Ranking The Top 5 Draft Picks From 1999 For Each Sport

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In this blog, I'll go through the Top 5 draft picks in the MLB, NBA and NFL from the year 1999 and rank them. I've done this for 1998 and 2001 already if you'd like to check those out. As always, I don't include the NHL because I don't know enough about hockey to fairly compare the players but here are the NHL Top 5 from 1999 if you'd like to play along:

1. Patrik Stefan, Atlanta Thrashers

2. Daniel Sedin, Vancouver Canucks

3. Henrik Sedin, Vancouver Canucks

4. Pavel Brendl, New York Rangers

5. Tim Connolly, New York Islanders

Stefan obviously didn't work out and was out of the NHL by the time he was 26 but the story of this draft are the Sedin twins. If they played any other sport or even just played for a team in the US, they would have gotten so much more coverage. Have any other set of elite athletes had careers like these? They were drafted and played for the same team for 17 years. In a couple of months, they will enter the Hall of Fame together. It's such a great story.

The rules for the other three leagues haven't changed. The top player from each pick will get three points, second place will get one point and third place won't get any. The sport with the most points after five rounds wins.

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#1 Pick

MLB: Josh Hamilton, Tampa Bay Devil Rays

NBA: Elton Brand, Chicago Bulls

NFL: Tim Couch, Cleveland Browns

Elton Brand had the best career of these three but he shouldn't have. Josh Hamilton was the best player. But that's how I evaluate these guys so we'll start with Brand. Brand and Hamilton were truly opposites. Brand started off as a 20/10 guy immediately and stayed at that level for a few years. It took him a few years to get better and when he did in 2006, he suffered an Achilles tendon injury the next season. He wasted his best years on lousy Bulls and Clippers teams.

Brand had a very good career. He was co-Rookie of the Year and made it to two All-Star Games. As a number one pick in the NBA, he could be considered a slight disappointment when teams look at that first overall spot as a HOF-level talent. If Brand never hurts his Achilles, maybe he ends up a fringe HOFer.

While Hamilton's story at one point was one of redemption, it's just a full-fledged tragedy at this point. He fell into drug addiction after being in a serious car accident before the 2001 season. What if he never gets into that accident? I imagine he becomes a great player for the Devil Rays. Does he lead that franchise to a title when you factor in the talent with the 2008 team? Or do they never draft players like Longoria because having Hamilton at an elite level puts them out of that draft position? They still would have had Carl Crawford. He was drafted in the 2nd round of this draft.

Hamilton won an MVP, was a five time All-Star and brought the Rangers to two World Series appearances. That 5 year/$125 million contract he signed with the Angels was a mistake before the ink was dry on the contract. He was already 32 and his body went through an awful lot between his hard nosed style of play and years of drug abuse. He didn't even show up on the Hall of Fame ballot because he only played nine seasons. He's suffered a couple relapses and even got arrested in 2019 for physically assaulting his youngest daughter.

Tim Couch was obviously a giant bust. The most interesting thing about Couch going number one was that the NFL gives expansion teams the number one pick. No other sport does that. Of all the expansion teams in every sport, Cleveland and Houston deserved getting the first pick the most considering they had teams rip the heart out of them when their original NFL teams moved.

NBA: 3 points

MLB: 1 point

NFL: 0 points

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#2 Pick

MLB: Josh Beckett, Florida Marlins

NFL: Steve Francis, Vancouver Grizzlies  (traded to Houston Rockets)

NFL: Donovan McNabb, Philadelphia Eagles

Donavan McNabb had the better career but I'd rather have Josh Beckett's. 

McNabb made it to five NFC Championships…but only one Super Bowl. He also threw up and lost in that Super Bowl. Beckett won two World Series and was the MVP in one of them. His complete game shutout in Game 6 of the 2003 World Series is one of the most iconic MLB moments of that decade.

McNabb has more passing yards than Jim Kelly, Steve Young and Y.A. Tittle…but he won't make the Hall of Fame. Beckett won't make the Hall of Fame either. He's already off the ballot. But he did throw a no-hitter. That's pretty fucking cool.

McNabb made six Pro Bowls. Beckett only made three All-Star Games but he still made $115 million in his career.

The other co-Rookie of the Year along with Elton Brand was Steve Francis. Francis was a very good player for the Rockets, decent for the Magic and then just awful for the Knicks. The Knicks Era is the most intriguing part of his career to me. You can understand why Knicks fans would have been optimistic. You had Larry Brown as a coach and now Francis could team up with Stephon Marbury. Unfortunately for the Knicks, all of them were old and past their respective primes and Francis only played in a total of 22 wins over a year and half in New York.

NFL: 3 points (3 points total)

MLB: 1 point (2 points total)

NBA: 0 points (3 points total)

Pick #3

MLB: Eric Munson, Detroit Tigers

NBA: Baron Davis, Charlotte Hornets

NFL: Akili Smith, Cincinnati Bengals

If peak Baron Davis was the best player on your team, you'd make the playoffs every year but you won't get out of the second round.   It's too bad he never had great teammates. Imagine if Baron got to play with someone like Kobe or Lebron or even Paul Pierce? He might have been a Hall of Famer. In shocking news for players of this generation, he weakly finished his career with the Knicks.

I'm going to give Eric Munson the number 2 spot. He played twice as many games in the minors than he did in his major league career. He was one of the better hitters on the 2003 Tigers who lost 119 games and he could play third base and catcher.

The third straight QB drafted, Akili Smith had the worst career of all of them. Daunte Culpepper and Cade McNown were also taken in the first round and Smith was worse than them as well. It would be seven years after drafting Smith before the Bengals would make the playoffs.

NBA: 3 points (6 points total)

MLB: 1 point (3 points total)

NFL: 0 points (3 points total)

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Pick #4

MLB: Corey Myers, Arizona Diamondbacks

NBA: Lamar Odom, Los Angeles Clippers

NFL: Edgerrin James, Indianapolis Colts

The only HOFers from this draft so far are the Sedin twins, Champ Bailey (taken #6th overall) and Edgerrin James. The Edge had a great start to his career leading the league in rushing his first two seasons. He had a pretty good finish as well by finally playing in his only Super Bowl in his second to last season. I never really thought of James as a Hall of Famer while he was playing and I'm sure a big reason why was because the first thing you thought of with the Colts during his entire tenure was Peyton Manning. He is 13th all-time in rushing and it is a testament to the Patriots that the combo of Manning and Edge never got to a Super Bowl together.

If you only look at Odom's career at face value without knowing anything about his marriage to Khloe Kardashian or any other personal dramas, you'd see the career of a very good basketball player. He was a key part of back to back Laker championships and was one of the better rebounders of his era. He's one of the guys you want to root for. Teammates and media constantly say what a good person he is and he's had some major tragedies in his life along with battles with addiction. He lost his mother to cancer when he was young and lost a child to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. 

The Diamondbacks were only in their 2nd year of existence when they drafted shortstop Corey Myers. He never made it to the major leagues topping out at AAA. The Dbacks really struggled with drafting high draft picks for years which would lead to the team bottoming out when the veterans of the 2001 championship team left. The 2004 Diamondbacks would go 51-111.

NFL: 3 points (6 points total)

NBA: 1 point (7 points totals)

MLB: 0 points (3 points total)

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Pick #5

MLB: B.J. Garbe, Minnesota Twins

NBA: Jonathan Bender, Toronto Raptors (traded to the Indiana Pacers)

NFL: Ricky Williams, New Orleans Saints

The Ricky Williams draft story is so amazing, I still can't believe it happened. Mike Ditka was entering his third season as head coach of the New Orleans Saints and felt he needed that elite player to bring them over the hump. He literally traded his entire draft (except for the 2nd round pick which was already traded) as well as a 1st and 3rd round pick the following year to Washington…to movie up SEVEN spots in the draft. The Saints already had the 12th pick but Ditka had his heart set on Williams.

I don't know if I'd say the Saints redeemed themselves but they signed Williams to an incentive-laded deal that made Williams a huge bargain and three years later would trade him to the Dolphins for two 1st round picks. He became a great player for the Dolphins but then retired when he failed a drug test for marijuana. He wound up coming back to the Dolphins, failing another drug test and then coming back again becoming a good platoon back for a few seasons.  The Ricky Williams experience was a wild one but like Odom, if you just look at the numbers, there is a good player there. He finished his career with 10,009 yards and is 31st all-time. It's only 2,235 less than Hall of Famer Edgerrin James.

If you could buy stock in athletes, I would have lost a ton of money on Jonathan Bender. I thought he was going to be great. A very good Pacers team traded Antonio Davis to get him and it seemed to be ideal for a guy just out of high school. Surrounded by veterans like Reggie Miller and Chris Mullin as well as being coached by Larry Bird, this seemed like a perfect spot. He just wasn't that good. Mix that with bad knees and it never came together for him. He did, of course, finish his career with the New York Knicks.

The Twins made up for drafting B.J. Garbe in the first round by drafting Justin Morneau in the third. Garbe never made it out of AA. he was the Gatorade High School Baseball Player of the Year but only hit .235 his entire minor league career.

NFL: 3 points

NBA: 1 point

MLB: 0 points

FINAL TALLY

NFL: 9 points

NBA: 8 points

MLB: 3 points

This is the 2nd time out of three of these that the NFL takes the crown. No surprise to see the NFL and NBA battling for the top spot but it's tough look for the MLB draft when two guys of the top 5 don't make the majors. I know I didn't include the NHL but not many teams have had a better first round than the Vancouver Canucks. Getting two HOFers who both play their whole career with the same team in the same draft is one of the greatest drafts ever.