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Anthony Davis vs. Michael Kidd-Gilchrist: How the New Orleans Pelicans avoided overthinking the 2012 draft

By Rick Stone

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Back in 2012, the “New Orleans Pelicans” didn’t even exist. It was still the New Orleans Hornets. And unlike the current New Orleans basketball team, they were struggling. Bad. Bad enough where they obtained the #1 pick in the 2012 NBA Draft.

While it seems a long time ago, it wasn’t. Just three years prior to this year, New Orleans basketball was headlined with the first selection of college players coming to the NBA. And the selection ended up being a player who changed the franchise for the better entirely. Anthony Davis.

The star from the National Championship winning Kentucky Wildcats was the consensus first pick in the draft. A combination of defensive prowess inside along with his massive wingspan made him a very popular player when he declared for the NBA draft. And after the New Orleans Pelicans struck the lottery with the #1 pick, drafting Anthony Davis seemed like a formality. However, there was another player who could have possibly gone with the first pick, and he was Anthony Davis’ teammate, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist.

Kidd-Gilchrist was also a member of the championship Kentucky Wildcats at the small forward position, and was seen as one of the best defensive players in the draft for quite some time. His ability to guard any player at the college level and shut them down completely was a very compelling idea for his draft stock. While Anthony Davis was seen as a possible star, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist was seen more as a safer option, with teams knowing what he was going to bring to the team immediately.

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New Orleans already had options at positions Anthony Davis was going to play in the NBA. They still had Robin Lopez, Jason Smith, and even made a trade for sharpshooting power forward Ryan Anderson to fill out the roster. The team had made plans to fill up their bigs before the draft even began. And the team did not plan on keeping their starting small forward from the year prior in Trevor Ariza. The moves they had made seemed to fit drafting a small forward instead of a big to fill with all their spots.

The thought process could have been there for New Orleans to overthink this pick. They COULD have seen MKG as a better fit to the team chemistry than AD. They COULD have seen Anthony Davis as a bigger risk and went for a longer-term, safer rebuild process. They COULD have seen AD’s lack of offensive game as a bigger weakness than Gilchrist’s weird shot release and weakness shooting the basketball. They COULD have made a major mistake, but give credit to Dell Demps on dodging a major mistake overthinking the pick here.

Dell had been known for making interesting decisions in the past that stunned fans. The original Chris Paul deal with the Los Angeles Lakers was a major surprise that ended up being turned down by the NBA, and made some wonder about Demps’ decision making. Demps also made trades against some major contributors for New Orleans in exchange for pieces that were not a guarantee to work. The players Demps traded away include James Posey, Marcus Thornton, Peja Stojakovic and Darren Collison. For a very young GM in just his second NBA draft, there was uncertainty about his decision making.

However, a young Dell Demps made the correct decision by drafting Anthony Davis, thus the story of his career continues to shine. However, for the Charlotte Hornets, the progress for them has taken a much different tone with Michael Kidd-Gilchrist.

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    • In three years of the MKG-experience, the Hornets haven’t seen a major jump from his rookie season, most of that due to injuries that he suffered. Michael has missed 50 games in the past two years of his career, and with the torn labrum he suffered this preseason will miss all of next season. Fate has not been kind to MKG early on his career, nor has it been to a Charlotte team who has tried many things to get themselves into the contender picture.

    Comparing MKG to Anthony Davis, even if he had been able to avoid injuries to this point in his career, still has no argument into who has become the better player. Kidd-Gilchrist is working his way towards becoming a reliable starter on the team while Anthony Davis is on the cusp of being one of the elite superstars in the entire NBA. At the end of the day, the New Orleans Pelicans earned one of the best players in the current NBA by avoiding overthinking their decision just three years prior. And avoiding overthinking what everyone believed an easy decision made it just that…a simple decision to get one of the most exciting and electrifying players of this generation.

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