In their 47-year history, the Cleveland Cavaliers have added a plethora of talent through the NBA Draft, including arguably the sport’s greatest talent ever.
Although the Cleveland Cavaliers have just an okay track record in the NBA Draft, they can make one claim no one else can: They drafted freaking LeBron James. So really, anything else they’ve done in the yearly offseason event is just gravy.
Plus, over recent drafts, Cleveland selected guys who were major contributors to their first ever championship, so things are getting better!
Historically, there have been a few big-name players that went on to have illustrious careers after being drafted by the Cavs. Problem is, the illustrious part of their playing days occurred while they were on different teams.
One such name? The great Bill Laimbeer, famous for being one of the lead enforcers on the late ’80s Bad Boys Pistons. Before those days, he suited up in 131 contests for Cleveland.
Another was Ron Harper — one of the league’s great role players, who went on to win to five titles as a member of the Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers. He lasted three-plus seasons in Northeast Ohio before being traded.
And if we wanna get really specific (and sorta mean) we could also mention that Jamal Crawford was technically drafted by the Cavs, before being immediately dealt for the draft rights to…Chris Mihm. Sheesh.
But that’s all in the past! Cleveland has just wrapped up the best stretch in franchise history, reaching the NBA Finals three times in a row and winning the 2016 championship. With the 2017 NBA Draft behind us — one in which the Cavs didn’t own a single selection — we decided to rank their 10 best draft of picks of all time.
Honorable mentions: Kevin Johnson, Andrew Wiggins, Charles Oakley (Three studs who were drafted by Cleveland but spent little to no time with the franchise)