Basketball Prospectus: Pelton: Tough Calls

Kevin Pelton on whether or not to extend members of the 2005 draft class.

He considers the probability of Atlanta extending Marvin Williams to be approximately 50/50.

Marvin Williams - While he's unlikely to ever make fans (or at least the media) forget the Hawks could have had Paul, Williams has developed into a solid starter. If he can develop range to the three-point line, his WARP is likely to shoot up in the next couple of seasons. Having lost Childress, the Hawks might be more likely to lock Williams up and keep him away from free agency.

The table in the article demonstrates nicely how drafting Marvin Williams was the worst possible use of the #2 pick. Obviously, in retrospect Billy Knight should have drafted Chris Paul, but at the time, I thought the best course of action was to trade down and pick up two players in the first round. (So, I severely underrated Chris Paul and had I been in charge the Hawks would have ended up with Raymond Felton (If Charlotte's willing to get rid of him, the Hawks would be wise to step in and install him at the point for the next half-decade.) or Jarrett Jack plus Ike Diogu. I'm not making the case that I'm a genius (thank goodness) just that Billy Knight had three options and chose the only one that could be disastrous. Which it sort of has been.) Drafting anywhere in the first round it would have been hard to pick two players who accumulated less value than Williams has thus far.