The 2015 NBA Draft Lottery will be held tonight at the New York Hilton Midtown in New York, New York.
Below is a brief explanation on how the lottery system works, followed by a projection on where each of the 14 teams might select in the upcoming draft at the end of June. After analyzing the results from the past ten lotteries, a surprising projection was made, in which the Sacramento Kings jumped from being the sixth-worst-team to being awarded the first overall pick.
How the Lottery Works:
(Video: YouTube/MrDraft35; ESPN Coverage of 2014 NBA Draft Lottery on May 20, 2014)
Utilizing the newly-weighted lottery system adopted in 1990 and later modified in 1993, the use of ping-pong balls and a lottery machine will ultimately decide where each of the 14 non-playoff teams will pick in the 2015 NBA Draft on June 25, 2015 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
- 14 ping-pong balls (marked 1 through 14) dropped inside lottery machine
- Four balls out of the 14 will be randomly drawn to create a four-digit combination. The order in which the balls are drawn does not matter when formulating the drawn combination.
- 1001 total combinations determined by the following equation, where n is the number of teams in the lottery (14), r is the number of digits in each drawn combination (4), and "!" is the mathematical symbol used to represent a factorial.
- 1000 possible combinations (11-12-13-14 combo is unassigned and is ignored if drawn; balls drawn back to top of machine)
- Process repeated to determine who receives second and third overall picks; If repeated team/combination is drawn, result discarded and another four digit-combination is drawn
- Picks four through 14 assigned to remaining teams in order of worst-to-best 2014-2015 record
NBA.com provides further details of the process and procedure:
The actual Lottery procedure will take place in a separate room just prior to the national broadcast on ESPN. Select media members, NBA officials and representatives of the participating teams and the accounting firm of Ernst & Young will be in attendance for the drawing.
The lottery machine is manufactured by the Smart Play Company, a leading manufacturer of state lottery machines throughout the United States. Smart Play also weighs, measures and certifies the ping-pong balls prior to the drawing.
The length of time the balls are mixed is monitored by a timekeeper who faces away from the machine and signals the machine operator after the appropriate amount of time has elapsed.
Probabilities of Winning the No. 1 Overall Pick:
| Team | %/Chances | 2014-2015 Record | Team | %/Chances | 2014-2015 Record |
| Timberwolves | 25/250 | (16-66) | Pistons | 2.8/28 | (32-50) |
| Knicks | 19.9/199 | (17-65) | Hornets | 1.7/17 | (33-49) |
| Sixers | 15.6/156 | (18-64) | Heat | 1.1/11 | (37-45) |
| Lakers | 11.9/119 | (21-61) | Pacers | 0.8/8 | (38-44) |
| Magic | 8.8/88 | (25-57) | Jazz | 0.7/7 | (38-44) |
| Kings | 6.3/63 | (29-53) | Suns | 0.6/6 | (39-43) |
| Nuggets | 4.3/43 | (30-52) | Thunder | 0.5/5 | (45-37) |
- The Minnesota Timberwolves, the team with the worst 2014-2015 record, have been assigned the most four-digit combinations or chances (250).
- The New York Knicks, the second-worst team, have the second most chances (199).
- The best non-playoff team in the lottery, the Oklahoma City Thunder, has the least amount of chances (5).
A tiebreaker drawing conducted by NBA President of Basketball Operations, Rod Thorn, was held on April 17, 2015 to determine whether either the Indiana Pacers or Utah Jazz will receive the 11th overall pick. Three other ties, outside the lottery, were also decided.
Thorn was the President of Basketball Operations for the Philadelphia 76ers for the 2010-2011, 2011-2012, and 2012-2013 seasons. He also held the title of General Manager for the 2011-2012 season, prior to Tony DiLeo taking over on September 21, 2012.
Projection:
Analyzing the results from the past ten NBA lotteries, a projection was determined on just how the ping-pong balls may fall tonight in Manhattan.
Pre-Lottery Order
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| MIN | NYK | PHI | LAL* | ORL | SAC | DEN | DET | CHA | MIA^ | IND | UTA | PHX | OKC |
* LAL pick, via PHX, will convey to Philadelphia if it is outside the top five (acquired via Milwaukee-Philadelphia-Phoenix trade on 2/19/2015)
^ MIA pick, via CLE, will convey to Philadelphia if it is outside the top ten (acquired via Cleveland-Minnesota-Philadelphia trade on 8/23/2014)
Post-Lottery Projection: Yellow highlight indicates change from pre-lottery order
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| SAC | MIN | PHI | NYK | LAL | ORL | DEN | DET | CHA | MIA | IND | UTA | PHX | OKC |
LAL pick, via PHX, will not convey to Philadelphia (inside of top five)
MIA pick, via CLE, will not convey to Philadelphia (inside of top ten)
Arriving at the Projection:
I began by tabulating how often, for example, the worst team in the league would actually earn the No. 1 selection, No. 2 selection, etc. Come to find out, the worst team in the league hasn't been awarded the No. 1 overall pick over the past ten lotteries, and just three times overall in its history.
It was found that the worst team has selected at the No. 2 pick five times, more than any other spot after the lottery has concluded. The fourth-worst team, which would be the Los Angeles Lakers this season, has earned the No. 1 pick once, the No 3 pick three times, the No. 5 pick four times, and the No. 7 pick once.
For after lottery positions that had a distinctive frequency value with a before lottery position, a red box was placed around the cell in Excel to indicate the after lottery position being granted to its above, corresponding before lottery position.
Making this assumption was not able to be done for all of the 14 selections. For example, the after lottery position of four had a close frequency with its before lottery positions of two and three. In contrast, the after lottery position of two, when comparing the frequencies from the before lottery positions of one and two, had a clear-cut frequency value.
(Note: BL = Before lottery position; AL = After lottery position)
This method was able to determine where the before lottery teams at positions 1, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14 might select tonight.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| MIN | LAL | ORL | DET | CHA | MIA | IND | UTA | PHX | OKC |
All but four after lottery positions were left to be determined.
Where will the New York Knicks and the Sacramento Kings select?
The Knicks and Kings have before lottery positions of two and six respectively.
The table above tabulates what before lottery positions have earned each respective after lottery position over the past ten lotteries. For example, the No. 1 after lottery position in 2014 was awarded to the team positioned ninth, before the lottery.
The average before lottery position for each respective after lottery position was taking, and it can be seen in the second-to-last column above. The closest average before lottery positions to two and six, the Knicks and Kings before lottery positions, was found to be 1.9 and 5.9 respectively. 1.9 is the average before lottery position that corresponds to the after lottery selection of four, and 5.9 similarly corresponds to the No. 1 overall pick, after the lottery.
Thus, the Kings were awarded the No. 1 after lottery position, and the Knicks fell from two before the lottery, to four after the lottery using this method of analysis.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| SAC | MIN | NYK | LAL | ORL | DET | CHA | MIA | IND | UTA | PHX | OKC |
Just the Sixers and Nuggets were the last teams left to determine where they will select in the 2015 NBA Draft.
Where will the Philadelphia 76ers and the Denver Nuggets select?
Just the No. 3 and No. 7 after lottery positions remained. The Sixers and Nuggets have before lottery positions of No. 3 and No. 7 respectively.
The table above is another representation of the above-displayed tables. The No. 3 before lottery positioned team has never selected seventh overall over the past ten lotteries, but has earned the third after lottery position twice.
Likewise, the seventh before lottery positioned team has never selected third overall, but has earned the seventh after lottery position five times.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| SAC | MIN | PHI | NYK | LAL | ORL | DEN | DET | CHA | MIA | IND | UTA | PHX | OKC |
Conclusion:
The likelihood of the ping-pong balls falling this way is highly unlikely, but it is fun to play 'what-if' and examine how the lottery has played out over the past decade.
The results do make some sense, however. As noted above, once the top three picks are awarded from three separate four-digit combinations, the 4-14 picks are granted to the remaining teams based on record from the 2014-2015 season in reverse order (worst-to-best). The Knicks had a poorer 2014-2015 record than the Lakers, who had a poorer record than the Magic, and so on.
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| MIN | NYK | PHI | LAL | ORL | SAC | DEN | DET | CHA | MIA | IND | UTA | PHX | OKC |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| SAC | MIN | PHI | NYK | LAL | ORL | DEN | DET | CHA | MIA | IND | UTA | PHX | OKC |
The Sacramento Kings have selected first overall in the NBA Draft just one time in their 30 years of existence. In 1989, they selected 6'9" big-man Pervis Ellison out of the University of Louisville.
Make sure to tune into ESPN tonight at 8:30 p.m. EDT, to see how the lottery will actually play out.
Matt Rappa (@mattrappa) is a contributor to Sixerdelphia.com.
