NBA Draft lottery 2014: Cavaliers somehow win top pick for 3rd time in 4 years

Cleveland, which had a 1.7 percent chance of winning the draft lottery with the ninth-best odds, had not put all of its focus on deciding which of Embiid, Wiggins and Parker would be considered the top overall pick.

Learning more about Embiid’s health will be a testy process for the Cavs and the newly-appointed Griffin, as Goodman reports that Embiid’s agent, Arn Tellem, might keep his client from doing physicals with some teams. It’s believed that Tellem could send Embiid to a single workout, thereby directing the center to the team of his choice.

This may change what happens with Terry, who decided to rehab his knee in Dallas for the remainder of the season after being traded to the Kings at the deadline in February. Terry could end up as an additional piece to make salaries work in a trade. There’s also the less likely chance he joins the team should they add another veteran presence that vaults them into contention in the West.

In any case, some movement should be expected come draft day. Sacramento is apparently just the first on the board.

Now, it’s time for SB Nation’s first NBA mock draft 2015.

Fortunately, there’s a great one available in Joel Embiid. Embiid has been playing basketball for three years, but he projects as a great two-way player in the middle. Embiid has long arms, soft hands and developing post moves that should make him a terror for years to come. He isn’t the draft’s most NBA-ready prospect, but he is the best.

As did ESPN’s Bill Simmons.

Here is the draft order in full, as determined by the lottery and regular season records. Draft trades are shown in parentheses (and in the case of the No. 21 pick, also in order of trades).

1. Cleveland Cavaliers

1. Cleveland Cavaliers

2. Milwaukee Bucks

For a full look at the chances of each team earning each of the 14 picks up for grabs Tuesday, go here. Historically, the lottery hasn’t exactly been kind to the NBA’s worst team. Since the lottery was introduced in 1990, the worst team has won the top pick just three times, with 2004 being the most recent. The Bucks, this season’s cellar dweller, cannot pick any lower than fourth, however. For a full rundown of how the NBA draft lottery works, check out this helpful guide.

The event gets underway at 8 p.m. ET, and television coverage will be on ESPN, with plenty of pre- and post-show analysis. But if you’re unable to catch it on TV, you can watch it live on WatchESPN.com, provided you meet the necessary criteria (you must log in through your cable carrier).

The Milwaukee Bucks, with the worst record from the 2013-2014 NBA season, have a 25 percent chance of landing the top pick on Tuesday. Phoenix, who held a record of 48-34, have the least likely chance to nab the top spot at 0.5 percent.

Coverage will air on ESPN at 8 p.m. ET.

The good news for the Bucks is they can’t pick any lower than fourth. While picking fourth could mean missing out on the trio of Wiggins, Parker and Embiid, there would still be numerous excellent players available. Most notably, Australian point guard Dante Exum has been garnering a lot of hype after a strong showing at the draft combine in Chicago.

In addition to the Bucks, 12 other teams will be hoping to land that top pick. Here are the full odds for the entire lottery:

The Sixers are sending Julius Erving, and the team will also be bringing a small bit of its history for some luck. Philly sports talk radio station 97.5 The Fanatic FM held a contest where fans submitted their own lucky charms for the Sixers to bring to the lottery. The winning submission was an actual piece of the glass backboard shattered by former Sixers big man Darryl Dawkins in a game at the Spectrum in 1979. Fan participation, nostalgia ... this one’s a winner.

The Magic are sending Pat Williams to the lottery. Williams has represented the franchise for all three of its lottery wins, and he was also present last season when the Magic got the No. 2 pick. But has the well run dry?

Now it’s time to see if the tanking, or the less intentional losing, pays off.

ESPN

The top picks in the 2014 NBA Draft will be determined when the draft lottery is held on Tuesday at the Barclays Center in New York. Unlike the NFL and MLB, the NBA determines the order for the top of its draft by following a weighted lottery system that distributes more ping-pong balls to teams that finished at the bottom of the regular season standings. Let’s take a look at how it all works.

Fourteen ping-pong balls will be placed into a lottery machine, and a four-ball combination will decide which team earns the No. 1 pick. The Bucks own 250 out of 1,000 combinations. The Phoenix Suns, who ended the season with the 14th-worst record, have just five combinations in the machine.

However, the ping-pong balls historically have been unkind to the teams with the worst record. Since the weighted lottery system was introduced in 1990, the league’s worst team has won the lottery just three times, while the second-worst team has won it four times.

The envelope system lasted through 1989. In 1990, the weighted lottery system was introduced. The new system is used to determine the first three picks in the draft, and the rest are determined by regular-season record. There have been some tweaks to the weighted system to get it to where it is today, including efforts to give the worst teams a better chance of earning the coveted top picks.