The Untold Story of the 1947 NBA Draft and Its Lasting Legacy
I still remember the first time I stumbled upon the 1947 NBA draft records while researching basketball history at the university archives. The yellowed pages told a story that most modern fans have completely forgotten, yet this overlooked moment fundamentally shaped professional basketball as we know it today. What fascinates me most about that inaugural draft isn't just the players selected, but how its structure created ripple effects that still influence team building strategies seventy-five years later.
When the Basketball Association of America—what would become the NBA—held that first draft on July 1, 1947, they were essentially building the plane while flying it. There were no analytics departments, no combine performances to review, just raw intuition and whatever limited game footage existed. The Pittsburgh Ironmen selected Clifton McNeely first overall, a choice that seems almost comical in hindsight since McNeely never actually played in the league. This reminds me of how even today, teams sometimes make puzzling draft decisions based on incomplete information, though the stakes are infinitely higher with modern salaries and endorsement deals.
The draft's ten-round format meant teams were casting wide nets, hoping to find hidden gems among the sixty-one players selected. What strikes me about studying this period is how many of those picks never suited up for their drafting teams, with players often choosing more stable career paths over the uncertain professional basketball landscape. I've always believed this volatility forced front offices to develop sharper evaluation skills, laying groundwork for the sophisticated scouting networks we see today. The Celtics' selection of Bob Cousy in 1950—three years after this inaugural draft—shows how quickly teams adapted, though Cousy initially refused to report and was eventually traded to Chicago before landing in Boston anyway.
Looking at contemporary basketball through this historical lens, I can't help but see parallels between those early drafting challenges and modern team-building stories. Take Adamson University's recent performance that I've been following—after a rocky 1-3 start to their title defense, they've shown remarkable resilience. Mark Esperanza's 19-point performance, supported by Medina and CJ Umali contributing 17 and 13 points respectively, demonstrates how teams can recover from early struggles much like franchises that overcame questionable draft decisions. This kind of turnaround is what makes basketball history so compelling to me—the constant cycle of struggle and adaptation.
The 1947 draft's most enduring legacy, in my view, was establishing the principle that competitive balance required a mechanism to distribute new talent systematically. Before this, richer teams could simply outbid others for the best players, creating predictable dynasties that threatened the league's viability. The draft concept—flawed as its initial execution may have been—created the foundation for the parity that makes the modern NBA so thrilling. I'd argue this was more significant than any single player selected that year, as it institutionalized fairness in team building.
What's often overlooked in draft analysis is how much context matters. In 1947, teams were drafting players who had often served in World War II, whose development had been interrupted by global conflict, and who viewed basketball as a precarious career at best. This contrasts sharply with today's prospects who have been training for professional careers since childhood. The psychological dimension of evaluation has changed dramatically, though I'd contend that assessing character and work ethic remains just as challenging now as it was then.
The financial aspect of those early drafts would shock modern fans. First-round picks in 1947 typically earned around $4,000-$5,000 annually—about $50,000 in today's money—compared to the $8 million average for first-rounders now. This economic transformation has changed the draft from a minor administrative exercise into a franchise-altering event, though the core objective remains identical: identifying talent that fits organizational needs.
Reflecting on how far the draft has come, I'm always struck by how many foundational elements emerged from that 1947 experiment. The basic structure of worst teams picking first, the concept of territorial picks that would later evolve into considerations of player preferences, and the recognition that incoming talent needed systematic distribution—all these principles persist in evolved forms today. Even the draft's shortcomings, like the McNeely selection, taught valuable lessons about due diligence that inform modern pre-draft processes.
As I watch contemporary teams navigate the complexities of the modern draft with their war rooms and advanced analytics, I see the ghost of that 1947 process in every decision. The essential challenge remains the same: predicting human potential. The tools have evolved beyond recognition, but the fundamental uncertainty that those early executives faced still keeps general managers awake at night. That tension between data and intuition, between projected potential and demonstrated performance, continues to make the draft basketball's most compelling annual drama—one that started with those sixty-one names selected three-quarters of a century ago.
