Worst Draft Pick Ever -- Len Bias

by Dana Petroni
(Katy, TX)

Len Bias, #2 pick in 1986 NBA draft.

Drafted by the Boston Celtics, who won the 1986 NBA title a week earlier. That was the best Celtics team of the Bird era and possibly the best the NBA had seen up to that point.

They traded a decent guard in Gerald Henderson (hero of the 1984 title team) to Seattle for their lottery pick. Auerbach was familiar with Bias and had plotted to draft him for at least two years, that is how good ha player he could have been.

Two days after the draft, Len Bias dies of a cocaine overdose and the Celtics received no draft pick compensation. The Celtics would eventually decay from the NBA's best in 1986 to the NBA's worst in 1996.