Morning After Reactions to the 2019 NBA Lottery

It's no secret that I love the NBA Lottery, and the level playing field of the new format only adds to that. Once I get a couple more years of grasping the new odds from each lottery position, I'll be back to checking Tankathon.com on a more regular basis than this past season because the chaos of the reactions with so many jumps is incredible. For example, New Orleans, Memphis, and Dallas tied in the standings, but the way the four digit number combinations were distributed after coin flips allowed the former two to move up and the Mavs to end up at #10...and thus lose their top-5 protected pick, ouch.

Here are the odds of each team landing where they did in the draft order along with my other favorite tidbits and observations of the results:

1. Pelicans (6.0%)
2. Grizzlies (6.3%)
3. Knicks (12.7%)
4. Lakers (2.8%)
5. Cavaliers (27.8%)
6. Suns (26.0%)
7. Bulls (16.8%)
8. Hawks (8.8%)
9. Wizards (3.8%)
10. Hawks, via Mavericks (24.3%)
11. Timberwolves (18.9%)
12. Hornets (86.1%)
13. Heat (90.6%)
14. Celtics, via Kings (95.2%)

• Football will probably always be king in New Orleans, but the lottery gods have certainly done their part to save basketball in that city. After franchise player Chris Paul demanded a trade in 2011, the team relented, tanked, and won the #1 pick to rebuild with Anthony Davis. Now with his future in the balance, they held onto him, tried to compete to convince him to stay, and still ended up with the #1 pick. It's awesome that in the first year of the new format that's designed to discourage teams from racing to the bottom, a team that didn't throw the season in the tank from the start won the lottery.
  
• That top pick will presumably be Zion Williamson, but it remains to be seen whether the high flying big man will be replacing The Brow or teaming up with him as essentially an upgraded version of Julius Randle, who holds a player option this summer. During the lottery results show, ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski stated that new GM David Griffin, aka the lottery magician, wants to build around Davis, but The Athletic's Shams Charania has already reported that the All-Star still wants out. The obvious reaction is that with big market teams like the Knicks and Lakers also winning top-4 picks, their trade packages become a lot more appealing, and New Orleans could potentially keep Zion with his Duke buddy R.J. Barrett.
• Another star possibly on the move is Mike Conley now that Memphis has secured the #2 pick that could be used to select Ja Morant as their point guard of the future. Sure, Morant has solid size and shooting ability to play alongside Conley at times while learning as a backup, but it's probably best to just let him take the reigns from the start and go through ups and downs, especially since they'll lose their 1st round pick next year if it falls outside the top-6. While they could take Barrett, whom I was constantly raving about as the clear #1 pick favorite coming into the season, it seems more likely that they'll resume the Conley talks from the trade deadline and rebuild around whatever they get in that deal, Morant, Jaren Jackson Jr., and potentially Jonas Valanciunas. In any case, it was a win for them to stay in the top-8 and keep their pick since there was a 42.6% chance that they wouldn't have these options at all. Funnily enough, one of their combos was also drawn for the #4 pick, meaning it had to be drawn again (PS the little Alvin Gentry cameo in this video is hilarious).
• New York is obviously disappointed, but they only had a 14% chance at the #1 pick compared to 25% in the old system, and they had a 47.9% chance of falling out of the top-4 completely. Now this pick is their strongest trade asset, or they could end up with Barrett as the star they crave. Staying in the top-3 of this draft was huge and likely a relief in the drawing room after the agonizingly long wait of the first two drawings.While the Cavs and Suns ended up where they were statistically most likely to land, all three of the Bulls, Hawks, and Wizards also dropping three spots to 7, 8, and 9, respectively, hurts after the seasons they had. At least Atlanta's 73.8% chance of holding onto the Dallas pick I mentioned in the open worked out, even if it ended up one spot lower than expected.
• The reason those teams dropped is of course due to the Lakers' continued lottery luck. They've been one of the most poorly run teams over the last handful of years, culminating in the embarrassing Magic Johnson exit and coaching search fiasco with the Kurt Rambis "rally," yet they've been rewarded with winning the #2 pick three straight years and now a seven spot jump to #4 despite having a 90.6% chance of picking between spots 11-14. That's massive for their chances at trading for another star like Davis.
• Lastly, Boston is a pseudo winner with the 1% chance of the Sacramento pick going to Philly if it became #1 not coming to fruition and Memphis now looking more likely to go into rebuilding mode. While the 34.1% chance of getting the #9 pick from them would've been nice, they already have what is now confirmed as the #14 pick, the Clippers' #20 pick, and their own pick at #22. This way they could get the Grizzlies' top-6 protected pick in next year's potentially deeper draft or an unprotected pick the following year from a team still likely to be be near the bottom of the standings. Although it's not great that the Knicks and Lakers helped their chances in the Davis trade market, the Celtics should still have the best package out there between all of their assets.