After finishing the season with a disastrous 17-65 record, the Milwaukee Bucks landed the second pick of the 2014 draft. It marked the first time the Bucks had picked inside the top 5 since 2005 and they haven't drafted that high since. Milwaukee selected Jabari Parker, who at the time was thought of as a can't miss prospect.
As it turned out, Parker missed. He tore his left ACL twice and left Milwaukee once his rookie contract expired. Blowing the second pick in the draft would ordinarily crush a franchise, especially one that plays in a small market, but wasn't the case with the Bucks.
Even though they didn't get a second bite at the top five pick apple and without the ability to lure high-end free agents, the Larry O'Brien Trophy currently resides in Milwaukee, so while it is important for the Rockets to hit on the second pick of Thursday's draft they can still survive if things go awry with whoever the selection turns out to be.
"There's so many different ways to become a championship team," Rockets general manager Rafael Stone said last week. "Nobody follows the same pattern, there is no set pattern, and so you want to do the best you can with every opportunity."
Stone has been quick to temper expectations on whomever places a Rockets cap atop his head on Thursday night, which is the smart play. There's no reason to declare some 19-year old the savior of an NBA franchise when you don't have to.
"I try very hard not to put pressure on us or our players that is not warranted," Stone said. "It's not like, Oh, this is the one that has to be perfect. No, you just have to do the best you can each and every time. The guys, what they owe us is absolute commitment and great work ethic, and then we get to where we get to.
"I feel really confident that if we do our job well, over and over and over, and our players reciprocate, we will get to where we want to get to, but I could never tell you that yeah, this is the crucial moment, this is it, and I wouldn't want to."
Despite not wanting to say it aloud, Stone hopes whoever he takes with his first choice will lead the Rockets for the next decade, but draft picks often fail to meet expectations, even at the top of the draft, but as we learned with Milwaukee, it's not a death knell for an organization, and Stone explained why.
"It may turn out that we've already got somebody on our roster who can be the key (to winning a championship), you don't really know."
That was the case when Milwaukee drafted Parker seven years ago, just no one knew it. A year prior, the Bucks selected Giannis Antetokounmpo with the 15th pick in the draft, and he averaged seven points and four rebounds per game as a 19-year old rookie on a 15-win team.
A month later, the Bucks acquired Khris Middleton as a throw in from the Detroit Pistons. Those two players formed the foundation of Milwaukee's title team, not the player taken with the second pick of the draft.
Antetokounmpos and Middletons don't simply grow on trees, but the Rockets are quite high on Kevin Porter Jr after he scored close to 17 points per game once he joined the team from the G League, while Christian Wood put up 21 points and close to 10-rebounds a night as the focal point of a team for the first time. Who's to say those two can't one day be the best players on a championship team?
Hopes will be sky high for whoever the Rockets choose to select with the second pick in Thurday's draft, but a team can survive if a top pick fails to live up to the hype. Just ask the current NBA champs.
