NBA Draft: 2013 historical redraft shows vast differences

Actual selection: Cody Zeller, C, Indiana

Entering what would be their last season as the Charlotte Bobcats, this team was destined to end up with a former Indiana Hoosier it seems.

And how much differently could things have developed for Victor Oladipo had be come to Charlotte — where Kemba Walker was already firmly entrenched at the point guard spot — than to the Orlando Magic, where he spent his first season being forced into that role? First-year coach Steve Clifford would have loved Oladipo’s defensive chops and his athleticism.

Given the Bobcats had Gerald Henderson at the 2 spot, Oladipo likely would have begun his career off the bench — as he did in Orlando — but instead of trying to become a point guard at the NBA level, he would have been able to develop at his natural position on the wing.

Cody Zeller, Charlotte’s actual selection at No. 4 overall, has spent his entire career with the franchise and has been a workmanlike option in the middle — when healthy. But after playing all 82 games as a rookie backing up Al Jefferson, Zeller has not played more than 73 games in a season since, with the seven games he had missed this season the fewest in that span.

It is tantalizing to think what the Hornets could have done with Walker and Oladipo in the same backcourt. For starters, it might have prevented the Nicolas Batum and Lance Stephenson disasters.

Actual selection: Alex Len, C, Maryland

The last time the Phoenix Suns tasted a winning season came in 2013-14, when they used the dynamic backcourt of Goran Dragic and Eric Bledsoe and got nearly 16 points a game from Gerald Green en route to a 48-34 season that still fell one game short of a playoff berth in the Western Conference (one game off Phoenix’s NBA record of 49 wins and no playoff spot in 1971-72).

We know what happened next. The Suns tried to go to a three point-guard look the following season by signing-and-trading for Isaiah Thomas, alienated the Morris twins, made a lot of questionable draft decisions and collapsed to the cellar of the West for a half-decade.

The selection of Alex Len didn’t work out as well as Phoenix would have hoped from a high lottery pick. In five seasons, he never averaged double-digits in scoring or rebounding, never started more than 46 games in a season and didn’t ever average more than half a game (23.3 minutes per game in 2015-16 is still his career high).

Porter would have given the Suns some protection for the inevitable drop off Green had after posting his career year and would have given Phoenix a young wing to grow around, rather than having to rely on the offensively challenged P.J. Tucker at the 3, trading Marcus Morris and pissing off Markieff Morris to the point they had to trade him to the Wizards for 25 cents on the dollar.

Porter took time to develop, as mentioned earlier, after he was taken third overall by the Wizards after being named a consensus All-American and earning Big East Player of the Year honors as a sophomore. At 6’8″ and less than 200 pounds, it took him some time to get his strength to a level he could survive the physicality of the NBA game.

Slowed by a hip injury as a rookie, Porter emerged as a respectable 3-point shooter (40.4 percent for his career, with back-to-back seasons of 43.4 percent and 44.1 percent respectively in 2016-17 and 2017-18.