Golden State Warriors only No. 2 pick in franchise history was a home run

The Golden State Warriors only No. 2 pick in franchise history was a knock out of the part, one that occurred in the 1965 NBA Draft.

It’s a shortlist of players that have been taken No. 2 by the Golden State Warriors. That shortlist is just a list of one, and the only player on it is Rick Barry. Barry had a better career than all three of the Warriors No. 1 overall picks.

Barry was taken in 1965 and played his collegiate ball at the University of Miami in Florida. Barry was the second pick in the draft after three territorial picks were also used. He was immediately after Fred Hetzel who was also drafted to Golden State, the then San Francisco Warriors.

Barry went on to have a terrific career with Golden State. As a matter of fact, it was so memorable that Barry still cracked out top-three Warriors in franchise history despite starting his career over five decades ago.

Obviously, at the time, Golden State’s front office was nowhere close to what it was now and it’s been through several variations of leaders since. However, those leaders got one thing right, and that was taking Barry who was arguably the best option in the entire draft.

Barry played eight years with the Warriors, taking about a five-year hiatus between stints. In his second year in the league, the legend averaged 35.6 points per game, the most in the NBA, an association that consisted of just ten teams at the time.

The famed Rick Barry was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1987. That said, let’s hope whoever the Warriors take, or use to bring in, can have the same type of impact on the organization that Barry had throughout the 60s and 70s.

While that may be setting the bar a bit too high, we’ve seen crazy things from Golden State over the last half a decade.