There are times in NBA Draft history when a player comes along who is a no-brainer for the first overall pick. We are about to witness one such moment next year, with Victor Wembanyama coming into the NBA, and the last time there was such clarity on who goes no. 1 was probably LeBron James back in 2003.
The hype surrounding LeBron back then was just on a completely different level. He was on the cover of Sports Illustrated in 2002 as the “Chosen One” and was the clear-cut first pick of the draft. It seems, however, that were still some people who weren’t sold on LeBron, with John Salley being one of them.
John Salley Says He Apologized To LeBron James For Saying That Carmelo Anthony Should Have Been The First Pick
Salley, a 4-time NBA champion, was just a few years removed from his last season in the league in 1999-00, and he felt that Carmelo Anthony should be the first pick. Melo ended up having a great career on an individual level, but there was no way he should have gone first. You can argue he had a slightly better rookie season than LeBron, but it was evident, after their first couple of years in the league, that James was far better than Melo. Salley, too realized his mistake and revealed on the Club Shay Shay podcast that he personally apologized to LeBron for it at some point.
“I listen to you when you champion LeBron, I take my hat off to you. You know I had to tell him? I have, like, wine for him, a whole bunch of stuff and he looked at me funny. I told him, I said, ‘I thought Carmelo should have been the No. 1 pick and I had to apologize. I was 100% wrong. I had no idea you were gonna be this good.’”
Good on him for admitting he got it wrong, as a lot of people tend to be quite stubborn in these situations. There was a team that got it all wrong back then, too, as the Pistons passed up on Melo for Darko Milicic with the second pick. If they had picked Anthony, they probably would have gone on to win more than one championship during that time and Melo wouldn’t have to find himself on lists of the best players to never win a championship.
During this episode, Salley also gave his starting 5 from all the greats that he got to play with, and there sure were many. He also revealed his top 5 players in the NBA right now, with LeBron being one of them.
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