It wasn't a weak draft at all. And even if it was then that would mean there were a lot of bad picks and he was one of them.
It's very easy to name 3 guys picked after him we'd rather have by a ton and a couple others that are better difference makers or just better.
You also have to ignore that Steven Adams was picked one pick ahead of him. Pretty huge drop off
2013 was most definitely a weak draft. Certainly in top end talent (Giannis is looking like the only all star in the entire draft). It's looking more and more like there were solid players deeper in the draft but certainly not more than you'd find in any other decent year.
Of course there were better players after Kelly, but let's not forget that Anthony Bennett, Cody Zeller, Ben Mclemore, Trey Burke, and the ROY Michael Carter-Williams (who already has one foot out of the league) were selected ahead of him. For his position in the draft and the type of talent around him, he was a pretty good pick. Not great, pretty good.
But claiming he was a bad pick just because there were better players after him is like saying Nikola Vucevic was a bad pick at 16 in 2011 because Jimmy Butler and Isaiah Thomas were still on the board.
Did we just compare KO to Vucevic? Did that just happen?
It's more like comparing him to JR Giddens
Obviously, Nik Vucevic is a much more apt comparison for Kelly than JR Giddens and his total of 247 NBA minutes.
By that logic maybe we should compare him to Hakeem too. I mean Hakeem played a lot of minutes at the same position and he had Jordan picked two spots after him but Hakeem was a good pick. Right?
See this is looking backwards at a draft, you have to go back to the time of the draft and in that draft there was no question Hakeem was going to be the first pick, big men with that skill set are going to be taken over swings and guards that's how it works, and Hakeem was an all-time great so it was an easy pick and also a very good pick. That is why you always hear about Bowie going in front of Jordan not Hakeem.
The way I look at this if you are a guy that likes to swing for the fences, was happy when the Celts took Gerald Green over Danny Granger than you wanted Giannis, if you prefer taking a guy that you know has some NBA level skills you take Olynyk but you can't look back and cherry pick the couple swing for the fences guys that were hits without also saying I liked all these guys that were busts.
I liked the Gerald pick at the time, and I was rooting for us to take Giannis at the time but I don't blame Danny at all, his job is on the line with the decisions he makes, I just sit on the couch and like to root for crazy athletic projects to pan out.