3 Winners, 3 Losers From 2024 NBA Draft Lottery

3 Winners, 3 Losers From 2024 NBA Draft Lottery

In case you may have missed it, the 2024 NBA Draft Lottery was Sunday! If you want to look at the order and who ended up where, check out Chickster’s post!

There were clear winners and losers from the matinee event! Who were a few of ours? Let’s dive into it!

(Note: These winners and losers are in no particular order of how bad they won or lost relative to each other.)

Winner: Atlanta Hawks

The Hawks, who won the lottery after being a play-in team, are a clear winner here. Sure, this draft isn’t the best to own a top pick. But the Hawks, who had the 10th-best odds, entered Sunday with a 13.9 percent chance of earning a top-4 selection and a 3.0 percent chance at a No. 1 pick. That’s a win.

There’s not a consensus No. 1 prospect, with Zaccharie Risacher and Alexandre Sarr arguably being the favorites. Atlanta, who had the fourth-worst defense, can take Sarr, arguably the top defensive prospect in the class, and look to move off of Clint Capela, who’s on an expiring deal with a $22.3 million cap hit. It can take Risacher (a shooter) and transition off Saddiq Bey (a restricted free agent) and potentially move off of at least one of Bogdan Bogdanovic (who is entering his age-32 season) and De’Andre Hunter (whose value has somewhat diminished).

The Hawks can also look to trade back for additional assets if there’s another team who really wants No. 1. Whether they keep the pick or not, I wouldn’t be surprised if they look to begin new life without one of Trae Young and Dejounte Murray, which also nets assets.

They have plenty of good routes they can go by landing the No. 1 pick, even if the draft isn’t top-heavy.

Winner: San Antonio Spurs

San Antonio struck the lottery–literally–last year by getting Victor Wembanyama and now owns two top-8 picks at No. 4 and 8. They had a 42.1 percent chance at getting a top-4 pick, but the other was Toronto’s pick–a top-6 protected pick–as a result of the Jakob Poeltl trade at the 2022-23 deadline.

The Spurs finished with the NBA’s fifth-worst record in Wembanyama’s rookie season. With two top-8 picks, they will have multiple bites at the apple to build around Wembanyama. San Antonio could also look to trade back at either No. 4 or 8 and stack assets or look to accelerate the build by trading one of the two picks for an impact veteran. Flexibility, flexibility, flexibility!

Winner: Houston Rockets

The other big winner of this year’s draft lottery was Houston, who finished with the No. 3 selection. Better yet, it wasn’t even with its own pick–it owned Brooklyn’s pick 2024 selection after the James Harden trade in 2021. Brooklyn’s unprotected first had the 10th-best odds with a 14.5 percent chance at a top-3 pick.

Atlanta getting No. 1 is big, but landing No. 3 in a deep Western Conference after winning 41 games is huge!

Year one under head coach Ime Udoka was undoubtedly a success. Among the teams in the top-10, Houston is perhaps the most likely “trade this pick for an impact veteran” candidate. Who that veteran is–and for what cost elsewhere–is a different question for a different day.

The point is: Landing an impact player right away is a lot more attainable at No. 3 than at the tail-end of the top-10 … and they didn’t have to give up anything to get it!

Loser: Detroit Pistons

For the second consecutive year, after finishing with the NBA’s worst record, Detroit fell outside of the lottery. Yikes! Their fans (James) deserve better.

That said, there still should be plenty of viable options at No. 5–even if Detroit has plenty of holes it needs to fill (which won’t be done with one draft). But the basketball gods have not been on their side for some time now. Let’s hope the tide turns soon because getting No. 5 (the worst possible place it could have picked) two years in a row is quite unfortunate, all things considered.

Loser: Toronto Raptors

Toronto gets the No. 19 pick in lieu of the Pascal Siakam deadline deal, but does not have their own pick after not getting their top-6 protected selection. It’s a good thing they received Immanuel Quickley, RJ Barrett and Bruce Brown as a result of the Siakam and OG Anunoby trades, but having multiple bites at the apple–including one in the top-6–is obviously much better than just one at the bottom half the first round. Tanking did not completely work in its favor.

Loser: Portland Trail Blazers

Portland was the worst team in the West last year and had a 56.8 percent chance at securing a top-5 pick … but ultimately landed with the No. 7 pick, a pick they had a 16.4 percent chance of getting. They also have the No. 14 pick (from Golden State), but a top-5 pick after their 21-win campaign would’ve been more ideal.

If they want, Joe Cronin could trade into the top-5 with those two picks, but in a perfect world, they wouldn’t have needed to. Let’s see how he decides to build around Scoot Henderson!

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