Celtics seek top pick, Lakers aim to keep theirs in lottery

Another year, another NBA Draft Lottery in which the Minnesota Timberwolves will be featured prominently.

Best case, Lakers land the No. 1 pick, draft Markelle Fultz, remain competitive enough throughout the 2017-18 season for free agents like Paul George to consider Los Angeles a legitimate free agent destination next summer. If the ping pong balls fall in their favor the Knicks will have a chance at landing an impact point guard.

Here are the most current lottery odds for the teams on Tuesday night, starting with the league-worst Brooklyn Nets, who tried to keep the Bulls from making the postseason late in the year. The prize – Patrick Ewing – made this anti-tanking debut alluring and seven executives sat there, waiting for the chance to cement their franchises with what was thought to be the sure championship piece. The envelopes were tossed around in a rotating sphere, and were selected by hand by then-commissioner David Stern.

While that might not be an ideal situation for an elite prospect who’d rather play a more impactful role as a rookie, playing on a contender is pretty cool, too. However, outside of top three the pick will belong to the Kings.

If the fix was in for 1985, it proved to even out the next year.

While tanking during the regular season is still prevalent in today’s National Basketball Association, it ultimately seems like a problem that can’t be fixed as long as the draft continues to work the way it works.

Giles was the No. 1 overall prospect in this freshman class coming out of high school, though he wasn’t able to produce consistently at Duke after tearing both ACLs in high school and undergoing three knee surgeries.

The Hornets’ odds for getting the No. 1 pick again, 26 years after LJ?

“The feedback I got past year…” You rooted for other inferior teams to win as the season was reaching the finish line, just so the Sixers can improve their draft positioning. If the Lakers manage to hang onto their pick this year, the 2019 first round pick they owe the Orlando Magic from the similarly-poisonous Dwight Howard trade instead morphs into the Lakers’ 2017 and 2018 second-round picks. While they all agreed that it may be bumpy to start (mainly due to competitive relationships between agents), they also seemed to point out that Pelinka could have a legitimate advantage due to his former career. It’s kind of how we work a little bit.

As you can see, the lottery is kind of a really big deal. Draft Express now projects him as a top-15 pick, largely because of his defense. Neither Tatum nor the team representatives on stage will be informed of the lottery results prior to the opening of the envelopes. Then, nearly all at once, their once-promising season unraveled.

The young core is obviously a lock to return (though nobody seems untouchable under the new management), but nearly all of the complementary players played on one-year or non-guaranteed contracts this season and they had a chance to make a case to be retained. How’d that turn out? Joakim Noah missed 36.