Combining and redrafting two of the greatest NBA drafts ever

Monday was the ninth anniversary of the 2009 NBA Draft - the event that saw Hasheem Thabeet, Ricky Rubio, and Jonny Flynn selected ahead of Stephen Curry. Over the past decade, this draft has been subjected to numerous theoretical redrafts.

Tuesday, however, marks the anniversary of probably the two greatest drafts in NBA history - 1996 and 2003.

(* - denotes Hall of Famer or surefire future Hall of Famer)

A couple of things stick out here. It was still early in the prep-to-pro era, so as hyped as Kobe Bryant was coming out of high school, teams at the top weren't clamoring to draft him. The same went for Jermaine O'Neal, who went on to play in six All-Star Games.

Steve Nash, meanwhile, was a relatively unknown Canadian who played at Santa Clara. Also, shout out to the New York Knicks, who had three first-round picks in the vaunted 1996 draft and came away with Walter McCarty, John Wallace, and Dontae Jones.

By 2003, however, the Cavaliers weren't going to let the fact LeBron James was in high school stop them from drafting him first overall.

Notable 2nd rounders: Mo Williams (47), Kyle Korver (51).

But, what if we combined the two drafts? For the purpose of this exercise, the winning percentages of the 29 teams that were in the NBA between the 1995-96 and the 2002-03 seasons were compiled and set in inverse order (yes, Bryant was a big reason the Lakers had the best record in the league in this time, but don't hate on fun, and check out the divergent Los Angeles result).

Yes, it's quite a step up for some, down for others. Happy draft anniversary!