The NBA holds its draft lottery Monday night in Chicago. Fourteen selections, one Cooper Flagg. May the odds be ever in the teams’ favor.
The lottery is a high-stakes night based on nothing but pure luck. It can sway the directions of franchises one ping-pong ball at a time. The teams with the three worst records during the regular season (the Utah Jazz, Washington Wizards and Charlotte Hornets) each have a 14 percent chance at landing the top pick. Here is a primer to understand what could happen and how it would impact all of the teams involved.
• Flagg, the dynamite draft prospect out of Duke, looms over this lottery. He is the consensus projected No. 1 pick, and every team hopes to be the one the lottery gods smile on to have the chance to draft him. He is not quite as hyped as Victor Wembanyama was before the 2023 draft, but he is a clear-cut choice to go at the top like Zion Williamson (2019) and Karl-Anthony Towns (2015) were in years past.
• The Philadelphia 76ers might have the most on the line Monday. This was supposed to be a championship-contending season for them, but those hopes were doused by December. Instead, they won 24 games and spent the second half of the season … let’s say maximizing … their lottery odds. And they needed to once it was clear this was a lost season. If the Sixers’ pick falls outside the top six, then it goes to the Oklahoma City Thunder. Yup, the Thunder, a team with a league-leading 68 wins in the regular season, could get another top-eight pick.
The Sixers head into the lottery drawing room with the fifth-best odds to land the No. 1 pick (10.5 percent) after finishing with the NBA’s fifth-worst record, and they have a 42.1 percent chance of getting a top-four pick. If one team in the lottery jumps them, they fall to the No. 6 pick in the draft but keep their pick. If two teams do, there’s a problem for Philly.
Here’s another problem: Since 2019, the first lottery in which the current odds-weighting system was in place, half of the draft lotteries have had multiple teams jump into the top-four selections with odds worse than the Sixers (outside the five worst records). In 2019, three teams outside the top four odds jumped into the top-four picks. Last year, the top four picks belonged to teams with the 10th-best, second-best, ninth-best and fifth-best odds.
If the Sixers manage to keep their pick, it would go a long way to helping make the most of the 2024-25 season. They can add young talent to a roster with 35-year-old Paul George and 31-year-old Joel Embiid, along with 24-year-old Tyrese Maxey. Team president Daryl Morey did say he wants to get younger next season.
Morey can, of course, also deal the pick to improve the roster. A top-five pick could be helpful in a bidding war for any All-Star who could hit the market this summer, along with the Sixers’ other available draft picks.
And if they don’t keep their pick, the Thunder can surely figure out how to squeeze in another young, talented player on a cheap contract onto a deep roster with a cap sheet that’s about to get more complicated.
Daryl Morey and the Sixers could end up with a top pick. Or that pick could be headed to OKC. (Bill Streicher / USA Today Sports)
• Houston has to hope it can get lucky Monday. The Rockets own the rights to the Phoenix Suns’ first-round pick and could add another young player to a team that won 52 games this season and was the No. 2 seed in the Western Conference. The Suns enter the night with the ninth-best odds at landing the No. 1 pick (3.8 percent) and a 17.3 percent chance at a top-four pick.
If that selection is just a top-10 pick, teams will immediately start to wonder if Houston will use it to help itself on the trade market this offseason. If the Rockets leap into the top four, that choice gets even more complicated. This draft is seen as a strong one through the top four picks, with Dylan Harper, Ace Bailey and V.J. Edgecombe all seen as being among the top prospects. Even that small chance at Flagg is pretty rare for a 52-win team.
History happens to be kind to the Rockets. They jumped into the third pick last spring when they owned the Brooklyn Nets’ selection, despite owning the ninth-best odds. That was one of three times in the last six lotteries when a team slotted in the ninth-worst record or worse jumped into the top four.
• Here’s a cruel stat for the Utah Jazz, owners of the worst record in the NBA at 17-65: No team with the worst record has won the lottery since the new odds went into effect in 2019. Here’s a pick-me-up for the Jazz: A team with a 14 percent chance to win the lottery (the highest any team can have) has done so four times in the six lotteries with those new odds.
Unfortunately for the Jazz, the Wizards and Hornets also have a 14 percent chance to win the lottery, and the teams with the second- and third-worst records have each won it twice since 2019. As they say, it’s the hope that kills you.
• No NBA team has been worse over the last two seasons than the Wizards. Their tanking efforts long-term sustainability project has been highly successful — at the losing part, at least. This is the month when they need to do some winning. The Wizards had the No. 2 pick in last year’s draft, which wasn’t as painful as it sounds because there was no consensus top player on the board. It was incredibly painful in 2023 when they missed out on Wembanyama. The Wizards ended up with the No. 8 pick and Bilal Coulibaly after a draft-night trade with Indiana. Landing Flagg wouldn’t be redemption, but it would be a new beginning in the nation’s capital.
• Will the lottery gods smile on the Spurs this season? They had the eighth-worst record in the league and also own the Atlanta Hawks’ first-round pick. Together, that gives them a 6.7 percent chance at No. 1. Wembanyama and Flagg in one front court? Sacré bleu! That seems unlikely — although the Pelicans won the right to draft Williamson from the No. 7 slot and the Hawks jumped up to No. 1 last year from the 10th spot — but the Spurs do have a 29.7 percent chance at getting a top-four pick. Even that would be a big talent infusion to put around Wembanyama, De’Aaron Fox and Rookie of the Year Stephon Castle.
• Yes, Nico Harrison traded Luka Dončić, but what if he drafts Flagg? That’s playing four-dimensional chess. The upside to the Dallas Mavericks missing the playoffs is that they have a 1.8 percent chance at the No. 1 pick and an 8.5 percent chance at a top-four pick. Hey, the Orlando Magic won the 1993 lottery out of the No. 11 slot, and they only had a 1.52 percent chance.
• Joe Dumars has a 12.5 percent chance to win the No. 1 pick in his new job as head of basketball operations in New Orleans, and this is a big draft for the Pelicans. They have had only one top-four pick since they traded away Anthony Davis after the 2018-19 season despite having the eighth-worst winning percentage in that time, and that was Williamson in 2019. They have a 48.1 percent chance of landing a top-four pick Monday.
• This is a big night for the Nets. They set a course for the draft lottery drawing last June when they traded Mikal Bridges to the New York Knicks for five first-round picks and a pick swap and also reacquired their first-round pick from the Rockets. The problem was that they were a little too good to start the season, then were passed by the Sixers late in the season in the race to the bottom. They ended up winning 26 games but have the sixth-best odds at the No. 1 pick (9 percent). But even a top-four pick would help their rebuild — they have a 37.2 chance at landing that — and they have enough draft assets that the player they would select could quickly be part of a winning team sooner than later.
• The Portland Trail Blazers had the 10th-worst record in the NBA as they unexpectedly surged to 36 wins. That only gives them a 3.7 percent chance at winning the lottery, but because the Hawks won the lottery last year out of the No. 10 slot, they at least have to be mentioned.
(Top photo from 2024 draft lottery: David Banks / USA Today Sports)