NBA Draft 2012: Fear The Sword Predictions Thread

With the 2012 NBA Draft just a few hours away, I figure it's time we get all of our predictions out on the table. I emailed the writers at Fear The Sword for their predictions with varying levels of success. Here's what I got from the FTS staff:

John:

Cavaliers select Michael Kidd-Gilchrist at #4

Angelo:

Cavaliers stay put and grab MKG at #4

David:

4. Michael Kidd-Gilchrist

24. Will Barton

33. Festus Ezeli

34. Furkan Aldemir

Patrick:

#4: Michael Kidd-Gilchrist

The Cavs take the guy with the highest floor and highest ceiling (at least in my opinion) and decide not to trade up to take Bradley Beal, much to the chagrin of our contingent of Beal-lovers. MKG fills a huge hole on the wing, where he can play both wing positions, and gives the Cavs the defensive stopper every team needs in order to compete with the Lebrons and Durants of the league.

TRADE:

Cleveland trades Anderson Varejao and the 34th pick for the 12th pick from the Houston Rockets.

Okay, I don't know if this is the trade that will happen, but my gut tells me we will trade back into the mid-lottery. Although my gut also told me we were taking Jonas Valanciunas last year at #4, but that's beside the point. IT'S GOING TO HAPPEN, STOP RUINING MY DREAMS.

#12: Terrence Ross

We grab the perfect complement to MKG at the other wing position in Ross, a guy who I feel has been overlooked by many because of his lack of national TV playing time. This guy is a 6'7" SG who is very athletic, which should serve to only make Kyrie Irving even happier in transition. He's got an excellent shooting stroke to complement MKG's lack of one, but also has the ability to get to the rim on occasion and will finish off alley-oops considerably better than recent retiree Anthony Parker. Plus, the kid's a pretty tenacious defender, giving us two guys capable of handling any offensive threat from the 1-3 positions.

#24: Fab Melo

Even without our beloved Brazilian on the team to mentor him, the Cavs are going to be lacking in size this year unless we sign a C in free agency (please let us do that). Although he's certainly a project big man, there are two things he will be able to step in right away and do that no one on our team could do last year: Rebound and block shots. With Kyrie, Ross, MKG, and Tristan, we don't an offensive threat in the middle, but with time Melo could certainly develop into one.

#33: Festus Ezeli

Because of the Varejao trade, we'll take another big man with a focus on defense, rebounding, and blocking shots. Ezeli will work hard from the get-go and give us that much more cushion to allow us to never play Semih Erden again.

Conrad:

I believe the Cavaliers will get the trade with the Bobcats done and trade up to the 2nd pick in the draft. With that pick, they'll go ahead and select their shooting guard of the future in Bradley Beal. I'm guessing that they cave and give up the 24th pick in order to get this done. With the 33rd pick, they take Festus Ezeli and with the 34th pick they take Kostas Papanikolaou and stash him overseas.

Go ahead put your predictions in writing now. Also, this is a great opportunity to mock our predictions.