It’s NBA Draft week! You recognize what which means. Or perhaps you don’t.
It means the fortunes of just a few dozen NBA Draft prospects are about to alter. Dreams are to be realized. Busts and steals might be sprinkled throughout the draft. Jobs might be solidified in NBA front offices. Other jobs can even be hanging on by a thread after Thursday night, and we may not realize it yet. The draft is one in every of the largest days on the NBA calendar since it opens up itself for every kind of coverage, changes through trades and anticipation of the subsequent wave of NBA players and potential stars.
You could be asking yourself a bunch of questions on what the draft is, how you possibly can eat it and the implications it could have. Well, we here at The Athletic have anticipated those very questions and are here to enable you be as prepared as possible for Thursday night’s chaos. Let’s dive into a few of these potential questions and pepper you with answers and data.
When is the draft, and the way can I watch it?
Thursday, June 23. It begins at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT. You may work out your local time zone times in between those two bookends of United States time zones (sorry, Hawaii and Alaska). The draft might be broadcasted in its entirety on ESPN. Check your local listings.
Now that I do know when it’s, what’s the NBA Draft?
Interesting query! The NBA Draft is basically how the influx of latest, young talent comes into this beloved league each 12 months. It’s an annual event wherein 60 selections (only 58 this 12 months, as a consequence of tampering penalties against Miami and Milwaukee) are revamped the course of two rounds. Each team is given multiple picks in every draft: one in the primary round and one within the second round. Those picks can then be moved in trades over time, which is how you find yourself with teams having more or fewer picks than intended — or none in any respect.
So any player can get drafted anywhere? Does this include current players?
Not only any player might be chosen. Players who’re under the age of twenty-two and haven’t accomplished their 4 years of eligibility in the school ranks must declare for the draft. If you happen to’re an early entrant into the NBA Draft, you could be one 12 months faraway from your highschool graduation. Players can come from multiple walks of life. While waiting to be eligible to declare for the draft, prospects can play overseas, within the G League and even just hang around and drive a taxi like they’re Dave Cowens in a Seventies offseason.
International players are eligible to come back to the NBA Draft as well. In the event that they’re 22 years of age or older and haven’t declared for a draft yet, they’re robotically put into the prospect pool. Otherwise, they must declare prior to turning 22 years old.
Current players usually are not available. This isn’t some fantasy draft you do in a friend’s league or on a video game. Once a player has undergone the draft process (whether or not they’ve been chosen) and signed within the NBA, they will not enter the draft. Sorry for bursting any hopes that your team might grab Steph Curry or LeBron James right away.
Wait, highschool players can’t be drafted?
Not anymore! They was once. Up until the 2006 draft, you would leave highschool, forego college or international play and enter the draft while getting a cool “from prom to pros” idiom attached to your bio. The NBA stopped allowing that. Why? Billionaire owners and the front-office executives who work for them couldn’t help themselves from investing high picks and tens of thousands and thousands of dollars in teenage kids straight out of algebra classes. Sure, there have been a bunch of success stories. Kevin Garnett, Kobe Bryant, Tracy McGrady, LeBron James and Dwight Howard can attest to that, amongst many others.
Nonetheless, not everybody coming out of highschool ended up pretty much as good as those guys. Some were even busts within the NBA world. So the NBA’s solution was to make them wait… another 12 months… because all of us realize it’s loads easier to trust a 19-year old with thousands and thousands of dollars and responsibilities in a multi-billion-dollar industry than it’s to trust an 18-year-old.
Can players refuse to be drafted by certain teams?
They sure can! It’s rare, and sometimes the bluff known as. Ricky Rubio didn’t want to come back to the Minnesota Timberwolves back in 2009, and he even played two more years overseas before eventually joining the Wolves. Players can get chosen by a franchise and outright refuse to point out up. In the event that they proceed to play this game of chicken, they essentially must go play overseas in the event that they wish to play skilled basketball. They’ll’t just go sign with a special team.
Two most famous incidents of this happened in 1989 and 1999. In 1989, Danny Ferry was chosen second overall by the LA Clippers. He refused to go play for that franchise. As a substitute, he called their bluff of not trading him to a different team. Ferry signed to play professionally in Italy through the 1989-90 season. He was eventually traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers and commenced his NBA profession in 1990.
In 1999, Steve Francis was chosen second overall by the then Vancouver Grizzlies. Francis was visibly and audibly unhappy concerning the prospect of going to Canada to play NBA basketball. Every part was cited as a reason to not play there for Francis. Taxes. Distance from his Maryland home. God’s will. Eventually, he was traded to the Houston Rockets and have become an All-Star.
These moments are pretty rare.
Are NBA Draft pick contracts guaranteed?
A few of them are! If you happen to’re chosen in the primary round of the NBA Draft and also you sign your rookie deal, the primary two years of your profession are guaranteed. Even should you stink or get injured and never play, you’ll get that cash. The following two years are team options, meaning they get to make a decision in the event that they want to provide you the fixed rate based on rookie-scale deals for every first-round draft selection spot. The upper you’re drafted, the upper your salary is. Second-round deals are more complicated and never nearly as guaranteed, unless you’ve gotten a shrewd agent there to fight in your future financial earnings.
Which team has probably the most picks within the draft?
The San Antonio Spurs have 4 picks (Nos. 9, 20, 25 and 38). Three of them are in the primary round, and one is within the second round.
The Minnesota Timberwolves have 4 picks (Nos. 19, 40, 48 and 50) with three of them within the second round to go together with their lone first-round selection.
The Houston Rockets (Nos. 3, 17 and 26) and the Spurs have probably the most first-round picks with three apiece.
Do any of the teams have zero picks?
The Los Angeles Lakers, Brooklyn Nets, Phoenix Suns, Dallas Mavericks and Utah Jazz are currently without picks in either the primary or the second rounds of the draft. They may acquire them via trade or purchase on draft night.
Who is anticipated to be the highest pick within the draft?
It’s prone to be either power forward Jabari Smith Jr. out of Auburn or big man prospect Chet Holmgren from Gonzaga. Those are the 2 consensus options right away for going No. 1. There may be an outdoor probability power forward prospect Paolo Banchero out of Duke could find yourself as a surprise selection.
Are they any good? Will they be the subsequent LeBron James or Steph Curry?
They ought to be quite good! Smith is a really athletic, quick big man who can really shoot the ball from deep. Holmgren is a super-skinny 7-footer with guard skills, shot-blocking ability and a superb jumper. Banchero is a distinctiveness forward who needs some work on his shot, but he can bully his way into a whole lot of advantageous situations.
They’re unlikely to be pretty much as good as historically league-altering players like LeBron or Steph.
What’s the weirdest thing concerning the history of the draft?
Two things stand out to me probably the most: territorial draft picks and the way future Hall of Famer Walt “Clyde” Frazier discovered he was drafted into the ABA before playing within the NBA.
Territorial picks happened within the draft from its inception in 1949 until the draft system was reconstructed in 1966. Before 1966, the NBA was desperate to accumulate home markets. So the most effective college players got right of first refusal for his or her hometown NBA franchises. A team could forfeit its first-round pick and choose a prospect inside a 50-mile radius of the house arena. You didn’t really have a alternative, so anybody attempting to experience the world outside of their hometown was not necessarily going to do this as an expert basketball player.
Examples of this are Wilt Chamberlain ending up along with his hometown Philadelphia Warriors when he joined the league in 1959. Hall of Famer Guy Rodgers was chosen by the Warriors within the previous 12 months of 1958, as well. Chamberlain went to Kansas for faculty, but he grew up in Philadelphia and went to highschool there. So the Warriors argued they ought to be allowed to take him. Tommy Heinsohn played his Hall of Fame profession with the Boston Celtics because he went to the University of Holy Cross. Oscar Robertson left the University of Cincinnati to play for the Cincinnati Royals (now the Sacramento Kings).
As for the Walt Frazier story, he was the fifth overall pick within the 1967 NBA Draft. He was also drafted into the ABA by the Denver Larks, who would change their name to the Denver Rockets, after which became the Denver Nuggets franchise we all know today. The way in which Frazier discovered about his selection to the Larks was by reading it on the front page of his school newspaper at Southern Illinois University. It’s very much like the story of Al Attles checking out he was chosen by the Warriors franchise because his friend heard it on the radio.
Where can I find draft coverage in real time of how things are unfolding?
I’m so glad you asked this query! We can have a incredible live blog with every type of study and tidbits throughout the times leading as much as the draft and through the draft itself at The Athletic (the location you’re reading this on). And also you’ll have the opportunity to observe a live show on the web through The Athletic NBA Show Podcast Twitter feed. I might be hosting that together with Mo Dakhil, Jay King and a whole lot of fun, knowledgeable guests dropping by.
(Photo: Brad Penner / USA Today)
