The 30 most painful NBA Draft pass-ups since 2000

NBA Draft Mistake #30: San Antonio drafting Joshua Primo in the lottery.

Fans of the San Antonio Spurs, myself included, are on cloud nine after landing the first overall pick in the 2023 NBA Draft. However, one reason they were so bad this season is that one of their recent lottery picks failed to pan out. Guard Joshua Primo was selected 12th overall in the 2021 NBA draft but is already out of the league after some serious allegations forced the team to cut ties with him.

12th picks don’t work out all the time, but the Spurs reached their goal by selecting Primo where they did. In fact, he didn’t appear on several mock drafts, so imagine the surprise when he was picked in the late lottery. Had he not allegedly done what he was accused of doing, he might have turned into a good NBA player.

Especially after growing from 6’4 to 6’6 after being drafted, there was hope that he could develop into a big point guard. That’s unlikely to happen now, and certainly not with the Spurs, who haven’t missed a beat without him. Of course, they did waste a lottery pick, and Alperin Sengun seemed like the obvious choice, even at the time, and has definitely improved since then.

With Victor Wembanyama set to join the Spurs next season and projected to put up monster numbers, the Primo debacle probably won’t hurt them going forward. Still, it might make the Spurs think twice about gambling on big unknowns in the upcoming drafts with their treasure trove of picks.