Basketball from a fan’s perspective

NBA Draft Lottery explained

It seems annually there are complaints regarding the lottery, the team with the worst won-loss record doesn’t always win the number one pick. The 2024 lottery is no different from many in the past. This year it’s “How come the Hawks receive the top pick when they didn’t have the worst regular season won-loss record. Rather than me going into great detail with my interpretation of the event we’ll go straight to the source. Below is a link by the NBA with an explanation how the draft lottery works, take time to read it in detail.

At the same time keep this in your memory bank, the Spurs were tied for the second worst record in the 2022-23 NBA season yet won in the lottery. The Spurs were able to choose Victor Wembanyama despite the fact the Pistons had the worst won-loss record in the association. The 2021-22 NBA season saw the lottery winner near to having the worst record, the Magic won the 2022 lottery and would later chose Paolo Banchero in the draft, the Magic won two more games than the Rockets that season. As I stated in a yet to be published entry I’m really unsure at this point in time whether there is a foolproof method of running a lottery that satisfies all members of the media and fans in general.   

https://www.nba.com/news/nba-draft-lottery-explainer

I guess I’m that guy

Anytime I read or hear complaints about the NBA it causes me to consider this fact. “Don’t problems develop in the NFL or with major league baseball,” of course they do. The main difference at least for me I’m not responding to NFL or baseball sites describing or complaining about the issues I see. My game s basketball which I will continue to monitor as a fan. With that out of the way let’s check a few things, LeBron James, Steph Curry, Kevin Durant, Joel Embiid all received early vacations.

We are left with youngsters to win an NBA Championship and just who are these young people? There is 25-year-old Shai Gilgeous-Alexander the acknowledged leader of the Thunder or his teammate 22-year-old Chet Holmgren. 200+ road miles south of Oklahoma City is 25-year-old Luka Doncic with the Dallas Mavericks. We could include 24-year-old Tyrese Haliburton of the Pacers in our discussion or 22-year-old Ant Man, Wolves highflyer Anthony Edwards. The Nuggets have lights out shooter Jamal Murray an “old” 27-year-old, we could also add his teammate Michael Porter Jr., he’s 25-years old. Their teams have been eliminated but keep Jaimie Vaquez Jr. of the Heat, who is 23 and 21-year-old Paolo Banchero of the Magic.

You probably noticed the list only contains those on playoff teams, there are others whose teams were not good enough to earn a playoff berth. At the top of that list of course is Victor Wembanyama, the alien. Expect Wemby to be even better next season as he leads the Spurs to a playoff berth…maybe. 20-year-old Scoot Henderson of the Blazers should also be included. The NBA in my view remains just as viable for the future as any other professional sport, I make this statement despite the negatives often presented to us.

The history  

If you check reference sources they will indicate Julius ‘Dr. J’ Erving scored 18,364 points during his brilliant career. What if I informed you the number of points is actually 30,026? I’ve mentioned this previously for unknown reasons the NBA fails to acknowledge the points Dr. J. scored while playing in the ABA. In this instance the focus is on Naismith and College Basketball Hall of Famer Erving, I’m am sure there are likely other former ABA/NBA players with similar history. In all likelihood he is the most visible of former ABA players as to the why the point total issue exists, I have no answer but I can speculate.

This is probably an offshoot of the “merger” between the leagues which occurred more in word over anything else. In 1966 all American Football League teams merged with National Football League teams to form a single league. This come together did not occur in 1976, the NBA decided they wanted the Pacers, Spurs, Nets and Nuggets added to the league. This was done despite the fact there were 9 ABA teams in the 1975-76 season. There was a question if the 5 remaining teams had the financial clout to remain in existence. It’s possible the Kentucky Colonels, San Diego Sails or Spirits of St. Louis might have been able to continue operations as NBA teams, the others would be questionable.

NBA Draft Lottery (and beyond)

This focus is on the San Antonio Spurs, they struck the motherlode in June 2023 being in the position to draft Victor Wembanyama. A look at the 2024 NBA Draft sees the Spurs with two first round lottery picks and two routine picks in the second round. Just as sure as I’m sitting here Coach Pop is not going to add 4 rookies to an already youthful roster. If that is not the case what then might occur, plenty of stuff the first being this. A trade of pick number 35 and 48, then again maybe only one of the 2nd round draft choices. I repeat they will not add 4 rookies that’s almost a guarantee.

On the other hand the Spurs have an important selection with their number 4 and 8 choices, it could occur but I have serious doubts either pick is traded, so where does that leave us? The so call draft experts (whomever they are) claim unlike 2023 the 2024 draft is devoid of potential talent. I’m going to hold off on that because often we cannot make such an assessment until we are down the road a bit. We could speculate on who might be available to assist Wemby in rebuilding the Spurs. There are several choices that could be made to develop this Spurs team. The deciding issue which pick is made ahead of the Spurs, that will dictate who might be chosen.