Brandon Apter (@bapter23), Managing Editor
With the Sixers preparing for a matchup with the southeast division leading Hawks, what better a time to take a look at exactly where the team stands for the upcoming draft, in terms of percentages. Though the Sixers parted ways with a second rounder in each of the next two drafts, they could end up with up to four first round picks in addition to the Nuggets second round pick. As of today, despite their recent strong play behind Ish Smith, Basketball Reference projects the Sixers to finish with 16 or 17 wins this season, which is nine or 10 more than they have right now at 7-41. The Sixers own the NBA's worst record, but the Lakers aren't too far behind at 10-41, the same number of losses as Philadelphia.
Basketball Reference projected the upcoming draft order through 7,500 simulations of the remainder of the season and the Sixers have a 66.6 percent chance to win the lottery, a 30 percent chance at second pick, 3.1 percent for third and 0.3 percent for fourth. Meanwhile, the Lakers have a 32.1 percent chance to win the lottery and a 0.9 percent chance to fall out of the top three, then conveying their pick to the Sixers.
Philadelphia, with the unlikelihood of the Lakers pick conveying, could still end up with three first round picks. Beyond their own, they also could receive the Heat's pick, which is top-10 protected, and the Thunder's pick, which is top-15 protected. Here is the projections for them, according to Basketball Reference.
The Heat currently have the 11th best record in the NBA at 27-22. They only have a 0.7 percent chance at this point to pick 10th, so if the draft was tomorrow, the Sixers would receive the pick. Miami has the highest percentage to land with the 14th pick with 13.2 percent while they have a 10.9 and 10.8 percent chance to end up up either 18th or 19th in the draft, which would still convey their pick to Philadelphia.
Meanwhile, the Thunder hold the NBA's fourth best record at 37-13 and their pick is top-15 protected. Basketball Reference gives Oklahoma City a 46 percent chance to end up in the 27th spot and a 30.8 percent to land in 28th. They currently have a 0.1 percent chance to pick as high as 23rd.
In addition to the first round picks, the Sixers also get the Nuggets second round pick. Denver currently has the seventh worst record in the league at 19-30, so their second round pick will likely end up around 37th overall.
Philadelphia will have some draft competition in their division with the Boston Celtics (28-22) owning up to eight potential picks in the upcoming draft. Boston will get the Nets first round pick, which is projected to be third overall this season. The Celtics also get the Mavericks first rounder, which is top-7 protected and likely to convey with Dallas in the middle of the NBA right now with a record of 28-23. The Mavs are projected to pick either 16th or 17th in the draft. Boston would then gets their own first round pick, which is projected to land around the 24th spot.
That's not all though. The Celtics would receive Minnesota's first round pick, but it is top-12 protected and the T-Wolves (14-36) currently own the NBA's fourth worst record. Since that pick is unlikely to convey, Boston will receive a second rounder in the 2016 and 2017 drafts from Minnesota. Finally, the Celtics also own the second round picks from the Cavs, Sixers and Heat while also getting either Mavs or Grizzlies selection, whichever is higher. They don't have their own second round pick.
The Sixers return to action tonight against the Hawks at 7PM in Philadelphia. Check out the Sixerdelphia game preview HERE.
