Once upon a time, New York Knicks forward Michael Beasley was a can't-miss NBA prospect in the conversation to be the No. 1 overall draft pick in 2008. The Bulls ended up taking hometown boy Derrick Rose with the top pick, but Beasley -- a 6-9 lefty with guard skills and a sweet shooting stroke -- was the easy choice for the Heat at No. 2.
As we all know, Beasley's career hasn't turned out quite the way we expected ... or the way he hoped. A myriad of off-court issues slowed Beasley's development and eventually he dropped out of the league completely. A couple of seasons in China helped him get back into the NBA, and he's become a productive bench player in recent years.
If you ask Beasley, however, his talent is still on par with the league's best players.
"As far as talent-wise, I match up with Kevin [Durant], LeBron [James], I match up with the best guys in the world," Beasley told Bleacher Report's Yaron Weitzman. "I'm not being cocky; it's just always how I felt. But I got into trouble as soon as I got into the NBA, and it left a bad taste in a lot of people's mouths."
We all know NBA players have to be extremely confident to compete night in and night out, but this is some next-level swagger from Beasley. Then again, we shouldn't really be surprised -- this is the man who tried to school us all on the myth of brain-use percentages.
