5 stars the Detroit Pistons missed by a single pick in the Draft

2003 NBA Draft: Pistons chose Darko Milicic 2nd over Carmelo Anthony, who went 3rd 

This one has been talked about ad nauseum with Carmelo himself saying that the Pistons would have had a dynasty if they had just selected him. 

They won the title anyway but might have been able to tack on a few more. Imagine if all other things had remained the same, and the Pistons had just taken Johnson and Anthony. 

The curse of Darko set off a string of draft misses that has extended up until the modern day. 

2014 NBA Draft: Chose Spencer Dinwiddie 38th over Jerami Grant (39) and Nikola Jokic (41) 

There is an argument about who has had the better career between Jerami Grant and Spencer Dinwiddie, but I don’t think there’s any argument who the better player is now and that the Pistons ultimately would have been better off with Grant, who they ended up with anyway. 

The real miss here came three picks later (I cheated) when the Nuggets made what was arguably the best draft pick in NBA history, selecting 2-time (soon to be 3-time) MVP Nikola Jokic with the 41st pick.