Caboclo joins short list of relatively unknown Draft picks

When Adam Silver walked to the podium on Thursday night and announced - with a smirk on his face - that with the 20th pick in the 2014 NBA Draft, the Toronto Raptors were selecting Bruno Caboclo of Brazil, confusion swept the land at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, in Toronto and across the NBA.

Raptors GM Masai Ujiri obviously knew enough about Caboclo and liked what he had seen from the Brazilian forward enough to take him, but many NBA fans and media members had no idea who Bruno was.

It happens sometimes. Here are a couple other examples of largely unknown players hearing their name called at the NBA Draft...

Renaldo Balkman - 20th overall by Knicks in 2006
Balkman won the 2006 NIT MVP award at South Carolina, but with three-year college averages of 7.4 rebounds, 5.3 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 1.2 steals and 1.1 blocks at an under the radar school, the 21-year-old was still a relative unknown come Draft night. How about this from Wikipedia?

There was further controversy when the Knicks' general manager, Isiah Thomas, claimed that the Phoenix Suns were prepared to take him; the Suns claimed that he was not even "on [their] radar". In the NBA's official draft guide, which was released to all reporters covering the draft, Balkman was not included in the list of the 300 top players eligible to be drafted in the 2006–07 rookie class.

Three hundred.

All things considered, Balkman ended up playing in 221 games for the Knicks and Nuggets, starting 12 games and averaging 4.0 points and 3.5 rebounds on 51 percent shooting with a 14.3 PER. He was also a part of the Carmelo Anthony trade.

Let's see what he's up to these days...

Tanguy Ngombo - 57th overall by Mavericks in 2011

As a late second round pick that never made it to the Association, Ngombo is in a different class all together. The Congolese-born Qatari big man is remembered for the confusing name and age discrepancy surrounding his puzzling selection by the Mavs in 2011. He was drafted as Targuy Ngombo, born in 1989, for Draft purposes, but reports claimed he was actually born in 1984 and therefore was too old to be eligible for the Draft. His draft rights were traded from Dallas to Portland and later from Portland to Minnesota though, so he must have remained eligible after being found to have been born in '89, but who really knows?

Bruno Caboclo - 20th overall by Raptors in 2014

Caboclo was tough to find on some top-100 prospects lists, let alone in 60-pick mock drafts. Nevertheless, Ujiri and the Raptors took the "Brazilian Kevin Durant" in the first round, with head coach Dwane Casey touting him as an "athletic phenomenon." At 6'9" with a reported 7'7" wingspan and the ability to shoot from the perimeter as well as put the ball on the floor, the Raptors are either going to look Spurs-ian in their scouting expertise and foresight, or they're going to be laughed at for this pick for a long, long time.

At No. 20 though, why not swing for the fences and try to knock one out of the park?