CHICAGO – As each of the white ping-pong balls, numbered 1 through 14, bounces into the SmartPlay device that facilitates the NBA’s annual Draft Lottery, the echo of the 2.7-gram plastic spheres rattling inside the glass serves as a stark reminder of how the fate of $4 billion franchises literally hangs in the balance of chance. Sunday afternoon, inside the secluded room at McCormick Place, the first three balls to determine the winner of the No. 1 pick in June’s draft came out of the 6-10-14 machine, for example, leaving seven teams with the possibility of the top selection. – or half the room.
The drawing takes place about an hour before the NBA’s television broadcast publicly reveals these results and why every league official, all 12 members of the media – including this reporter – and every representative of the 14 potential lottery teams in attendance must turn in their mobile devices in sealed white boxes. envelopes. This ensures the results remain secret until Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum reveals on stage which team poster is tucked into each numbered envelope corresponding to each pick. Last year, there was palpable excitement inside the lottery bunker as team executives waited to find out which lucky organization would get the right to select Victor Wembanyama. This time, the lack of consensus among the top prospects left behind the scenes with a general air of curiosity.
If a “1” came last, Washington would have secured the first pick. The Wizards were in exactly that position a year ago, finding themselves just one ball away from bringing Wembanyama from France to the nation’s capital. Portland needed a “2”, San Antonio needed a “3”, and so did Toronto with a “4”, Memphis with a “5”, and then Houston with a “9”. Unfortunately, the final ball was “13,” and that meant the Atlanta Hawks, who entered Sunday with the 10th best odds and just a 3% chance of being the No. 1 pick, emerged victorious.
Daniel Starkman, Atlanta’s vice president of player personnel, knew his team had a chance when the third ball produced a big number. Starkman’s brother owns a sock company, and the Hawks executive wore fire engine red socks with the Pacman team logo to help persuade his good fortune. “I can’t wait to check out our Slack channels and see what our group is thinking,” Starkman told Yahoo Sports after the draw. With many decision-makers across the league suggesting that this draft contains the kind of uncertainty that could present dangerous repercussions for the team that picks first, Starkman emphatically rejected the principle that the possibility of failing to find the right needle in this haystack of prospects It’s some sort of death sentence for a front office. “Having the ability to select any of these top prospects presents a lot of options for any team looking to improve,” Starkman said. “Who wouldn’t want that?”
You could see the same excitement on general manager Landry Fields’ face as he sat on the dais, a wide smile spreading across his face when Atlanta jumped into the top four during the broadcast and again when the Hawks were declared the last team in foot. . The team bosses present in the broadcast room enjoyed their congratulatory handshakes, asking each other happily: “Who would you take it if you could choose any player in the draft?”
Their selection and the Hawks’ rise to first place immediately casts additional uncertainty over this unstable class of players. Atlanta was already widely expected to be one of the most active teams of the offseason, having explored the trade market for All-Star point guard Dejounte Murray ahead of the February trade deadline, league sources told Yahoo Sports. And there is a growing belief among rival teams that this summer will also put All-Star Trae Young on the league’s trade block. Perhaps Atlanta will look to assign the top pick to one of these players in their upcoming trade talks. Going into the lottery, league personnel were already estimating that this draft would have the highest probability in years that the No. 1 pick could be traded — which hadn’t happened since 2017, when Boston fell to third with Philadelphia, allowing Sixers. get Markelle Fultz while the Celtics happily landed Jayson Tatum. Atlanta’s outcome certainly puts that possibility back into June, especially since the Hawks have already identified third-year forward Jalen Johnson as a critical building block moving forward regardless of what happens with the expected maneuvers in the backcourt.
Despite being a ball away, Washington didn’t fall much. The Wizards entered the day with the second-highest four-ball combination out of a possible 1,001 that could come up in the lottery machine. And once 7-6-1-5 determined the second coin toss, Washington general manager Will Dawkins knew his club was holding firm with the second pick. Dawkins did not bring any good luck charms with him into the private room. His Wizards may be the team furthest from competing for the playoffs without a well-defined franchise centerpiece like Wembanyama in San Antonio or even Cade Cunningham in Detroit. Dawkins expressed confidence that Washington’s scouting department can find such a player at the top of this board, even with the unknowns that abound.
“There are a lot of All-Stars in this class,” Dawkins told Yahoo Sports. “We’ll probably have to wait a few years to see which ones really stand out.”
Then 6-7-11-9 came out of the machine, and that gave the No. 3 pick to Houston over Brooklyn thanks to the draft capital the Nets sent to the Rockets for James Harden. That spot had the ninth-best chance of jumping to the senior selection in Sunday’s draft, so the Rockets scored another big lottery jump that will have ripple effects across the entire offseason landscape. Houston, sources said, was planning to consider the trade option if the Rockets had remained within the expected range at the bottom of the top 10. Houston has clear goals of competing for the postseason after picking in the top four during each of the last three drafts, which left rivals already considering the Rockets as the second team in the top three in June that will evaluate the negotiation of their selection. With such a change in circumstances, both Atlanta and Houston will have to completely reconsider their paths before making any type of decision.
The Rockets sent Sam Strantz, the team’s associate general counsel, to the living room. To imagine Houston’s outcome, he tucked into his jacket pocket the white baby hat with pink and blue stripes that his newborn son, Sawyer, wore to the hospital no more than two months ago.
The fourth and final draw produced the 3-10-6-5 combination, meaning San Antonio found its luck again after the Spurs took over Wembanyama last May. Brandon Leibsohn, the Spurs’ senior manager of basketball strategy and legal affairs, wore the belt he wore in his initial interview to join San Antonio. “I wanted to make sure I had something from day one to today,” Leibsohn told Yahoo Sports. Atlanta and Houston’s seismic leaps also pushed Toronto’s pick into the top six, which meant the Raptors’ No. 8 pick has now moved to San Antonio as well, a vestige of Jakob Poeltl’s 2023 trade deadline deal. Spurs suddenly inherit two wobbles in the first eight teams as they land impactful pieces to grow alongside their burgeoning Frenchman. “All the pillars of team building, for us, are just about finding players who can help us develop something sustainable for a long time,” Leibsohn said.
Detroit notably fell to the fifth pick for the second year in a row after entering the lottery with the best possible chance of winning the top prize. This will mark the third consecutive season that Detroit has held the No. 5 pick, after the Pistons selected Cunningham with the first selection in 2021. The Pistons could also be a trade possibility at this spot. However, there is just as much uncertainty about which executive will have the final say on such an important decision as there is about the top talent in this class. Detroit has already announced that the Pistons are looking to bring in a new president of basketball operations above general manager Troy Weaver, utilizing search firm Turnkey, where former Nets and Sixers executive Billy King plays a key role in all basketball consulting services.
Potential candidates for the position have been told the agency will fire Weaver from his position, league sources told Yahoo Sports. But early results from Detroit’s search didn’t appear to bring much progress for the Pistons. Although Detroit had hoped to interview Milwaukee’s top executive, Jon Horst, the Bucks blocked those advances and did not allow Horst to do so, sources said. Other names, such as former Trail Blazers general manager Neil Olshey, sources said, also declined contact from the Pistons to interview for the position.
Many of the league’s decision makers are still arriving in Chicago, where the NBA Draft Combine will continue throughout the week. There will be countless clandestine meetings between NBA power brokers, leaving plenty of trade talk and early free agency talk circulating in the Wintrust Arena stands. The Lakers left coaching industry figures with the impression that Los Angeles plans to conduct interviews for the franchise’s head coach this week as well. The league’s silly season is well underway.
