Sacramento Kings: Ranking the last 10 first round picks

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 25: De'Aaron Fox #5 of the Sacramento Kings looks on in the second half against the Golden State Warriors at Chase Center on February 25, 2020 in San Francisco, California. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and/or using this photograph, user is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. (Photo by Lachlan Cunningham/Getty Images) /

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9. Malachi Richardson (2016)

Continuing their misses in the 2016 NBA draft, the Kings traded back into the first round by sending Marco Belinelli to the Charlotte Hornets to draft Malachi Richardson 22nd overall. After one surprisingly successful season at Syracuse University, Richardson jumped up draft boards.

He fit a need for the Kings, as we have addressed earlier. Injuries and trips to the G League limited his production in a season and a half in Sacramento and he would only go on to average 3.5 points, 1.2 rebounds and 0.5 assists per game in 47 games.

In his second season, he was traded to the Toronto Raptors in exchange for Bruno Caboclo. Over the two seasons, he would appear in just 23 games before heading overseas. The script seems to have been quickly written on the young shooting guard. Looking at the players taken just after him makes the pick look that much worse.

Taken between 26 and 29, Furkan Korkmaz, Pascal Siakam and Dejounte Murray all would have been staggeringly better choices. Korkmaz and Murray fit the role that Richardson looked to play on the team.

While the positional overlap is there for Siakam on the team if they had taken two fewer centers in the draft, pairing Siakam with Cousins would have changed the direction of this franchise. It is impossible to say that any of those players would have grown in Sacramento but that does not change how stark this choice is.

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