus better than Jake."
Hans Omepete: "I pop in to Attica during visiting hours and get Jake to give me the scoop. He tells me, 'Jesus is a good player. He's got game. But don't bullshit the bullshitter. Either you're somebody...or you're nobody. We didn't land on Plymouth Rock. Plymouth Rock landed on us! I'm not going to bury my son, my son is going to bury me! KING KONG AIN'T GOT SHIT ON ME!'"
Warden Wyatt: "Jake was so smooth in that meeting I suddenly had to release him from prison. How could I deny the world that gift?"
Chris Shortman: "His CPS [catchphrase-per-syllable] was through the roof. I'd never seen such efficient smoothocity. I said to Hans, 'Forget Jesus. This is the Shuttles who is Worth a damn.' But he wouldn't listen."
Hans Omepete: "Listen, I wanted to take Jake. But he was too much of a liability. And have you seen the guy? Could you imagine building a marketing campaign around Jake Shuttlesworth? Yikes..."
Rockets draft Jesus Shuttlesworth SG 6'5'' 200 26 C+ A- B- B- C+ C (5 years)
.
1.17
Ernie Grunfeld (general manager of the Bullets too): "That's right! You can't even get rid of me in sim life! Nyah ha hah!!!" [twirls mustache]
Bullets fans:
Bullets draft Trae Young SG 6'2'' 180 19 C A- B C+ D+ B (3 years)
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1.18
Lester B. Pearson (scholar, statesman, soldier, stenographer): "We weren't sure what was going on in Washington. Sorry."
Captain Sir John Franklin (westward scout, hand reaches for the Beaufort Sea): "Sorry."
Rachel McAdams (I like Rachel McAdams, so what, you wanna fight about it?): "I'm sorry."
Lester B. Pearson: "As a fellow quiet, tall, bespectacled man, I felt a real kinship with young George. We were delighted to learn he went to school in one of Canada's finest universities DePaul, just down the street from the Suez Canal where I had contributed to solving a bit of a kerfuffle, and so we brought him in for a sit down."
George Mikan (quiet, tall, bespectacled man): "I never thought a 'long fellow' could succeed in the basket-ball. To be honest I only played to practice goaltending for what I naturally assumed would be a long ice hockey career. I was humbled by the invitation, but there was one stumbling block."
Lester B. Pearson: "I introduced myself as Lester B. Pearson."
George Mikan: "I apologized."
Lester B. Pearson: "I apologized."
Captain Sir John Franklin: "I also apologized."
George Mikan: "It's just that 'Lester' really isn't much of a name for a general manager. Don't you think so? I don't want to cause any trouble."
Mike Pearson: "Once that was settled we really sold him on our universal health care, the passage of which I had also contributed to, to some extent. I was in charge at the same time as JFK. Sorry. Anyway, he humbly accepted our humble offer to join the humble Couv."
Grizzlies draft George Mikan C 7'0'' 265 26 A+ C C- C A- C (2 years)
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1.19, 1.20
Danny Ainge (President of Basketball Operations): "When Austin and I heard this young Harvard hot shot had bought the team, we assumed it'd just be more of the same hands-off style ownership."
Austin Ainge (Director of Player Personnel): "Little did we know this guy is a transplant from Tennessee who had no idea about the culture or tradition of this organization."
Clyde Parks (Local fan, plumber): "Everybody in Boston agrees that white dudes look wicked good in the green, always have always will."
Russell Vanderpump XII (Celtics Owner): "Honestly I just love the mascot guy, can't get enough of him."
Danny Ainge: "So we're sitting in the war room, Austin and I are shuffling scouting reports preparing to be on the clock. Russell is nowhere to be found so we're hung ho ready to make our pick. Austin answers, and all I can hear is a bunch of commotion."
Austin Ainge: "It was Russell, apparently he was on vacation. The most important event for our franchise and this guy is gone. Anyways, we're talking about the pick and who we're looking at, and I hear Russell say 'double it up' So I ask what he means and he goes 'Yeah I need two, two for sure. I don't care what it costs just get them.' I told him alright and hung up the phone."
Russell Vanderpump XII: "Whoops."
Austin Ainge: "Pops and I are pretty shocked, but happy. Our staff loved Wendell Carter, and we figured we could pair him with Gerald who we saw as a dominant scorer. We phone in the Carter pick and I get a text from Russell 'I love France, give me the french all day' so now we're scouring our lists for this Frenchman Russell is talking about. We find Doumbouya and come to the realization that we've got to change our entire plan and build around two teenagers."
Clyde Parks: "The fuck is a Wendell Cahtah? You got Bobby McDermott sitting on the board and we get this guy and an African? That'll play well in Beantown, good luck selling tickets."
Danny Ainge: "Russell gets back in town after a week in Paris and asks us why we traded up and took Sekou. Turns out he was negotiating at a brothel while he was on the phone with Austin. I'll leave it up to you to interpret what the text meant. The good news is Simmons is on suicide watch so maybe he'll leave me alone."
Austin Ainge: "After the miscommunication Russell all but disappeared for what seemed like days. We're told the Boston public isn't very happy with 'that damn african' and Russell is letting the situation cool down before coming back."
Celtics draft Wendell Carter Jr. C 6'10'' 260 19 B- B- C- B- C+ A (5 years)
Celtics (from Lakers) draft Sekou Doumbouya SF 6'9'' 227 18 B C+ C- B- B- A (4 years)
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1.21
Steve Ballmer (owner, staring unnervingly): "After the unpleasantness with Donald Sterling we needed a top to bottom culture refresh."
Ralph Lawler (announcer, standing politely): "He broke Lawler's law! Lawyers aren't worth a lolling lily once you've lost to Lawler's law, lol!"
Steve Ballmer: "Who better to tear it down to the studs, scorch the earth, scorch the studs, pile all the ashes together and scour them with some sort of dissolving reagent than Fason?"
Inur Fason (general manager, sim league and Drag Race champion): "Do I hear the whispers about how I went out of my way multiple times to destroy 4.0? Honey, that's just water off a duck's back. What I love about what I do is expanding people's minds on the topics of gender expression, gay rights, and most of all, having absolutely no one under contract when I start a rebuild."
Steve Ballmer: "Mike Conley. Tyus Edney. Rowdy Eavenson. Eric Hofmann. When you think great Fason squads, you think great point guards, and so we painstakingly compiled a big board of the top twenty one point guards in the draft. Twenty picks later, not a single point guard had been drafted."
Ralph Lawler: "The team that wins the tip gets the ball again to start the fourth quarter. Lawler's law cannot be broken!"
Inur Fason: "I didn't become Seattle's premier Jewish narcoleptic drag queen by not sticking to my guns. If the perimeter oriented style doesn't work out, I'll trade every last Clipper so fast their wigs will be snatched clean off. If the next core doesn't work out, I'll burn that runway when I come to it. If that doesn't work out either, I'll 'helpfully' volunteer to 'assist' the league directly off a cliff and it'll be 6.0 time. Can I get an amen?"
Ralph Lawler: "Bingo!"
Clippers draft Bobby McDermott PG 6'0'' 190 26 B B+ B C+ C- B (3 years)
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1.22
Rory Delap (throws): "Oy, ain't only one Rory in sim league, guv."
Tony Pulis (grizzled gristle): "Pêl-droed rwy'n gwybod. Pêl-fasged, blood fam?" [dons tracksuit on top of tracksuit he was already wearing]
Rory Delap: "Gaffer's totted forty points a campaign long as tuppence up the wickersham, or I inn't the pride of the Royal bloody Town of Suttonfolkshire Coldfield and all the West Midlands, I inn't."
Robbie Earle (pie-rejector): "Sexy, sexy basketball is back in Dallas-on-Trinity!"
Mavericks draft Cameron Reddish SF 6'7'' 210 19 B- B C+ C+ C+ B (3 years)
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1.23
Billy King (talking on two phones at once): "Buy! Sell! Batteries! Bit coin! Battlestar Galactica!"
Killy Bing (not Billy King ;)): "Open Uke Case for what a great GM Billy King is."
The Jester (punctuation enthusiast‽): "Fifty quickness! Dee arr big! Anthony Mason!"
Billy King: "When my league did a mock oral history we all bought Dictaphones and recorded ourselves, then I wrote a Python script to splice them all together and we listened to them during our All-Star break, which is actually a week long. You think this is long? This isn't long."
Killy Bing: "This pick on the block for future firsts."
Billy King: "Looking to buy into the draft, future firsts available."
Kings draft Gerald Martin Johanssen SF 6'6'' 210 27 B A- C B- B- C (2 years)
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1.24
(editor's note: Em Jay's media relations director did not return repeated inquiries to be interviewed for this piece, or to address rumors first reported by Adrian Wojnarowski that the GM left draft headquarters for a night of alcohol fueled debauchery at a local music festival. His commentary has been reconstructed from media appearances around the time of the draft.)
Magic Johnson (mogul): "Back when we won the title it was all about the big fellas. Greg "The Arena" Monroe, Dr. Rounds at the power forward. You gotta feed the dog to protect the yard!" [raucous laughter]
Billy Joe "Red" McCombs (Spurs board member, Texan, Jesus enthusiast): "Even back in the Dallas Chaparral days, the extent of the draft guidance we got from our GM was a crumpled up Post-It with the phrase "bigs no blocks" written on it. So it came as a shock to myself and the rest of the board when GM Jay not only showed up on the day of the draft but was actively engaged in the discussion."
Em Jay (general manager): "WHERE IS MY GAMBLING STUFF"
Jerry Tarkanian (head coach): "We thought this was draft was tailor made for our player style. A 6'6" big with C+ defense in the top five? You don't need a tiger to tell you that Kellogg is going to frost some flakes. Good thing, since we've hunted all local wildlife larger than a breadbox to extinction."
Red McCombs:
Jerry Tarkanian: "So the draft is going on and no-defense big after no-defense big is flying off the board, and I can tell Em Jay is getting hotter and hotter. I remember it was just after Mikan goes to the Couv, Jay pulls me aside."
Em Jay: "Thought qrong"
Jerry Tarkanian: "That really made me stop and think 'what?' but I relayed the message to the rest of the brain trust. Eventually we decided to flip the big board. Keep Austin weird, you know?"
Em Jay: "Alright, way to go donnie!"
Red McCombs: "We took that as a yes. So what's the opposite of a young big with no defense? The oldest wing we could find, all our scouts agreed he was a plus defender at minimum. Sure he was demanding a five year deal, but compared to paying Draymond Green six mil a year for six years he was a bargain."
Magic Johnson: "The Spurs just acquired the next Magic Johnson in Nick Diaz. If the Spurs players play well, they'll have a chance of winning!"
Em Jay: Sheesh
Spurs draft Nick Diaz SG 6'7'' 245 35 A- B+ B+ B+ C F (5 years)
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1.25
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse, Owner (Orlando Magic): "I've always had two main passions in life, skateboarding and basketball. It was exciting to be able to finally buy a team and do the basketball professionally, but I also thought that this could be a great opportunity to bring some of the mindset of the skatepark to the basketball court and give a fresh take on how a basketball team should be run."
John Hammond, General Manager (Orlando Magic): "Skateboard is a nice enough guy, but we were used to having an absentee owner (Em Jay) who was at music festivals and just let us just do our thing during drafts like this. So we prepared like normal. We had our board together, everyone was excited as some of our big targets fell down the board to us, we were all raring to pick Brain Winter when Skateboard made an appearance in the draft room right before we got on the clock."
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse: "Look, I understand that I'm just some guy who bought a basketball team and I don't really know what I'm doing. But I do know that you have to have a brand, an identity, something that people know you by so they know you're rad AF or your just some some stiff on a skateboard that most definitely cannot shred it. So I made the executive decision we were going to be a team full of Grinders. Grind it out. Grind City. I was pretty sure that term could be applied to basketball and it is familiar to me as a skater, so I figured it was a good starting point."
John Hammond: "So at that point we get on conference with the league to make our pick and Skateboard presents his "Grind" brand idea to us. Totally throws everyone off their game. We were ready to put in the pick for Brain Winter but all of a sudden Skateboard starts yelling in the corner."
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse: "GRINDER! GRINDER! GRINDER! GRINDER! GRINDER!"
Odin, Commissioner of TMBSL: "So all I can hear is chanting on the other end of the line and it sounds like they are repeatedly yelling "Griner". I ask for clarification but all I get back is chanting. Time is running down on the clock, so finally I just put the pick in for Brandon Griner."
John Hammond: "Fuck me."
"Skateboard" Fred Rouse: "I was really pleased with how the first round played out. We got our Grinder...wait, what? It's just Griner? Uh..........*muttering*.....fuck it...CLOSE ENOUGH. GOT OUR GRINDER"
John Hammond, Former GM (Orlando Magic): "I tendered my resignation before the start of the second round and they named Tony Hawk the new GM of the Magic. Tony Hawk."
Magic draft Brandon Griner C 7'2'' 240 26 A- C D A C C (4 years)
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1.26
Paul Allen (Trailblazers co-owner, Microsoft co-founder, co-biggest fan of Co-co): "We knew we were in for a bumpy ride when the GM walked in and asked how many guys he could take with his draft pick."
Jon-Michael Majkut (general manager): "Look, you try organizing thirty four guys into the Ohio ice hockey champions and then we'll see how well you keep all the 'rules' straight for your side gig."
Neil Olshey (senior vice president, basketball operations): "Somehow it went even further downhill after that. Our main criteria were a wing who was strong on defense and outside shooting. Senior staff were alternating writing names on a white board since the GM was still in uniform and couldn't pick up the marker, and a certain head coach who shall remain nameless saunters up and writes Eligin Baylor."
Doctor Jack Ramsay (head coach): "I just thought he was eligible to bayl us out of our poor luck in draft placement. Everyone loved my name based puns in hockey hotbed Miami, I was just trying to break the ice."
Doctor Jack Ramsay (still talking): "Break the ice, you get it? They play hockey on ice."
Paul Allen: "One thing leads to another and our GM and head coach have dropped the gloves literally and metaphorically speaking respectively. Jack's yelling that Jon-Michael wouldn't know a basketball if it was painted on his helmet, Jon-Michael's yelling that Jack's not even a real doctor, Gilbert Arenas is over in the corner grilling burgers on a hibachi, absolute bedlam."
Doctor Jack Ramsay (not a real doctor): "The guy loves hockey so much, why doesn't he GM a hockey team? And as a matter of fact I earned a doctorate in education at the University of Pennsylvania. I'm not saying you should ask me about your gall bladder but it's not like I'm one of those lawyers who insist on going by doctor out here."
Jon-Michael Majkut: "Look, you live by a code in the boardroom. A guy tries to skate by with his head down, you put him on his golden parachute. Someone rides you all period, you circle back and settle it man to man by drilling down on the synergy of some rebranding action items. Doesn't matter if he's your best friend or an eighty five year old man off the ice, when you're between the lines sometimes you've got to hostile takeover some goon."
Neil Olshey: "I often think that Gil could still play point today. His timing remains spot on, each burger flipped back onto the grill at the moment Jon-Michael's knuckles thudded into Jack's leathery face, like a cosmic ballet. A cosmic, gruesome ballet, where the dancers get into bloody fist fights. So I guess not like a ballet at all."
Paul Allen: "If it hadn't been for the blinding plaid throwing his aim off we'd probably be looking at Jail Blazers 2.0, and wouldn't you know it but the commish picks that exact moment to ring in for our pick."
Jon-Michael Majkut: "I was shouting 'talk some more! talk some more!' because while communicating with your fists is all well and good they don't enunciate and I needed the so-called 'Doctor' to be clear on where we stood. I didn't realize the league office had been on speakerphone until I'd skated over to the penalty box, and by that point we'd already drafted Malcolm Moore."
Neil Olshey: "Some people might say that drafting based on the vague aural resemblance between their name and the taunts you levy on a geriatric you're pummeling is no way to run a team. I say to those people, are you hiring?"
Trailblazers draft Malcolm Moore SF 6'5'' 210 25 B+ B- C+ A- C+ C (1 year)
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1.27
Stan Van Gundy (head coach, chief usher, vice president of disheveledry): "I've been part of some uncomfortable exchanges. But I know that sometimes to climb that mountain you do what you gotta do. The GM wanted to bring in each player for one on one interviews and to this day I'm not sure if it made things better or worse that I insisted on being there too."
D. Ump Thyme (a successful and wealthy entrepreneur): "I could watch you sleep forever, Shamorie. I want you to willingly surrender yourself to me. Roll your eyes at me again and I will put you across my knee! Do you want more? Welcome to my world."
Shamorie Ponds (fresh faced college graduate): "I don't know if I can be with him the way he needs me to."
Stan Van Gundy: "Dump laughs and then is distracted by his BlackBerry, which must be on vibrate because it doesn't ring."
D. Ump Thyme: "Oh, I exercise control in all things, Ponds. But your body tells me something different. Your legs, for instance. The way you're pressing your thighs together under the table. And the change in your breathing. And in your complexion."
Shamorie Ponds: "That is not the reaction I expected. I was anticipating full-scale Armageddon."
D. Ump Thyme: "Can I just say how impressed I am with your commitment to this meeting? And in that spirit, I'm going to throw in a sweetener. When I tell you to come into this room this is how you'll be. You'll wait for me kneeling by the door. Hands flat on your thighs."
Stan Van Gundy (increasingly concerned): "I don't think my heart could stand the strain of another exchange like that, or my pants for that matter."
D. Ump Thyme: "Shamorie, you're like a fallen ethereal wraith." [readies riding crop]
Stan Van Gundy: "I knew then and there we had to build a f***ing wall to limit our civil and criminal liability, and that it was probably too late."
D. Ump Thyme (snarling, emphasizing each word): "You. Are. Mine."
Pistons draft Shamorie Ponds PG 6'1'' 170 21 B B- B B C C (5 years)
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1.28
Mike Malone, Head Coach: "The night before the draft, we're all putting in late hours in the conference room putting together our big board. We'd been at it for hours, going back and forth on what we were going to do. Building a team from scratch is no small task, and we were really trying to find a way to create an identity."
S. Lou Tang, General Manager: "We were getting nowhere. Half of the group wanted to go for developmental players, the other half wanted players we wouldn't need to wait on. We were at a stalemate, and we were running out of time."
Mike Malone: "We turned to our rock in these kinds of circumstances. The person who always has a way of bringing clarity to any problem we faced: our in-house horticulturist."
"Doctor" Tommy Chong, Horticulturist: "We had been working on something for this kinda thing for months. We started with a nice indica sativa, grown in the hydroponics farm in the basement of the Pepsi Center. We cross-bred that strain with a little something I picked up on my travels through Asia, which the locals refer to as "The Flame of Reckoning". Or maybe it was "the Spark of Knowledge". Anyway, we took a bit of that and increased the nitrates while playing nothing but Careless Whisper by George Michael, which really gives it a mellow finish. We took that new hybrid, which we called The Careless Flame of Sativa, mixed in a little bit of cardamom and a dash of nutmeg, and distilled it into a purely concentrated liquid form. Then we made brownies."
S. Lou Tang: "After we shared some brownies with Dr. Chong, the whole draft board seemed boring. We decided to bag it altogether and just watch some TV. Someone, I think it might have been Ted, was like 'Have you guys ever seen that movie where Arnold Schwarzenegger gets pregnant?'"
Ted, Someone: "I asked them how can mirrors be real if our eyes aren't real."
Mike Malone: "So we're watching Junior, and Arnold is running around with his crazy accent and a baby growing inside him. Can you imagine? A baby inside a MAN? And Danny DeVito as a doctor? It was too perfect. Tang and I looked at each other and at the same time, we both said 'THIS IS THE TEAM'. We had found our direction."
F. "Junior" Bankz, Vice President of Basketball Operations, former pizza man: "I showed up at about 3 in the morning with a stack of pizzas and found all three of them giggling and talking about starting a band. The next thing I know, I've got a 6 figure job offer and a corner office. The only thing I had to do was start going by "Junior" and bring pizzas to every future meeting."
S. Lou Tang: "We didn't stop there. We started calling up every Jr in our rolodex and offering them jobs in the organization. Odell Beckham Jr? Name your price. Dale Earnhardt Jr? Welcome aboard. The band Jr Jr? When can you start? We hired the entire junior class of Fairview High to be our marketing department."
Ted: "Really though, how CAN mirrors be real if our eyes aren't real?"
Mike Malone: "Once we locked into the culture of the organization, the rest of it was easy as pie. Or cake. Or brownies. Or tootsie rolls, but you've gotta be careful with those, because even though they're technically smaller, they can be just as potent."
Nuggets draft Michael Porter Jr. PF 6'10'' 215 20 B- B C- C+ B- A (3 years)
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1.29
(editor's note: the publishers would like to stress that general manager Val Venis was very enthusiastic about participating in this oral history even after he was informed what oral history actually meant, and insisted his remarks and gestures be transcribed verbatim. Readers with young children or sensitive dispositions should close the article now.)
Bryan Colangelo (chief executive officer): "You know that awkward moment when you see a co-worker after you've already been through the pleasantries that day? Hello, how you doing, see you later. Do you say them again? Do you try to go more in depth conversation? We didn't have that particular problem in Toronto."
Val Venis (general manager): "Hello, ladies!!!" [suggestive leering]
Bryan Colangelo: "Every. Time. Every time you'd see him, it didn't matter if you were coming back from lunch, the bathroom, maternity leave... if you were out of eyeshot for five minutes you'd get another taste."
Val Venis: [continues leering]
Kristaps Porzingis (Raptor ambassador and cosplayer extraordinaire): "To have fairness, also there were hard times under GM Hans Omepete. There was year in playoffs he shout 'do-over' every time we lose. Somehow it work, but is believed by me having playoffs ten and six times shorten career of all comrades. You can look up, Priest of Lauderdale's field goal percentage decline five straight years. Walter McCarty on track to be glorious hero of proletariat, one year later, gone. Still I can't look young children of McCarty in eye. Mostly because height only one meter. But also shame. I could have stop it. I could have refuse to play shooting guard of capitalist pig dog. I wear ears of dead donkey."
Val Venis: "Ooooooooo, that's the Money Shot!" [grinds hips lewdly]
Bryan Colangelo: "Early on we made the decision to favor potential over established talent. With a few notable exceptions the rest of the league was going the other way."
Val Venis: "Looks like they fell right into... the Venis Flytrap! Yes, I had some actual wrestling moves. Okay I had one actual wrestling move. Let me show you some literature about cannabis legalization. Yes, this is also somehow a real thing I'm into."
Bryan Colangelo: "This is Canada. We've got a rep as nice guys but don't forget we're a Dominion of the British Empire. We have the right to censor any Canadians who criticize our decisions, be they in Toronto, Ottawa, Buffalo, you name it. There's nowhere to hide from the Mounties..."
Val Venis: "Did someone say the mounted punches with theatrics, ladies???" [holds up flipbook of suggestive drill and train imagery]
Bryan Colangelo: [sighs quietly] "So we went with a guy whose highest grade was a B- and a middling 4.0 Raptor and called it a day. Who cares? Even if we had good publicity, a Canadian dollar is only worth six cents. Forget this. I'm gonna go ruin Markelle Fultz's career."
Raptors draft Devonte Green PG 6'3'' 185 21 C B- C+ C+ C- A (3 years)
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