The OKC Thunder held the 21st pick in the 2017 NBA Draft and used it on a project shooting guard, was it the right call?
While there aren’t games there is time to consider the current roster more closely. Specifically, taking a retroactive look back at recent drafts. Well, let’s take a stab at the 2017 NBA Draft class from an OKC Thunder perspective.
In this NBA Draft, the Thunder used the 21st pick on Terrance Ferguson, who elected to skip college basketball to play professionally overseas in Australia. The Tulsa, Oklahoma native was a project form the start. The question is did that project pay off?
Ferguson has had an interesting career so far. To re-grade him, we first need to set the grade of the pick at the time. For me, when it was announced he was the pick at 21 in 2017, I gave it a B-.
I saw the upside, and the potential to be an elite 3-and-D player that would fit alongside Russell Westbrook and company extremely well.
Interestingly enough, for the OKC Thunder, there are only a few guys I would go back and pick ahead of youngster in this class (of course only counting the players that went after 21). So it is not as if they totally botched it, despite not making the best decision.
Of course, I would sign up right now to swap Ferguson for OG Anunoby, that is without question. I would also take Kyle Kuzma and likely Derrick White over Ferguson as well.
Josh Hart and Dillon Brooks would also get the nod from me, but I could see other OKC Thunder fans giving rightful pushback to that.
There is also a legitimate case that when it is all over I would rather have Chris Boucher‘s career. That being said, the team was in a win-now mode in 2017 and wouldn’t have been able to let Boucher grow in the G-League.
So what has Terrance Ferguson done to this point in his career?