It's 2018 and Kyrie Irving and Gordon Hayward are both healthy enough to make what most believe will be a Boston Celtics run towards an NBA title.
The pieces were in place.
Boston had a pair of stars in the present with Irving and Hayward. And behind them was an infusion of talented youngsters led by Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown and Terry Rozier, who all showed their next-level promise in leading Boston to a deeper-than-expected postseason run in 2017 while Irving and Hayward were sidelined with injuries.
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Boston had a chance to add to its growing stable of talent with the 27th overall pick in the 2018 draft, a spot where teams in past years were able to find future diamonds in the rough.
Some of the best young talent in the NBA right now came in as the 27th pick, a group that includes Bogdan Bogdanovic (2014), Rudy Gobert (2013), Kyle Kuzma (2017) and Pascal Siakam (2016), with Gobert and Siakam having already earned All-Star honors.
So when the Celtics selected Robert Williams III with the 27th overall pick that year, they were feeling pretty good about the selection.
One of the most athletic bigs in that year’s draft, the 6-foot-10 Williams was projected by many as a potential lottery pick (top-14) whose slide prior to the draft was due to a myriad of issues.
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For starters, Williams changed agents shortly before the draft. Pair that with him not participating in the NBA’s Pre-Draft Combine and it left teams without the most current medical information — which as you can imagine, made a number of teams leery of using a high draft pick on him.
There were also concerns about his effort being inconsistent.
But his size, length, athleticism and penchant defensively (he played two seasons at Texas A&M and was the SEC Defensive Player of the Year both seasons) made him a worthy gamble for Boston so late in the first round to join a roster that was already well stocked with veteran big men Al Horford and Aron Baynes along with Daniel Theis from Germany.
However, Williams III was by no means the only big that presented himself as an intriguing option for the Celtics so late in the first round.
And while most would agree that Williams was a high-reward, low-risk pick at that point in the first round that Boston should have taken a gamble on, here are a couple other big men who would have been good fits as well who didn’t last long on the draft board following Boston’s selection of Williams.
Who they could’ve taken instead: Omari Spellman, F/C, Villanova (Round 1, No. 30)
At 6-8, 245 pounds, Spellman has ideal size in today’s NBA to play both power forward and center. He doesn’t defend the interior or rebound at Williams’ level, but his spot-up game is strong and because of that, he is a much bigger threat offensively.
Who they could’ve taken instead: Mitchell Robinson, C, Western Kentucky (Round 2, No. 36)
His youth, athleticism and defensive potential are very similar to Williams coming into the league. The biggest difference between the two is Williams has battled a series of injuries that have limited his court time while Robinson has stayed relatively healthy, which has allowed him to make mistakes, learn from them and become a better player who has shown signs of being a high-impact defender/rebounder/shot-blocker in the NBA for years to come.
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