Darko Miličić embarrasses himself again

[Clutch]

No comment. Video and pics say all it needs to be said :oldlol:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SH7zds-aGc

Best part: 0:48 - 0:59


http://www.index.hr/images2/milicicdarkopiva2.jpg

http://www.index.hr/images2/milicidarkos5.jpg

[kamil]

He's Serbian.

[TheMilkyBarKid]

This guy was picked ahead of wade, melo and bosh :facepalm

[KembaWalker]

http://images.complex.com/complex/image/upload/t_article_image/berf2csdn43iovemx98g.jpg

[WallIn]

Pistons :facepalm

[Sakkreth]

Uhhm what's wrong ?
lol

[midatlantic09]

I can't believe this guy was a #2 draft pick. Whichever GM drafted him is a very lousy evaluator of talent. Other than height, the guy had zero basketball skills.

[coin24]

Darko gives no fu*ks.. Alpha bigdickivic:bowdown:

[kNIOKAS]

Just another low iq big child that never had to get his ego checked... To watch this guy is indulge in dumb entertainment.

[chocolatethunder]

I can't believe this guy was a #2 draft pick. Whichever GM drafted him is a very lousy evaluator of talent. Other than height, the guy had zero basketball skills.
It was Dumars and he actually had some basketball skills but was a total moron. He wasn't unskilled he was an idiot with a brain and heart the size of a pea.

[alenleomessi]

he still has scored same amount of points in this year's playoffs as his pals from the draft Wade, Bosh and Melo :applause:

[Rake2204]

It was Dumars and he actually had some basketball skills but was a total moron. He wasn't unskilled he was an idiot with a brain and heart the size of a pea.I think this is pretty spot on.

Darko Milicic really did have a pretty solid skill base there but a few things came into play:

1) He expected his skills to translate seamlessly when he arrived, expecting everything to work against NBA level players that worked over on his side of the ocean. He seemed unprepared to face resistance. Also, his confidence was incredibly fragile. The minute he didn't dominate, he would visibly begin to mope (watch his first preseason game even, he was down on himself from the get-go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJ_eLleTfLM).

2) I've heard many times he struggled with American life. As in, perhaps indulging too much in it. We look at players as players but if we're real, he was a 17-year-old from a small Serbian town who was suddenly a multi-millionaire in America.

Even as a rookie, I heard accounts that he spent an inordinate amount of time at Scores in New York raining on strippers. There's not much wrong with that on the surface, it's his life, but it could possibly provide an insight as to what his level of focus, concentration, and maturity looked like when he came stateside, combined with what we see from him now.

I've never been able to blame Joe Dumars for the move too much because his starting lineup at the time was Chauncey Billups, Richard Hamilton, Tayshaun Prince, Ben Wallace and _____________. All they needed was a true center - no two ways about it. Chris Bosh was not really considered a top two talent.

Meanwhile, with the international player explosion, it was believed the next Dirk Nowitzki was waiting around every corner (just like how Nikoloz Tskitishvili was picked up super early by the Nuggets in 2002).

[305Baller]

he could not drink it all?

[chocolatethunder]

I think this is pretty spot on.

Darko Milicic really did have a pretty solid skill base there but a few things came into play:

1) He expected his skills to translate seamlessly when he arrived, expecting everything to work against NBA level players that worked over on his side of the ocean. He seemed unprepared to face resistance. Also, his confidence was incredibly fragile. The minute he didn't dominate, he would visibly begin to mope (watch his first preseason game even, he was down on himself from the get-go: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJ_eLleTfLM).

2) I've heard many times he struggled with American life. As in, perhaps indulging too much in it. We look at players as players but if we're real, he was a 17-year-old from a small Serbian town who was suddenly a multi-millionaire in America.

Even as a rookie, I heard accounts that he spent an inordinate amount of time at Scores in New York raining on strippers. There's not much wrong with that on the surface, it's his life, but it could possibly provide an insight as to what his level of focus, concentration, and maturity looked like when he came stateside, combined with what we see from him now.

I've never been able to blame Joe Dumars for the move too much because his starting lineup at the time was Chauncey Billups, Richard Hamilton, Tayshaun Prince, Ben Wallace and _____________. All they needed was a true center - no two ways about it. Chris Bosh was not really considered a top two talent.

Meanwhile, with the international player explosion, it was believed the next Dirk Nowitzki was waiting around every corner (just like how Nikoloz Tskitishvili was picked up super early by the Nuggets in 2002).
I wanna add a couple of things to this.
Larry brown was his coach. LB is one of my favorite coaches ever but he can destroy a rookie or any other player for that matter. LB was no Darko fan and he just crushed the dude over and over both publicly and at practice. This guy was a child and was not prepared for that kinda shit. Larry Brown is amazing at developing players who can handle the way he is. He takes guys like Aaron McKie and Ratliff and makes them all stars. Or Kevin Ollie and Bowen and Eric Snow and turns them into serviceable NBA players. His schtick didn't always work with rookies and that's the way it is. All of the guys on that Detriot squad would defend Darko in the press and say that he was good. Shred especially. When he went to Orlando Jameer told me that he could play. He wasn't just saying that for his health. The dude could play but his experience of being browbeaten by LB and his totally insane brain both held him back. In pre draft workouts the dude was killing it. Shooting threes and he had post moves and all kinda shit. That doesn't mean he was going to be an all star, but he wasn't a bum. Skita on the other hand was kind of manufactured and Dantoni had something to do with that I think. Dantoni was his coach and he hyped him up to everyone when skita was playing single digit minutes a game I think. That was a disaster.

[Real Men Wear Green]

Gronk seems to do something like this every other day and everyone loves him. The embarrassment here has more to do with Milicic being such a bust than chugging a beer. A billion people chug cheap beer every day. You don't want to be getting it on your face but it just shows that he's a partier. I don't think he's running for President so what's the big deal? Just don't be the one driving the car when you go home tonight and it's ok.

[ZMonkey11]

I can't believe this guy was a #2 draft pick. Whichever GM drafted him is a very lousy evaluator of talent. Other than height, the guy had zero basketball skills.

:biggums:

Except he was pretty clear cut as the 2nd pick in the 2003 draft by many GMs. He had every GM drooling over him during pre-draft shootarounds. He was seen as unusually skilled for his size.

Furthermore, Melo didn't make sense because they JUST drafted Tayshaun Prince, who was showing a lot of promise. Bosh didn't have the size of Milicic, and Wade was considered a "risky" pick by the Heat because no one really thought he would go that high.

Shit, why don't we call out Denver for not picking Wade? 3 chips vs 0? Who is the idiot that would think Melo, a former NCAA champion, would be outperformed in the NBA by an undersized shooting guard from Marquette of all schools?

Or maybe call out Toronto? Even his draft mate figured out how much better Wade was than he, so Bosh uprooted and joined Miami.

[AussieG]

Darko is funny in a retarded way.

[ZMonkey11]

And if you are a 7+ foot Serbian player having beers handed to you while standing shirtless on stage, I don't think you can embarrass yourself. He is the life of that party. He probably owns that city.

Haters gonna hate. Darko gonna Darko.

[Burgz V2]

i dare someone tell him not too. dude is a massive human being and

[Wiltside]

This guy was picked ahead of wade, melo and bosh :facepalm

1 > 0

[DCL]

kwame brown is liking this

[ImKobe]

Larry Brown ****ed this guys future up to me, had he been drafted to a franchise that had a coach, who cared about developing young talent, things probably would have gone a lot differently for him. It's hard enough to adapt to the league as an Euro, but to play under Larry Brown as a rook is a whole 'nother story.

I feel like people are giving Darko too much crap about this...he didn't choose to be a lottery pick, Detroit had a stacked enough roster to win anyways (they won his rookie year) so they didn't really care about the draft enough, and the results back that up..

Had they drafted Wade or Bosh or Melo, chances are they win more than one title and Spurs have 3 instead of 5.

[BigNBAfan]

he seems like he having a good time to me, getting paid to make appearances and get drunk and feeding your tats

[Rake2204]

Larry Brown ****ed this guys future up to me, had he been drafted to a franchise that had a coach, who cared about developing young talent, things probably would have gone a lot differently for him. It's hard enough to adapt to the league as an Euro, but to play under Larry Brown as a rook is a whole 'nother story.

I feel like people are giving Darko too much crap about this...he didn't choose to be a lottery pick, Detroit had a stacked enough roster to win anyways (they won his rookie year) so they didn't really care about the draft enough, and the results back that up..

Had they drafted Wade or Bosh or Melo, chances are they win more than one title and Spurs have 3 instead of 5.I personally feel as though Larry Brown often gets too much of the blame. From a lot of what I've read and seen, Milicic struggled with attitude and maturity problems from the start. If there truly were issues in that regard, I'd commend Brown for not playing someone who had an awful attitude and couldn't play well.

People often suggest Milicic was talented at the start but was beaten down and began playing poorly after not getting any playing time. I believe he was playing poorly against NBA competition from the get-go, and Brown simply responded by basically saying, "Welp, he's awful right now and would not help this championship contender, so why would he be playing?" He saw tons of playing time in the preseason and Milicic displayed the same characteristics at that point that many accused Brown of evoking through years of not playing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJ_eLleTfLM

I'm also not sure what would have happened if anyone but Milicic was selected at the #2 position. I have huge doubts about an '04 championship. Anthony would have created a situation at small forward (Tayshaun Prince was a playoff hero in 2003 as well). Bosh would not have responded like Rasheed did come playoff time. And rookie Wade would have likely been relegated to bench duty behind Richard Hamilton and Chauncey Billups, still leaving a huge gap in the frontcourt.

Over the long term, creating a championship team is such a delicate balance that I wonder what any three of those guys would have done to the mix. For instance, maybe drafting Anthony (the only other real possibility at the time) means trading Prince which creates a huge defensive gap and ball-sharing problems between Hamilton, Billups and Melo.

I think the Pistons were largely in the right place in the right time for everything to come together as it did. Luck and skill came together. Semi-risky signing of Billups, who blew up, trading a team leader (Stackhouse) for a young unproven in Hamilton, accidentally drafting an awful player that leads to a great mid-season trade (for Rasheed)... a lot of things had to go right just to land one ring. Perhaps any other way could have resulted in zero (like Anthony in Denver).

All that said, yes, I think Milicic does get too much crap in some regards though. You're right, he didn't choose to be the number two pick. He created a lot of his own issues, but it's clearly overkilled.

[ImKobe]

I personally feel as though Larry Brown often gets too much of the blame. From a lot of what I've read and seen, Milicic struggled with attitude and maturity problems from the start. If there truly were issues in that regard, I'd commend Brown for not playing someone who had an awful attitude and couldn't play well.

People often suggest Milicic was talented at the start but was beaten down and began playing poorly after not getting any playing time. I believe he was playing poorly against NBA competition from the get-go, and Brown simply responded by basically saying, "Welp, he's awful right now and would not help this championship contender, so why would he be playing?" He saw tons of playing time in the preseason and Milicic displayed the same characteristics at that point that many accused Brown of evoking through years of not playing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJ_eLleTfLM

I'm also not sure what would have happened if anyone but Milicic was selected at the #2 position. I have huge doubts about an '04 championship. Anthony would have created a situation at small forward (Tayshaun Prince was a playoff hero in 2003 as well). Bosh would not have responded like Rasheed did come playoff time. And rookie Wade would have likely been relegated to bench duty behind Richard Hamilton and Chauncey Billups, still leaving a huge gap in the frontcourt.

Over the long term, creating a championship team is such a delicate balance that I wonder what any three of those guys would have done to the mix. For instance, maybe drafting Anthony (the only other real possibility at the time) means trading Prince which creates a huge defensive gap and ball-sharing problems between Hamilton, Billups and Melo.

I think the Pistons were largely in the right place in the right time for everything to come together as it did. Luck and skill came together. Semi-risky signing of Billups, who blew up, trading a team leader (Stackhouse) for a young unproven in Hamilton, accidentally drafting an awful player that leads to a great mid-season trade (for Rasheed)... a lot of things had to go right just to land one ring. Perhaps any other way could have resulted in zero (like Anthony in Denver).

All that said, yes, I think Milicic does get too much crap in some regards though. You're right, he didn't choose to be the number two pick. He created a lot of his own issues, but it's clearly overkilled.

I don't have anything against Larry Brown personally but I've heard some of his former players say negative things about him, especially Jalen Rose.

I feel like the Detroit management did a poor job scouting and drafting to begin with, Darko didn't really have the talent to live up to being a top 5 pick in that draft, he certainly could have had a better career than he did on a rebuilding franchise, where there would have been less pressure for him to perform right at the start and he would have gotten more minutes to play through his mistakes and what not.

I do understand the reasoning behind not drafting Wade or Melo or Bosh, because you had a young Tayshaun Prince, prime Sheed and a Rip Hamilton on the roster, and all of them played really well and were key in that 04 championship run, Rip even got better the following year. I'm not even sure who I'd draft in their position, even if I knew how good those players would become. Maybe David West or Chris Bosh, just to develop them off the bench for a couple years and ultimately put em in the starting role in place of Sheed in 07. Wade would obviously be the best player available, but I feel like he wouldn't make them better the first few years, maybe keep him in a Manu role until he's clearly a lot better than Rip?

[Eric Cartman]

After watching the video a few observations:

Second hand smoke has had, probably in large doses

Who are the 2 men tattoed to this body?

The gathering and festivities seems like a pretty common thing in Serbia (need a serb to confirm)

[midatlantic09]

:biggums:

Except he was pretty clear cut as the 2nd pick in the 2003 draft by many GMs. He had every GM drooling over him during pre-draft shootarounds. He was seen as unusually skilled for his size.



Unusually skilled in what exactly? All he's ever had is height and the ability to run the floor pretty well for someone 7'0. Aside from those two things, the guy had no other skills. Not sure why he was taken over Carmelo or Bosh.

[chocolatethunder]

Unusually skilled in what exactly? All he's ever had is height and the ability to run the floor pretty well for someone 7'0. Aside from those two things, the guy had no other skills. Not sure why he was taken over Carmelo or Bosh.
I'm not sure if you watched basketball back then or not but in Europe and individual workouts he had NBA 3pt range, could handle well for a guy his size, run the floor and block shots. Read this article.

http://pistonpowered.com/2010/09/13/myth-detroit-pistons-picking-darko-milicic-over-carmelo-anthony-with-the-no-2-pick-in-the-2003-nba-draft-was-an-avoidable-blunder/


http://sports.espn.go.com/nbadraft/d03/story?id=1560315

[Rooster]

I personally feel as though Larry Brown often gets too much of the blame. From a lot of what I've read and seen, Milicic struggled with attitude and maturity problems from the start. If there truly were issues in that regard, I'd commend Brown for not playing someone who had an awful attitude and couldn't play well.

People often suggest Milicic was talented at the start but was beaten down and began playing poorly after not getting any playing time. I believe he was playing poorly against NBA competition from the get-go, and Brown simply responded by basically saying, "Welp, he's awful right now and would not help this championship contender, so why would he be playing?" He saw tons of playing time in the preseason and Milicic displayed the same characteristics at that point that many accused Brown of evoking through years of not playing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJ_eLleTfLM

I'm also not sure what would have happened if anyone but Milicic was selected at the #2 position. I have huge doubts about an '04 championship. Anthony would have created a situation at small forward (Tayshaun Prince was a playoff hero in 2003 as well). Bosh would not have responded like Rasheed did come playoff time. And rookie Wade would have likely been relegated to bench duty behind Richard Hamilton and Chauncey Billups, still leaving a huge gap in the frontcourt.

Over the long term, creating a championship team is such a delicate balance that I wonder what any three of those guys would have done to the mix. For instance, maybe drafting Anthony (the only other real possibility at the time) means trading Prince which creates a huge defensive gap and ball-sharing problems between Hamilton, Billups and Melo.

I think the Pistons were largely in the right place in the right time for everything to come together as it did. Luck and skill came together. Semi-risky signing of Billups, who blew up, trading a team leader (Stackhouse) for a young unproven in Hamilton, accidentally drafting an awful player that leads to a great mid-season trade (for Rasheed)... a lot of things had to go right just to land one ring. Perhaps any other way could have resulted in zero (like Anthony in Denver).

All that said, yes, I think Milicic does get too much crap in some regards though. You're right, he didn't choose to be the number two pick. He created a lot of his own issues, but it's clearly overkilled.

I think Darko came to the L at the wrong time. He was just too young and too inexperience especially in a championship caliber team. There's just too little room for errors and mistakes that Darko needed to learn and grow. Pistons should have kept him in Europe and marinated him until he's mentally ready. I reckon Mehmet Okur contributed with that team but he was much older.

[Jailblazers7]

Wow, the video title was literal when it read "drinks with his tattoos."

[warriorfan]

when he was pouring beer on his tats :roll:

[Rake2204]

I don't have anything against Larry Brown personally but I've heard some of his former players say negative things about him, especially Jalen Rose.

I feel like the Detroit management did a poor job scouting and drafting to begin with, Darko didn't really have the talent to live up to being a top 5 pick in that draft, he certainly could have had a better career than he did on a rebuilding franchise, where there would have been less pressure for him to perform right at the start and he would have gotten more minutes to play through his mistakes and what not.

I do understand the reasoning behind not drafting Wade or Melo or Bosh, because you had a young Tayshaun Prince, prime Sheed and a Rip Hamilton on the roster, and all of them played really well and were key in that 04 championship run, Rip even got better the following year. I'm not even sure who I'd draft in their position, even if I knew how good those players would become. Maybe David West or Chris Bosh, just to develop them off the bench for a couple years and ultimately put em in the starting role in place of Sheed in 07. Wade would obviously be the best player available, but I feel like he wouldn't make them better the first few years, maybe keep him in a Manu role until he's clearly a lot better than Rip?Yeah, it can be tough to gauge Larry Brown. Some people don't seem to love him while others find him legendary (Rasheed's nickname for Brown was L.B. or pound-for-pound, as in the best coach, pound for pound, in the league). His emphasis on doing the right thing and teaching the game seems to have served him well, aside from his willingness to constantly wander about the basketball landscape.

I agree Detroit likely did a poor job scouting that year though. I think Joe Dumars even admitted as such years later. Again, with the revelation of foreign superstars like Dirk Nowitzki and Peja Stojakovic, I think a lot of teams (not just limited to Dumars and Detroit) put the cart in front of the horse on some occasions, perhaps over-ready to jump on the hype train of the next big hidden foreign superstar. I'll have to look for the article, but I think Dumars said they made over their entire evaluation process following that draft (he actually ended up with a pretty solid draft record outside of Darko).

And lastly, if Wade or Bosh were truly considered options back then at #2 (they weren't), I think you're right in thinking they could have possibly worked out. I'll always wonder if any other combination than what Detroit developed would have led to a ring, but I certainly think those guys (Bosh and Wade) could have ended up making that team pretty good just as well.


I think Darko came to the L at the wrong time. He was just too young and too inexperience especially in a championship caliber team. There's just too little room for errors and mistakes that Darko needed to learn and grow. Pistons should have kept him in Europe and marinated him until he's mentally ready. I reckon Mehmet Okur contributed with that team but he was much older.I agree. I think he was too young and too inexperienced, though I also wonder if he ever would have reached the right mental frame of mind and maturity to get to where he was supposed to be. I mean, he's currently feeding beer to his tattoos, haha. I think a few extra years of development outside of the league couldn't have hurt, but it also may have just revealed his limitations led to the realization that he wasn't a #2 overall type of player.

Also, Mehmet Okur was a stud. Even in the often limited minutes in Detroit, he balled out. His skill and craft was clear from the get-go. Detroit's real first foreign import of the 2000's was Zeljko Rebraca, who I heard a lot about but was ultimately disappointed. Memo came over the next year (2002-2003) and right off the bat, the moment I saw him hit a step-back three-pointer in his first preseason game, I knew he was going to be that dude. His perfect shooting game against Philly in the playoffs his rookie year: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-QpbCIlzlg

[GimmeThat]

They probably thought they were getting someone who will also be trained over the years through international competition/olympics etc.

Which ended up leaving him never quite understood the high concept basketball Larry Brown was implementing with a group of veterans, as the left out lottery rookie.

[Rake2204]

Joe Dumars on the Milicic pick:

Dumars: Absolutely, it was a mistake. I could give a dissertation on [background research] now. After I drafted Darko, from that point on, the amount of background we do on every single player that you see us draft is ridiculous. We do as much or more background than any other team in the NBA because of that. The background on Darko was about 20 percent of what we do now. I look back on it now and realize you didn't know half of the stuff you needed to know. With Darko, we may have had two sources of information. That was it. We may have talked to a couple of guys over in Europe. That was it.http://espn.go.com/nba/draft2013/story/_/page/2003-draft-history-2/an-oral-history-2003-lottery-draft

[inclinerator]

darko makes prime shaq look small

[morbius]

I remember hearing that Miličić was picked with 2nd pick and I was totally in shock. His team Hemofarm was doing pretty well that season in the Serbian league and managed to make the future champions work hard to beat them in the semifinals, but Darko was just a young bench warmer on that team. They picked with a second pick a 17 year old who doesn't even play on his team? Total insanity, Divac was already a star when he was 16.

If it was a weak draft, I'd understand Detroit's decision. Heck, Darko was leaps and bounds better player than Stormile Swift who was also picked with the 2nd pick. They both had good athletic abilities and poor basketball IQ, which their franchises thought they could correct.

But despite all, Darko could have been a decent NBA player if he wasn't such a head case. He was relatively talented and actually practised pretty hard, but would not give a consistent effort on the floor.

[DCL]

despite all that, darko still made over 50 million in the league, which is like a trillion dollars in his country.

he laughed all the way to the bank. :lol