NBA Draft 2026 winners and losers include Dybantsa, Peterson, Boozer and … fans?

Every year, I do a winners and losers column for the NBA Draft. Up until this year, I typically have had no problem finding teams that I think did exceedingly well or extremely poorly.

This year was substantially different.

The first round of the draft was a remarkably on-the-rails affair. I can justify every pick made on Tuesday night. Even with the Toronto Raptors taking Allen Graves — whom I ranked 30th — at No. 19, I think he’s such a tremendous fit in their scheme that I can’t really make an argument against it.

In total, teams selected 28 of my top 30 players, and no one outside my top 34 went in the first 30 picks. All the top 25 players on my board have been picked, which means all the guys I had locked in as true first-round grades were taken in the first round. The first 15 picks of the draft were the same 15 players I’d ranked in the top four tiers of my 2026 NBA Draft Guide.

Tuesday’s first round needed some sort of chaos agent. The New Orleans Pelicans didn’t have a selection, making the event drastically tamer than when Troy Weaver and Joe Dumars gave up what eventually became this year’s No. 8 and No. 23 picks for last year’s No. 13 pick. Maybe teams are getting better at drafting, and the scouting ecosystem league-wide is becoming more advanced. Maybe there are fewer marginal efficiencies to be mined now that name, image and likeness rights have taken over college basketball’s draft-decision process and essentially reduced the pool of elite players in each class.

Or maybe we got all of the chaos out of our system on Monday with the Giannis Antetokounmpo and Julius Randle trades.

Regardless, I felt like the process behind most of the picks was pretty solid. I would give every first-round selection at least a B- if I were grading picks this year, which isn’t that fun.

Even so, I found some winners and losers to discuss, as well as a league-wide trend that concerns me for the next couple of years of roster building.

So let’s break it all down.

Winners

AJ Dybantsa, Darryn Peterson, Cameron Boozer, Caleb Wilson and their respective teams

The Washington Wizards, Utah Jazz, Memphis Grizzlies and Chicago Bulls are winners for acquiring these four prodigiously talented players. This is the deepest top-four group that I can remember in the 11 years I’ve been analyzing the draft.

All four of these players are massive winners, too. Each landed in the perfect fit for his skill set.

Dybantsa went No. 1 to a Wizards team that desperately required his downhill rim pressure and ability to get to the foul line. Last season, the Wizards were 27th in the league in free-throw rate and 25th in average shot distance from 2-point range, which is to say they typically took longer shots when they actually did take 2-pointers.

Additionally, they were 30th in defensive rebounding rate. Dybantsa’s presence will fill multiple gaps for the team both in the short- and long-term as it looks to climb the Eastern Conference standings. If I were running the Wizards, I would have taken Dybantsa No. 1.

At No. 2, Peterson went to Utah, a team that desperately needed a big-time scoring guard to slot in at the off-guard position next to Keyonte George. More than anything, Utah needed a secondary ballhandler who could share the load with George and make plays for teammates, as Ace Bailey, Lauri Markkanen and Jaren Jackson Jr. don’t profile as high-level ballhandlers or passers.

With Peterson in the fold, the Jazz have that player. Anyone who goes back to watch Peterson’s high school tape will tell you he is more than capable of running ball-screen actions and making reads. This is also among the best coaching situations Peterson could have gone to. I know a lot of basketball fans haven’t been locked into the Jazz over the last couple of years, but Will Hardy is an elite offensive coach. His architecture and spacing is sublime, and players who can drill shots off of movement like Peterson thrive under him.

Peterson — an admitted introvert who just wants to go about his business, play ball and work hard on his game — should fit in well in Utah. The Jazz have a rabid fanbase, but he’ll get to come into his own in one of the smaller NBA cities, where his movements won’t be tracked every moment, unlike if he’d been the star draftee in a bigger city. This feels like a home run for Peterson from a basketball and personal perspective.

With Boozer to Memphis at No. 3, it’s hard to find a more Grizzlies player under this Zach Kleiman-led front office. Memphis has been among the best teams at drafting, largely sticking to players who produce at a high level while being elite competitors. Boozer is among the most productive college basketball freshmen of all time, and if you ask anyone about him, they speak remarkably highly of his maturity and desire for greatness.

The city and front office will embrace him. He also enters a Memphis team that has a ready-made rim protector at the five in Zach Edey to help mitigate any issues Boozer could have there.

Don’t sleep on Chicago getting Wilson at No. 4, either. Wilson is the perfect first draft pick for new president of basketball operations Bryson Graham, who is a massive proponent of players with standout size, length, athleticism and physicality traits, even coining an acronym called “SLAP.”

Wilson was, outside of Dybantsa, the best intersection of those traits in the class. He has great size and length, he’s wildly explosive, incredibly powerful and fearless. He embodies “SLAP” so much that I would be stunned if the Bulls didn’t have him ranked higher than fourth on their board, even if the consensus for nearly everyone in the industry was that Wilson was the fourth prize.

It’s hard to overemphasize how competitive Wilson is. We’ll see if he can reach the ceiling that his tools portend for him, but it won’t be because of a lack of effort or because he can’t live up to the moment.

Sacramento Kings

For years, the Kings haven’t had the easiest time getting prospects into their building for workouts. Rightly or wrongly, player agents have not been enthusiastic about sending players to the Kings because of Sacramento’s track record. So on some level, it’s a welcome departure that everyone in the league knew that Darius Acuff Jr. preferred to land with the Kings on draft night. It didn’t necessarily stop the teams above Sacramento from taking him, but it was well-known that Acuff — a player I ranked fifth following his historic season at Arkansas — wanted to play for the Kings.

It’s a credit to Sacramento general manager Scott Perry — who’s known to pride himself on the relationships he creates around the industry. He coached Acuff’s father at Eastern Kentucky in 1999.

The Kings also didn’t panic to get their guy. They let the board fall to them, let the LA Clippers and Brooklyn Nets above them go through their process and didn’t feel like they needed to move up the board by trading assets during a rebuild. The front office worked through the intel and made the right call.

In Acuff, they got both the best talent on the board and filled a massive need in the backcourt. He is an elite playmaker, possessing remarkable polish and poise. In SEC and tournament play over his final 23 games last season, he averaged 26 points while shooting 48 percent from the field, 44 percent from 3 and 83 percent from the line. If you drop that to his final 13 games, he averaged nearly 29 points and seven assists while shooting 48/48/84 splits.

Acuff got better against better competition as the year went on. He’ll be the Kings’ starting point guard, get to run his own show — hopefully with Domantas Sabonis as a sharp screener to give him some space to operate — and likely put up massive numbers early on. Undeniably, the defense has to improve. But this is a match made in heaven for everyone.

I also loved what the Kings did late in the first round, moving up from No. 34 and using an additional second-round pick to get No. 29 and take Alex Karaban. He is the winningest player in Connecticut history and the exact kind of connective player that the Kings need. He’s an excellent team defender who passes well, makes quick decisions and keeps the advantage every time. Karaban also made 37 percent of his 3s at 6 feet 7. I think he’ll be useful while playing 20 minutes per night, and Sacramento did not have to pay much to get him.

This was a great night for the Kings.

Memphis Grizzlies

The Grizzlies got Boozer — whom I would bet, based on their track record, they had No. 1 on their board — at No. 3. He’s a terrific fit on a team with a ton of shooting and a great interior presence next to him. I also really liked the way that Kleiman worked the board at No. 16.

Memphis dropped from No. 16 to No. 17 in a deal with the Oklahoma City Thunder, picking up two second-rounders in the process. Then at No. 17, the Grizzlies traded down to No. 21 with the Detroit Pistons, picking up three future second-round picks that Kleiman said are neither in this year’s nor next year’s draft. In total, Memphis got five second-round picks to move down five slots, which is excellent work after the first 15 picks of the draft emptied all 15 of the players I had in my top-four draft tiers. Essentially, the Grizzlies got those picks while staying in the same tier of available prospects.

They drafted Karim Lopez at No. 21, a player I was probably lower on than the rest of the NBA by ranking him No. 24 on my board. But taking my No. 24 player at No. 21 is a reasonable decision in terms of value. If the question is whether I’d rather have Bennett Stirtz or Ebuka Okorie or Lopez with five second-round picks, I’m taking Lopez with the picks every time. Lopez will need to improve his jumper and work on his defense, but he competes, rebounds well and has downhill driving skill.

For a rebuilding team, those picks will be valuable either in potential trade packages or in talent acquisition. Getting Boozer is the critical win that jumpstarts the franchise after it moved Desmond Bane and Jaren Jackson Jr. in the last calendar year.

The Philadelphia 76ers and … Daryl Morey?

Look, re-litigating Morey’s decision to trade Jared McCain to the Thunder is probably a fool’s errand, but I’d be remiss not to say this deal looks pretty good now that there is a player attached to the pick the 76ers acquired from OKC.

Essentially, Morey traded McCain to the Thunder for Labaron Philon Jr. and three second-round picks, a value proposition that I think is strong, even as a fan of McCain’s game. Philon is a terrific playmaker out of ball screens who had an elite season at Alabama. I had him as a top-20 player in the class, and I was on the lower end of his evaluations. He improved drastically as a shooter, can pass and also displayed much improved finishing ability around the rim while averaging 22 points and five assists.

I’d rather have Philadelphia’s end of this deal than Oklahoma City’s. Philon has four years left on a rookie scale deal versus McCain’s two, and while we haven’t seen Philon play in the NBA yet, I think he’s a good bet to provide at least a strong presence as a backup lead guard behind Tyrese Maxey on a 76ers team in desperate need of ballhandling.

There is also some upside beyond that. McCain will be a terrific player for Oklahoma City, and he provided positive moments in the playoffs. This isn’t a shot at McCain or the Thunder, who were in the middle of a title chase and clearly needed another shooter and ballhandler, as we saw in the playoffs. But he and Philon are pretty equivalent in terms of value, and the three second-rounders tip this over the line into Philadelphia’s favor.

Morey, who was dismissed after the season, and the 76ers front office were excoriated following this deal at the February trade deadline, which I found strange at the time. I’m not saying that this will turn into a coup or anything like that for the 76ers. Both players are talented. But I think the public displeasure sent Morey’s way looks off-target now that the main part of the deal has been completed. Philly parted ways with Morey after the team’s second-round playoff loss to the New York Knicks.

Losers

Isaiah Evans, Henri Veesaar and Meleek Thomas

Guys, what are we doing here? Evans, Thomas and Veesaar went unselected in the first round despite retaining collegiate eligibility, which means they will likely make under $1.5 million next season, assuming they get guaranteed contracts. All three players would have made well in excess of double those dollar figures had they remained in college.

People will be quick to blame their agents and the players for receiving bad advice. I won’t deny that such a thing can happen. But these players have access to the internet and resources that would have shown or told them that they were far from locks to be selected in the first round. Their agents also knew this and assuredly would have shared that risk assessment with their clients (especially for Veesaar and Evans, both of whom are repped by The Team — formerly Wasserman — an agency that sent multiple potential first-round picks back to school this draft cycle).

None of these three players was in the top 22 of my mock draft at any point this year, and once you get into that range, there is potential for variance. Every team has different evaluations, and the potential for strange selection run-outs is so strong that it’s a massive gamble to leave school when you have so much money on the table.

That’s why you saw players such as Amari Allen, Tounde Yessoufou, Braylon Mullins, Thomas Haugh, Patrick Ngongba, Motiejus Krivas and plenty of others return to school. There’s no longer an excuse for players in this NIL era to retain eligibility and remain in the second round. And while we like to infantilize players and act like they’re at the whim of powerful forces, they hold agency over their own careers.

Hopefully, these three will be among the final cautionary tales of poor draft decisions.

Excitement for fans

Throughout the first round, you could see the impacts of recent NBA draft reform. It looks like it’s working — while also creating some unintended short-term consequences.

First and foremost, it feels like teams are hesitant to move any significant draft capital to the future. With picks from 2027 to 2029 slated to be governed under the new 3-2-1 lottery reform system that could randomize the draft lottery, it’s difficult for teams to know how aggressive they can be in moving draft picks in that time period. If you are at risk of not making at least the second round of the playoffs, it’s quite a gamble to give up what will be, at the very least, a slight chance at the No. 1 pick.

And if you’re thinking about moving a pick out in the 2030 to 2033 range, when teams don’t even know what the lottery system will look like then? You’d better be getting a star to consider such a decision, like the Miami Heat did in acquiring Giannis Antetokounmpo.

That hindered trade options at the top of the draft on Tuesday. When I spoke with league sources on the team side who discussed trades, it felt as if there was a significant disconnect on how valuable draft picks were. The teams trying to move up felt like they would be offering significant upside in pick packages. But teams that were moving down the board felt like they needed drastically more.

Could it have simply been that these teams in the top 12 were excited to draft a strong crop of talent? Absolutely. But the conversations I had with teams after the first round made it feel like there still isn’t a consensus on how much each pick is worth, which leads to teams asking for exorbitant prices and not offering significant value in return.

Now that the Giannis deal is done, I wonder if we’ll see fewer trades involving draft capital over the next year, because teams can’t find common ground on valuing draft picks. That might lead to fewer big deals.

The apron system is also having a major impact. On Monday, the Minnesota Timberwolves traded out of the first round to move off Julius Randle’s salary while taking no money in return. In that same deal, the Bulls took on Nic Claxton’s money to bolster their front line, likely inspired in part by a desire to avoid the “relegation zone” in the lottery odds; a team that finishes in the bottom three will lose one-third of its lottery balls in the new system.

On Tuesday, the New York Knicks saved about $2 million — the difference between the $3.3 million first-year salary of the No. 24 pick versus a $1.4 first-year salary outside of the first round — by essentially trading the No. 24 pick for five second-rounders. That will result in significant luxury tax savings as well, depending on the Knicks’ decisions on their pending free agents. The Denver Nuggets saved less than that by moving the No. 26 pick for the No. 35 pick and two future second-rounders but will also experience similar luxury tax savings. The Cleveland Cavaliers became the third tax-avoider in five picks by trading the No. 29 pick to the Kings for No. 34 and a future second- rounder, shaving about $1.65 million potentially off their books.

Teams are looking for any way to avoid the first and second aprons to improve their talent and save cash. Essentially, the second apron is acting as a hard cap, which is undeniably what the NBA envisioned when enacting these rules. This, along with the league’s lottery reform rules forcing teams near the bottom of the league to compete, is leading to a redistribution of talent league-wide.

Teams such as the Nets and Bulls can add talent basically for free — and are incentivized to do so — while the expensive Wolves are trading a former All-Star to move down five picks in the draft. The Nuggets, Cavs and Knicks are trying to cut costs at the expense of adding better, younger talent, leading to teams like the Kings, Dallas Mavericks and Phoenix Suns taking advantage.

The league is getting exactly what it wants, which makes it a winner. But fans who wanted to see an exciting draft night filled with trades for talent as opposed to trades being made for complicated financial minutiae reasons were probably losers.

In the end, it was a boring night, because it feels like teams with billion-dollar valuations led by billionaire owners are still trying to determine the best course of action in a grave financial system, instead of competing to win a title at all costs.