Cavs pay homage to former #1 draft pick Brad Daugherty

The upcoming draft is getting closer for the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The 2020 NBA Draft is around the corner, and it’s one in which in the Cleveland Cavaliers hold the fifth overall selection. With the upcoming draft slated for Nov. 18 in that realm, it’s been interesting to see Cavs.com’s Joe Gabriele offer up his draft profiles for draft selections that Cleveland could potentially select.

The latest from Thursday was on Devin Vassell, and while his new shot is far from a selling point, Gabriele keeping it going has been nice for Cavs fans.

Now, when it comes to my take for the Wine and Gold in this upcoming draft, I’d hope the Wine and Gold will address the defensive end. Wings such as Isaac Okoro and Deni Avdija I’d be more than on-board, or if they go big there, Onyeka Okongwu. All three of those players could be key defenders for Cleveland pretty early on, I believe.

And perhaps if the Cavs were to trade back, with say, the point guard-needy Detroit Pistons at #7, for instance, and maybe select there along with pick up a heavily protected future first/two future seconds, as Forbes‘ Evan Dammarell suggested, they could Okoro again. Or maybe Patrick Williams is in-play there, who could be a quality prospect to develop that could really help defensively early on at the 3/4, too.

The same could go involving maybe Williams if the Cavs were to do a trade-down swapping with the New York Knicks at #8 and also pick up their #27 pick, and land a reserve guard such as perhaps Malachi Flynn, as KJG’s Amadou Sow hit on. Sow alluded to if the Cavs were to purchase a second-round pick, in that case, for context, though.

Overall, however, if the Cavaliers do stand pat and take a player at #5, which I’d still imagine they probably will, I just hope it’s not Obi Toppin, due to major defensive concerns, most notably. Albeit Toppin was recently mocked to the Cavs by Cleveland.com’s Chris Fedor (subscription required), and does seem to be really in-play for Cleveland if he’s available.

Anyhow, just in a general sense with the 2020 NBA Draft coming up pretty soon here, it was nice to see the Cleveland Cavaliers pay homage to former #1 overall pick Brad Daugherty in a tweet on Thursday. That was a solid throwback Thursday move, Cavs.

Daugherty is a Cavaliers legend that has his #43 jersey rightfully in the rafters at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse, and is obviously one of the best Cavs’ draft picks ever, regarding this draft subject.

It was good to see the Cavs pay homage to Daugherty with the draft coming up.

Daugherty, who was one of five number one overall picks in team history, panned out to be a heck of a selection back in 1986.

In his eight NBA seasons, all of which were with Cleveland, Daugherty averaged 19.0 points, 9.5 rebounds and 3.7 assists per contest. He was rightfully a five-time All-Star, and as the above Cavs tweet referenced, Daugherty made All-NBA Third-Team in 1992, too.

The 7-footer was a terrific low-post player and roller, highly capable mid-range shooter and was such a heady passing big. That helped open up teammates such as Mark Price, Larry Nance, Craig Ehlo, the late John “Hot Rod” Williams, among others.

Daugherty and Price, who was a then-second-round draft trade acquisition in 1986 via the Dallas Mavericks, were a tremendous pick-and-roll duo, too. That led to so many easy looks for the Cavaliers in their heyday in the mid-to-late 1980’s-early 1990’s, and Price highlighted that in a reply tweet to the Cavs as well, which was really cool to see.

Moreover, Daugherty, Price and company made regular appearances in the postseason, and that Cavaliers era played such a fun brand of basketball which featured its share of balance and ball/man movement. Unfortunately for Daugherty/the Cavs, though, he was oft-injured in his career, which ultimately cut his career to those eight seasons.

Albeit Daugherty has been very engaged with the team it seems consistently for a long time, and he did an outstanding job in his guest appearances in play-by-play Cavs broadcasts on Fox Sports Ohio in honor of the squad’s 50th season in 2019-20.

It was a nice gesture by the Wine and Gold to have previously had Daugherty rep the team virtually during the 2020 NBA Draft lottery back in August, too. And this above seemingly TBT tweet, with the draft around the corner, was in that ballpark involving Daugherty.

Looking at what’s on the horizon, let’s hope the Cavaliers make a quality selection in the upcoming draft.