So this reddit post happened recently. The question is this: Make the best starting five you can whose draft positions add up to 200 or greater. So Magic would add 1, Darko Milicic would add 2, Kobe would add 13, etc. I saw this question, was interested in it, and knocked it out of the park. Unfortunately I got there late. So here's my answer, which I'm posting in blog form because I'm self-indulgent like that.
PG - Magic Johnson (1)
SG - Manu Ginobili (57)
SF - LeBron James (1)
PF - Dennis Rodman (27)
C - Artis Gilmore (117)
Total: 203
Okay. So most people in this thread fucked up spectacularly. There were two common mistakes. First, to take a bunch of late-first-to-second rounders and try to make the best of what is truly a pretty weak crop of players (think Isaiah Thomas at #60). This is a bad choice because basketball is predominantly about top-level talent and frankly there isn't much of that outside of the first round.
The second mistake was to assume no one good was drafted late and "punt" a position while getting the maximum value from your other players. This is fine if you punt it right (e.g. Gilmore), but if you end up with a garbage player in your starting 5, that's going to hurt.
Here's the winning strat: Recognize that value here comes from getting a few players drafted very late who are still very good. That is to say, not worthless sixth-rounders, but also not guys who are very good but drafted not-so-late (like Draymond or Isaiah, the latter of whom really isn't good enough to merit inclusion in this conversation). Gilmore is comfortably the best-value draft pick I saw -- he was taken in the seventh freaking round, and he's arguably one of the ten best centers ever. (This may not sound that impressive, but recognize that the top of that list goes, in some order, Kareem Wilt Shaq Russell Hakeem, and then guys like Ewing, Parish, Robinson, Malone, et al. vying for the last few spots.)
There's one caveat with Gilmore, and that's that he was also drafted by, and played for a number of years in, the ABA. So that 117 might potentially be influenced by the possibility that he wouldn't go to the NBA. I don't know; I can't find sources from that far back. During the NBA-ABA merger, he was actually taken 1st overall, and he went pretty early in the ABA draft (not sure exactly where). But frankly, I don't care. 117 is his official NBA draft position, listed on BBRef and his Wikipedia page. Him getting drafted 1st in the ABA dispersal draft, after playing an extraordinary 5-year career in the ABA, really doesn't matter here, nor does his ABA draft position. I get him and it counts for 117.
Next up, I tried to find a high-value player from the late second and beyond, and who should pop up but Ginobili. This guy has super high value, as probably everyone who's watched basketball in the past 15 years knows, and is pretty much the perfect teammate. He's also an elite 2-guard, and while he's not at the Kobe level, his value at 57 is super high.
Now we're in a nice position. Artis and Manu add up to 174, meaning if we can get a pick at 24 or later, we get to finish up with two first overalls. First overalls, in basketball, are extremely valuable; basically half of the all-time greats were taken #1 overall. Fortunately, there's a great choice: Dennis Rodman at 27, who puts us over already and who is arguably the most valuable player in NBA history. He's an all-time great defender and the GOAT rebounder, and he fits beautifully in with this team, as he does with almost any team.
That leaves us with the freedom to go nuts with our last two picks, so we're taking Magic and LeBron, two of the greatest players ever and easy choices at the 1 and the 3. And so we arrive at our final roster. Notice how not only do we have an absurd level of talent (Manu and Gilmore are the two worst players on this roster, and they're both comfortably Hall of Famers), but we also have a beautiful balance with respect to roles, ball-dominance, offense-vs-defense, and leadership.
Magic is going to run the offense with LeBron slotting into his ideal role as a multitalented genius player on the wing. The fastbreak is going to be utterly unstoppable and the half-court is pretty absurd too. Gilmore is our main scorer inside, with LeBron and Manu taking lead perimeter scoring roles. Magic can do whatever he wants (which is usually to pass, but remember that time he started at center in the decisive Game 6 of the 1980 Finals, and won, with a 42/15/7? That happened), and Rodman can do whatever he wants (which is to play lockdown defense and rebound, which is why Rodman is the most valuable player ever).
Magic and LeBron both love to control the ball, but they're both also very effective playing with other players who can control the game, so they'll work fine together. Manu and Gilmore are relatively low-usage players, so they won't miss touches. And Rodman is obviously crazy-low usage (which, again, is part of the reason why he's so valuable). So basically, we have an unstoppable one-two punch, we have perfect third and fourth options, and we have the greatest glue guy in NBA history.
Our offense is going to work beautifully, because we have Magic, LeBron, Manu, and Gilmore. All four of those guys are offensive savants -- Gilmore's the one you might not know, but he's ridiculously efficient on reasonably high volume. We're also set defensively, since Gilmore is a great defensive center, Rodman is one of the greatest defensive players ever, LeBron can lock down anyone on the wing, and hopefully Magic and Manu will keep up. (We're handwaving this because interior defense is more important and we dominate at it.)
And finally, we shouldn't have any problems at all in the locker room. Magic is whatever the opposite of locker room cancer is (locker room chemo? locker room radiation therapy?), LeBron seems to get along well with everyone besides Kyrie, Manu is great, and whatever, I'm done talking.
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