The culmination of a season’s “work” from about one-third of the NBA will be realized on Sunday at 3 p.m. ET in Chicago.
The 2025-26 NBA season saw unprecedented levels of tanking as teams opted to align themselves with a 2026 draft class that comes with great promise and expectation.
The question that now remains, for those teams that blatantly focused on collecting ping-pong balls (hey there Washington, Utah, Indiana, Brooklyn and Sacramento): was subjecting your fanbase to a mere facsimile of NBA basketball and creating possible ill will with the league office ultimately worth it?
Land within the top four, and it just might have been, particularly because this is the last year that this style of lottery will be in place. Next season, a reported “3-2-1” system will be up and running, meaning teams like Washington or Utah this season would be in the “relegation zone” and see their lottery odds drop significantly.
So, not only does this year promise to be one of the most consequential draft classes ever, the lottery could be very much the same as it could signify the end of the lose-to-win mentality of team-building.
Here’s more on what Sunday will have in store.
The lottery system, as we know it, has been in place since the 2018 draft.
As the system will play out on Sunday, the team with the worst record in basketball this season — the Washington Wizards (17-65) — will be able to pick no lower than fifth in the draft. Meanwhile, the teams with the three worst records from this season — the Wizards, Indiana Pacers (19-63) and Brooklyn Nets (20-62) — will each have a 14 per cent shot at winning the lottery.
Unlike the NHL, the NBA doesn’t show the drama of the ping pong balls bouncing around inside the tube and then being sucked up for the presenter to then name what’s on the ball — at least, not live. The NBA conducts the actual drawing in private and later releases a video of the proceedings. To ensure the public that there’s no “frozen-envelope” shenanigans happening behind the scenes, the NBA invites team representatives and invites select members of the media into the drawing room to observe.
What the public sees on the broadcast, when deputy commissioner Mark Tatum is revealing the placards with the team names and logos from oversized envelopes, are team representatives up on stage — usually a member of the front office or ownership, a current team player or a team “legend.”
For example, Atlanta Hawks general manager Onsi Saleh will be on stage for his team, Hall of Famer Vince Carter will represent the Brooklyn Nets, and rookie of the year runner-up Kon Knueppel will represent the Charlotte Hornets.
No one on stage is supposed to know what the results are from the drawing room, so their reactions to events should all be genuine. Nothing that happens on stage should impact what happens with the actual draw in any way.
And, as a reminder, the lottery consists of just 14 teams. As was the case last year with the San Antonio Spurs, a single team can have multiple picks in the same lottery should prior transactions allow that to happen. Additionally, teams will have a chance to leap up into the top four of the draft, with the teams with the three worst records given equally the best chances to do so. Otherwise, teams’ odds to both win the lottery or leap into the top four are determined by their record.
The following table shows each team’s chances of winning the lottery and leaping up into the top four.
You’ll notice there are asterisks next to a few teams. More on those below.
Now for the fun stuff — if the consequences of previous trades are your idea of a good time, that is.
Remember those asterisks in the table above? That’s where the real drama of the draft lottery lies, and where, if you have no real rooting interest in any of the teams participating in the lottery, your interest could be piqued.
Not doing it for you? How about this: the defending NBA champion Oklahoma City Thunder could win the No. 1 overall pick.
The reason for this can be traced back to when the Los Angeles Clippers decided to trade for Paul George by sending out five first-round picks, two first-round pick swaps, veteran forward Danilo Gallinari and a relatively unknown kid from Canada named Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who was just coming off a solid All-Rookie second team season that year.
Since the Clippers missed the playoffs this season, their (unprotected) pick will be conveyed to the Thunder. At No. 12 in the pre-lottery odds, it doesn’t seem likely, but there’s still a 7.1 per cent chance the Thunder could leap into the top four, and a 1.5 per cent shot they grab the No. 1 overall pick to add to their potential dynasty.
Additionally, in a different Clippers transaction that occurred at this year’s trade deadline, L.A. dealt centre Ivica Zubac to the Indiana Pacers for a protected first-round pick. Should this pick fall within Nos. 5-9, the Clippers will be picking in Indiana’s spot. This is a gamble that slightly favours the Pacers, who have a little over a 52 per cent chance to land in the top four and approximately a 48 per cent chance to land within pick Nos. 5 and 6 – where it would be conveyed to the Clippers.
Elsewhere, the Hawks aren’t officially listed among teams in the lottery this year, but they most certainly will be able to make a lottery selection come June 23.
In one of the most stunning and head-scratching draft-day deals executed in recent memory, the New Orleans Pelicans traded up with the Hawks last year for the draft rights of Derik Queen in exchange for the draft rights to Asa Newell and a first-round pick in this year’s draft. That pick conveys to Atlanta as the better of those between the Pelicans and the Milwaukee Bucks.
The Bucks won’t go away from this empty-handed, however, as they’ll receive the lesser of their own pick or the New Orleans pick.
Essentially, the Hawks are being given an opportunity to pick likely no worse than 10th, with a decent shot to land within the top four and at No. 1 after winning 46 games and reaching the playoffs for the first time since 2023. Milwaukee is going to get a chance to pick in the lottery in some form, and the Pelicans are getting nothing — although Queen could make an All-Rookie team for their troubles.
Who could go first overall?
Given what we saw from this season’s crop of rookies, the 2026 class has a lot to live up to, but it’s being hailed as one of the strongest classes in some time.
This is the primary reason for the shameless tanking we saw during the regular season. Virtually any player you can name that’s projected to go within the lottery is projected to, at minimum, have a floor of being a solid NBA starter with all-star or even All-NBA potential outside of the top three.
Instead of explaining each of their individual games, just go ahead and click on their names and check out some of their mixtapes.
It’s worth noting that Peterson has been controversial because of how few games he’s played this season. As ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne reported, however, Peterson was experiencing full-body cramps because of a high dosage of creatine.
Whether Peterson’s image can be rehabilitated in time is one of the biggest questions leading into the draft, as his silence on the matter during the season led many to criticize the 19-year-old’s desire and competitive spirit. It’s something that could see even him drop out of the top three, a notion that previously seemed inconceivable.
