NBA Draft Lottery

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The NBA Draft Lottery is an annual event held by the National Basketball Association (NBA) to determine the order of the NBA Draft for that year. The teams that did not make the playoffs compete in a weighted lottery, in which teams with less total wins have a greater chance at selecting higher in the draft.

Contents 1 History 2 Process 3 Lottery ceremony 4 External links

[edit] History

Prior to the Draft Lottery, the first pick in the NBA draft was determined by a coin toss between the team in each conference with the worst record. Hurt by accusations that the Houston Rockets tanked their 1984 season in order to obtain Hakeem Olajuwon, the NBA instituted the Lottery process in 1985. The Draft Lottery was at first a chance drawing for the top seven draft picks among the seven non-playoff teams, with each team having an equal chance of landing the number one pick. The New York Knicks won the lottery and made Patrick Ewing the number one pick. Some in the NBA were concerned about results when the worst team, the Golden State Warriors, drew the seventh and final lottery draft position. Also, controversy over the envelope selection in which the NBA allegedly rigged the lottery to send Patrick Ewing to the New York Knicks soon became NBA lore.[1]

In 1986, many non-playoff teams had previously traded their first-round draft picks, and as a result, the top two teams in the Draft Lottery were playoff teams, with the eventual NBA champion Boston Celtics picking second, a pick which would eventually haunt the franchise: their selection, Len Bias, expected to be a star for years to come, died two days after the draft of a cocaine overdose. The Philadelphia 76ers, who won the lottery on the draw from a trade with the then-San Diego Clippers in which the Clippers traded their 1986 first-round pick for Joe Bryant, traded it to the Cleveland Cavaliers afterwards.

For the 1987 Draft Lottery, the NBA Board of Governors decided to use the lottery process for only the top three draft choices; the remaining non-playoff teams would select in order of their season records[2]. This meant that the team with the worst record could receive no worse than the fourth selection, the second-worst team could pick no lower than fifth, and so on. All subsequent Draft Lotteries have been conducted in this manner.

In 1990, the NBA changed the format of the lottery to give the worst team the best chance of landing the top pick. For the 11 non-playoff teams that season, the team with the worst record would have 11 chances, the second worst would have 10, and so on. Despite the weighted odds, the Orlando Magic managed to win the lottery in both 1992 and 1993; the second time, they had held the best record among non-playoff teams (and thus the smallest odds of winning).

Starting with the 1994 Draft Lottery, the chances were weighted even more in favor of the teams with the worst records, so that the best non-playoff team would only have a 0.5% chance of receiving the top pick, while the worst team would have a 25% chance. The heavy weighting of the lottery has been ridiculed as providing incentives for lottery-bound teams to tank at the end of the season. Teams unlikely to make the playoffs, and thus likely to be part of the draft lottery, often sit out their best players in order to have the best possible chance of receiving a very high draft pick.

The term "lottery pick" in the NBA denotes a pick whose position is determined through the lottery. As there now are fourteen non-playoff teams, there are fourteen lottery picks per year. Non-playoff teams in the NBA are often called "lottery teams."

[edit] Process

The lottery is normally held during the fourth week of May. The 2008 draft lottery was held on May 20. The Chicago Bulls, Miami Heat, and Minnesota Timberwolves won the first through third picks, respectively.

To determine the winner, fourteen ping pong balls numbered 1-14 are placed in a standard lottery machine and four balls are randomly selected from the lot. Just as in most traditional lotteries, the order in which the numbers are drawn is not important. That is, 1-2-3-4 is considered to be the same as 4-3-2-1. So although there is a total of 24 orders in which the balls numbered 1-2-3-4 can be picked, they are all treated as the same outcome. In doing this, the permutation of 4 balls from 14 becomes the combination of 4 balls from 14. That is, the total of 24,024 (14! / 10!, or 14x13x12x11) possible permutations is reduced by a factor of 24, to 1,001 combinations. Of these, 1 outcome is disregarded and 1,000 outcomes are distributed among the 14 non-playoff NBA teams. The combination 11-12-13-14 (in any order that those numbers are drawn) is not assigned and it is ignored if drawn; this has never occurred in practice.

In the event a lottery pick is traded to another team, the record of the original team (whose pick it was before the trade) still matters in determining eligibility for the lottery, and assignment of chances.

As of 2008, with 30 NBA teams, 16 qualify for the playoffs and the remaining 14 teams are entered in the draft lottery. These 14 teams are ranked in reverse order of their regular season record and are assigned the following number of chances

1. 250 combinations, 25% chance of receiving the #1 pick
2. 199 combinations, 19.9% chance
3. 156 combinations, 15.6% chance
4. 119 combinations, 11.9% chance
5. 88 combinations, 8.8% chance
6. 63 combinations, 6.3% chance
7. 43 combinations, 4.3% chance
8. 28 combinations, 2.8% chance
9. 17 combinations, 1.7% chance
10. 11 combinations, 1.1% chance
11. 8 combinations, 0.8% chance
12. 7 combinations, 0.7% chance
13. 6 combinations, 0.6% chance
14. 5 combinations, 0.5% chance

Here are the odds for each seed to get specific picks if there were no ties (rounded to 3 decimal places):

Seed	Chances	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	9th	10th	11th	12th	13th	14th
1	250	.250	.215	.178	.357
2	199	.199	.188	.171	.319	.123
3	156	.156	.157	.156	.226	.265	.040
4	119	.119	.126	.133	.099	.351	.160	.012
5	88	.088	.097	.107		.261	.360	.084	.004
6	63	.063	.071	.081			.439	.305	.040	.001
7	43	.043	.049	.058				.599	.232	.018	.000
8	28	.028	.033	.039					.724	.168	.008	.000
9	17	.017	.020	.024						.813	.122	.004	.000
10	11	.011	.013	.016							.870	.089	.002	.000
11	8	.008	.009	.012								.907	.063	.001	.000
12	7	.007	.008	.010									.935	.039	.000
13	6	.006	.007	.009										.960	.018
14	5	.005	.006	.007											.982

In the event that teams finish with the same record, each tied team receives the average of the total number of combinations for the positions that they occupy. In 2007, the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Portland Trail Blazers tied for the sixth worst record. The average of the 6th and 7th positions in the lottery was taken, resulting in each team getting 53 combinations (the average of 63 and 43). Should the average number not be an integer, a coin flip is then used to determine which team or teams receive the extra combination(s). The result of the coin flip is also used to determine who receives the earlier pick in the event that neither of the tied teams wins one of the first three picks via the lottery.

The lottery is conducted with witnesses verifying that all 14 balls are represented once as they are placed in the lottery machine. The balls are placed in the machine for 20 seconds to randomize prior to having the first ball drawn. The remaining three balls are drawn at 10-second intervals. NBA officials determine which team holds the winning combination and that franchise is awarded the #1 overall draft pick. The four balls are returned to the machine and the process is repeated to determine the second and third picks. In the event that a combination belongs to a team that has already won its pick (or if the one unassigned combination comes up), the round is repeated until a unique winner is determined. When the first three teams have been determined, the remaining picks are given out based on regular season record with the worst teams getting the highest picks. This assures each team that it can drop no more than three spots from its projected draft position.

A simple explanation: 1000 different outcomes of an experiment exist and are equally likely to occur. A certain amount of outcomes is assigned to each non-playoff NBA team. The largest number of outcomes is assigned to the team with the worst record. The team with the second worst record gets the second largest number of outcomes, and so on for each of the 14 teams in the lottery. The experiment is conducted, and the team to which the winning outcome was assigned receives the 1st pick in the NBA Draft. The experiment is conducted again. If the winner is the same team that already won, the experiment is performed over again until there is a different winner. The winner of the second experiment receives the 2nd pick. The winner of the third experiment receives the 3rd pick. After the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd picks are determined, the 4th-14th picks are assigned to teams based on weakness of record.

In a case where a lottery team trades its pick to a playoff team, the playoff team assumes the lottery team's position in all draft lottery situations, unless provisioned by the conditions of the trade.

[edit] Lottery ceremony

The drawing of the ping-pong balls is conducted in private, though observed by independent auditors and representatives from each team. The results are subsequently presented in a short ceremony (typically broadcast prior to or during halftime of an NBA playoff game), in which the order of the lottery is announced in reverse order, from the fourteenth selection to the first. Representatives from each NBA franchise with a lottery pick are present at the lottery ceremony.

[edit] External links

• NBA.com: Let the ping-pong balls fall