At the end of the regular season, the dunces of the NBA have their eyes riveted on the prodigy of Boulogne-Levallois.
That’s it, it’s over… The 2022-23 regular season came to an end on Sunday evening with a final round of matches. The next will mark the beginning of the Victor Wembanyama era. It remains to be seen where the 19-year-old French prodigy will evolve. Obviously, the question is still unanswered. The 2023 draft will not take place until June 22, in New York. However, there will be no more suspense after the May 16 Lottery. Clearly, the 14 teams that will not participate in the play-offs will have their chances of winning the first choice of the Draft, and therefore of selecting the giant (2.21m) from the Mets 92.
At the moment, we only know ten of the 14 clubs that will be on the starting line. For the rest, we will have to wait for the results of the play-in. Teams which will however have little chance of winning their case, between 2.5 and 0.7% to be very precise. Indeed, the franchises do not start on an equal footing before the lottery.
Three teams at 14% chance
At one time, the last in the standings of the regular season drew first in the Draft, the penultimate in second, the antepenultimate in third… In order to reduce the effects of tanking (to purposely lose to draw the highest in the Draft), the NBA set up this lottery in 1985. Until 2018, the last in the league standings still had a 25% chance of winning the first choice of the Draft, 19.9 for the penultimate. Since 2019, new change: the last three teams have the same percentage of chances, 14, then 12.5 and 10.5 for the following ones.
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Concretely, “Wemby” therefore has a maximum chance of ending up in Detroit (30th, 17 wins, 65 losses), San Antonio (29th, 22-60) or Houston (28th, 22-60), but Charlotte (27th, 27-55 – 12.5%) and Portland (26th, 33-49 – 10.5%) are not that far behind, nor is Orlando (25th, 34-48 – 9%). In case of a tie? We’re taking out… a piece! Heads or tails. This will be the case for Washington (35-47) and Indiana (35-47). Stakes ? the 24th from the end will have a 7.5% chance of taking the Frenchman, against 6%. To see what will become of Dallas (21st, 38-44 – 3%), in the viewfinder of the NBA after having put its executives to rest at the very end of the season, including superstar Luka Doncic…
No more bets…
One thing is certain: anything can happen. In 2019, we remember that it was the Pelicans who hit the jackpot. However, they only had the seventh worst record at the end of the previous season, with a 6% chance of winning the lottery and selecting Zion Williamson. It’s not a record. In 1993, Orlando won the lottery with only a 1.5% chance! The Magic had taken Chris Weber … before trading him for the third pick, Penny Hardaway, on Draft night. In 2008 and 2014, Chicago and Cleveland won with 1.7% odds, picking Derrick Rose and Andrew Wiggins respectively, the latter being sent to Minnesota against Kevin Love.
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In short, it is urgent to wait, even after the end of the regular season. It is on May 16 that a large part of the future of Wembanyama will be decided, during this famous lottery. Until then, the tricolor international will aim to end the season and his passage in the French championship in the best possible way with the Metropolitans 92.