Yesterday was a horrible day for Houston Rockets fans. I know this because I am one, and my 15-year-old son is even more so, and he made his angst quite clear. It was an even worse day for Detroit Pistons fans, whose team ended this season with the worst record in the NBA. On the other hand, it was an outstanding evening for fans of the San Antonio Spurs, who tied with Houston for the second worst record. To be clear, none of these teams played last night. The only two teams on the court yesterday were Denver and the Los Angeles Lakers, who played game one of the Western Conference Finals. Tonight, Boston and Miami will play the first game for the East. Other than that, the off-season has begun.
So why are the Spurs so elated and the Rockets and Pistons so blue? Because last night was the draft lottery, where a cascade of randomized ping pong balls determines the draft order for the worst 15 teams in the league. It’s a statistically weighted process that gives the best chances of picking near the top to the worst teams. The three worst – Houston, Detroit, and San Antonio – all had a 14% shot at the top pick. And they all had a greater than 50% shot at being in the top three. Which means that even though Houston and Detroit were by no means guaranteed one of those places, they still feel robbed when they didn’t get one.
This particular draft has been labeled a three person draft. Meaning the experts believe that player talent drops off after the top three. And that you won’t find a franchise player after that. That’s what everyone wants. Not a good player, or a great player, but a transcendent one. So the Rockets at pick four and the Pistons at five feels like insult to injury. It’s not just that you didn’t get the top draft pick. It’s that whomever you do pick might as well have been playing pickup at the YMCA. While there are highly regarded players at the second and third spot, this year’s draft has really come down to one player -- 7-foot-5 French superstar Victor Wembanyama, who at 19 has been called a generational talent by none other than LeBron James, who was also deemed a generational talent. This is why yesterday was such a big deal. Because if you got the number one pick, the destiny of your franchise will change forever. And if you miss out, you will live an eternity of what if. It’s the Michael Jordan scenario. The Bulls picked Jordan and became one of the most successful dynasties in NBA history. Portland took Sam Bowie and never recovered. That is the theory of the case.
I won’t question the value of elite talent in winning NBA basketball games. In fact, the NBA in particular is a league where talent is most essential. Which is why so many great college basketball players have virtually no shot in the NBA. At some point, the game is simply too fast, too strong, and too vertical. But I will say this about viewing the NBA lottery as the holy grail of franchise destiny. Remember in 2019, when everyone said that Zion Williamson was a transformative player who would turn New Orleans into a top franchise. And now most teams aren’t sure if they’d even want him on their roster. So this idea of a sure thing franchise star is far more art than science. Also, remember that in the current era of the NBA, teams are more constructed than organic – and often done by the players themselves. Which means that as much as the Spurs hope for a long run with Victor Wembanyama, it’s just as likely that he ends up somewhere else. Maybe most important from the League perspective, this year’s lottery results remind you that there’s almost no point in tanking anymore – or losing on purpose to get a better pick. As a Rockets fan, there’s no joy in losing 62 games so we can watch three teams pick ahead of us. And as a reminder, the Philadelphia 76’ers, the origin story of rebuilding through losing, still haven’t won an NBA Finals since Julius Erving.
None of that takes away from the fact that for Rockets and Pistons fans, yesterday was a horrible day. And a final note about transcendent NBA draft picks. Remember, Michael Jordan was actually picked third.
Keith Strudler is the director of the School of Communication and Media at Montclair State University. You can follow him on twitter at @KeithStrudler
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