What's new
By:

If the NBA Draft Lottery is rigged, where will we land?

Let me give different scenarios, all hypothetical and don’t pertain to this moment but a vague generalization of the past 30 years:

1. The league throwing the Lakers a bone when they need to be on the upswing and land a big talent in the lottery.

2. The league throwing the Knicks a bone because “they’re a big market”.

3. The league trying to drum up more NBA interest in a huge NCAA state in NC.

4. The league doing a franchise like SAS a solid and giving a handout that leads to a couple decades of self-sufficiency and raising the overall competitiveness of the league.

These four scenarios show how the idea of “big market = money = favor them” isn’t the best way to view things, even if you’re conspiratorial. NYC is the largest sports market in the world. Despite that, the league pushing that ****** franchise would be dumping money down the drain. The Lakers on the other hand, despite periodic mismanagement, has a proven track record to stay relevant and give you good return. San Antonio, as well, despite being a small market, does a lot for maintaining competitive balance in the league. The league benefits from a late-90s Jazz. It’s like the employee who you pay decent, not great, but good value, they show up early, stay late, don’t complain, aren’t a squeaky wheel, and put their head down and go to work. That does have real value. The fact that you can get by without giving them a raise for multiple years is also appreciated, and exploited, but brings real value.

Tl;dr there’s nobody right now that doing a favor for them will have any kind of predictable guarantee of benefiting the league generally. If Silver was asked, I’d imagine he’d be less thrilled about the #1 going somewhere like Charlotte. I don’t think you’d get added value in Brooklyn. He probably wouldn’t even be there that long. There’s an argument that you could put someone like Flagg in Utah and it being similar to Wemby in SA.

Small market teams pulling their weight is actually important for the league and they obviously see that. It’s more when you’re head-to-head on certain things the golden children will always be the golden children (Lakers).
 
If the league is going to fix anything in this lottery, it will be where Cooper Flagg goes and maybe where Dylan Harper goes. Then maybe they’ll ask themselves if they want Philly to keep their pick or convey it to the Thunder. The situation in Dallas is a train wreck, but it shouldn’t be enough to give them Flagg to solve it.

The tin-foil hat theory would be that the league would put Flagg in a major east coast TV market, like Brooklyn, in order to protect the value of their tv deals and appeal to casual fans.

I think the league would let the Jazz have #3 though, maybe even #2.

Good candidates to move up this year would be BRK, TOR, UTA, PHI.
 
Dear colleagues, we must temper our psychologies. All out "belief" in the unobservable (at least for now) postulate of lottery conspiracy is inconsistent with an empirical stance. One may suspect, one may wonder, but all out belief borders on metaphysics.
 
For Cleveland to win the lottery 3 yrs out of 4 right after they lost Lebron was some real sketchy ****.

Also this one time when NOLA “conveniently” won the lottery when the league temporarily took over the franchise during their ownership change.

And someone explain to me why small market teams like Charlotte and Sacramento never won the lottery even once despite having the worst records in the league for the last 15+ years.
 
Last edited:
While I think conspiracy theories about the draft are silly (the Ewing draft maybe being the only one I'd consider might have been rigged), I will admit sometimes its kind of fun to indulge in what if speculation, same as its fun to engage in superstitions, as long as you don't buy into it super hard. Like, the Jazz always blow leads once my Mom starts watching games. Do I know that one person watching a game (usually pre-recorded and over already at this point) can't actually affect the outcome? Sure. Is it still fun to give her a hard time about it? Yup.

So yeah, looking at the teams present, I think the league would best benefit from Brooklyn or Philly. They got a 37 win team in the playoffs from the east. If they're shadow running things they'd want a bettern narrative for an Eastern Conference team.
 
jom2003 said:
And someone explain to me why small market teams like Charlotte and Sacramento never won the lottery even once despite having the worst records in the league for the last 15+ years.
Click to expand...
For Charlotte.....

Made the playoffs twice in that 15 year period. Draft odds were .17% 25% 19.9% .17% .8% .8% 1% 6% 1.8% 1% 12.5% 13.3% 14% in that period

That factors out to be.. about a 35% chance they didn't win in that time period. Certainly not lucky but not horrible odds it happened. That includes having the #1 and #2 worst records back when the odds were weighted a lot more favorably.

If you just include the years from the time the draft odds changed in 2019, its abou a 60% chance they didn't win in that time period.
 
infection said:
Let me give different scenarios, all hypothetical and don’t pertain to this moment but a vague generalization of the past 30 years:

1. The league throwing the Lakers a bone when they need to be on the upswing and land a big talent in the lottery.

2. The league throwing the Knicks a bone because “they’re a big market”.

3. The league trying to drum up more NBA interest in a huge NCAA state in NC.

4. The league doing a franchise like SAS a solid and giving a handout that leads to a couple decades of self-sufficiency and raising the overall competitiveness of the league.

These four scenarios show how the idea of “big market = money = favor them” isn’t the best way to view things, even if you’re conspiratorial. NYC is the largest sports market in the world. Despite that, the league pushing that ****** franchise would be dumping money down the drain. The Lakers on the other hand, despite periodic mismanagement, has a proven track record to stay relevant and give you good return. San Antonio, as well, despite being a small market, does a lot for maintaining competitive balance in the league. The league benefits from a late-90s Jazz. It’s like the employee who you pay decent, not great, but good value, they show up early, stay late, don’t complain, aren’t a squeaky wheel, and put their head down and go to work. That does have real value. The fact that you can get by without giving them a raise for multiple years is also appreciated, and exploited, but brings real value.

Tl;dr there’s nobody right now that doing a favor for them will have any kind of predictable guarantee of benefiting the league generally. If Silver was asked, I’d imagine he’d be less thrilled about the #1 going somewhere like Charlotte. I don’t think you’d get added value in Brooklyn. He probably wouldn’t even be there that long. There’s an argument that you could put someone like Flagg in Utah and it being similar to Wemby in SA.

Small market teams pulling their weight is actually important for the league and they obviously see that. It’s more when you’re head-to-head on certain things the golden children will always be the golden children (Lakers).
Click to expand...

If certain picks in the NBA draft are rigged, here's what I think the criteria and rationale for rigging are:
1) Did the local fanbase just experience a huge loss, whereby they are up in arms and in need something to be hopeful about (e.g., losing Lebron in free agency, losing Anthony Davis in a trade demand and standoff, losing James Harden in a meltdown)?
2) Is the franchise in question going on the market and need to protect its current valuation or give out a lottery pick as a thank-you gift to the new ownership (e.g., Milwaukee Bucks, Charlotte Hornets, New Orleans Pelicans)?
3) Is the player in question a superstar who will drive NBA ratings by attracting the casual viewer if the league sends him to a major tv market?
4) Are the franchise and the player a good match for one another?
5) Can the league help the Lakers?

The rationale against sending the Jazz a #1 pick would be that the Jazz have rabid fans who support the team and sell out the arena no matter what the team looks like. Hence, there isn't really a benefit for doing so aside from maybe a feel-good story.
 
Last edited:
Ok my guess is the Jazz get the #3 pick. The league can still say "see you still won in the lottery."

The best thing the league can do is create competition. That is what made the NBA great in the 90s. Create rivalries everyone will want to watch.

Second the NBA needs to create a vilian. People love to root against someone.

With that said I think Flagg in Utah fits both. With Flagg the Jazz/Spurs games could get epic. Like the 90s. The only problem is those are all small market teams.

The Lakers seem to have a bright future now with Doncic. OKC should be a monster for years to come. Memphis could be the villain team (because of Ja) SA needs to get better to be put in here and I think they will. I almost forgot houston.

The East is just so weird when it comes to teams. Boston is going to be good for a little while longer but are starting to age. Cleveland looks young and hungry. NY is a mess. Detroit is an up and coming team. Orlando is just weird.

I definitely could see the NBA wanting flagg in the east. That would be a NO to Toronto.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page
Back
Top