The NBA draft is an annual NBA event. At the draft, 30 NBA teams can select the new players they need. These players are usually from various universities in the United States, but in recent years More and more international players and high school graduates are participating in the draft.
Draft Rules
The NBA draft is divided into two rounds, and each team selects players according to some predetermined rules. The top picks belong to the 14 teams that did not enter the playoffs last season. These teams will participate in a lottery to determine the draft order of each team. Usually, the worse the record last season. The greater the chance that a team will draw a draft pick at a higher position. The next 16 picks are reserved for those teams that have reached the playoffs. The order of the lottery for these 16 teams is determined based on their record in the regular season. The worse the team's performance, the higher the draft pick. Therefore, the team with the best regular season record last season has the lowest draft position. It is worth mentioning that the last pick in the 2004 draft was not the Detroit Pistons, who eventually won the championship, but the Indiana Pacers, who ranked first in regular season record.
The order of the second round picks is the same as the first round. However, NBA teams are allowed to use the rights to their second-round draft picks as bargaining chips in the seasonal player trade market to acquire the players they need from other teams. Therefore, the structure of a second-round draft will sometimes be significantly different than the structure of a first-round draft due to trades.
Every team in the NBA must select at least one rookie player during the entire draft process. At the same time, NBA league rules also prohibit any team from trading their first-round picks for the next two consecutive years. This rule was introduced in part because of the operation of the Cleveland Cavaliers in the early 1980s. Ted Stepien was the owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers from 1980 to 1983. A series of questionable player trades he operated cost the Cavaliers no first-round draft picks for several years. These failed player trade movements of Stepping almost destroyed the Cavaliers. In the end, the NBA had to impose sanctions on Stepping. pressure to sell the Cavaliers, and then Gordon Gund, a local rich man in Cleveland, became the owner of the Cavaliers. In order to facilitate this deal, the NBA gave the Cavaliers several future opportunities. of bonus picks. This rule only applies to "future" draft picks. For example: In the 1999-00 season, the team can give away the first-round pick in 2000, regardless of whether they have the first-round pick in the 1999 draft, because the 1999 draft pick is no longer "the future" "Draft picks. But they can't trade all their first-round picks in 2000 and 2001. This is why many teams sell draft picks "every other year". In addition, as long as the team has a first-round pick of that year, whether it is their own or acquired from another team in a transfer, it can be counted. As long as you have one, it doesn't matter if you sell the others.
NBA Draft Lottery
The NBA Executive Committee met in Salt Lake City in June 1984 when they voted to select first-round picks for teams that did not qualify for the playoffs. order. This system started in 1985. Prior to this, between 1966 and 1984, the team with the worst record in the East and West would flip a coin to determine who would get the right to draft first.
In the NBA draft lottery, the team with the worst regular season record is most likely to get the first draft pick, while the team with the best record among the teams that missed the playoffs has the least chance. The lottery will determine the selection order of the first three teams, while the remaining teams that have not qualified for the playoffs will be selected in reverse order of their regular season records.
In the lottery ceremony, the host will place 14 table tennis balls numbered 1-14 in a drum-shaped container.
Randomly drawing 4 balls from 14 balls can produce 1001 possible combinations, regardless of the order of selection. Before the draw, teams participating in the draw were given 1,000 combinations based on their regular season rankings. 4 ping pong balls will be drawn to the top of the container in order to form a four-digit combination, and the team that obtains this combination will receive the top pick. Then, the four ping pong balls will be returned to the bottom of the container, and the previous situation will be repeated to determine who owns the second and third picks. If the drawn combination is not within the allocated range, the draw will be repeated.
Select Players
All American players are automatically entered into the NBA draft after they graduate from college. American players can also declare for the draft between when they graduate high school and when they complete college. The NBA sets two dates for players to declare for the draft. All players who wish to participate in the draft are not automatically eligible for the draft. They must declare for the draft before or on the first day to declare for the draft. After that, the NBA will set up several pre-draft training camps for players who may participate in the draft in the future, allowing players to demonstrate their abilities and skills to league teams in the training camps. Any player can decide to withdraw his or her name before the final day of declaring for the draft and decide not to participate in that year's draft. The final day of declaring for the draft is one week before the draft. This is important for current college players because they will not lose their college eligibility if they declare for the draft on or before the first declaration day, as opposed to if they do not officially declare for the draft until the final declaration day. If they are drafted, no matter whether an NBA team eventually selects them, they will lose the opportunity to further study in college. Another point is that if a player signs with an agent, he will automatically end his college studies.
When a player is selected in the first round of the draft, the team that selects him must sign a contract with him for at least one year. The player's team can "own" the player for three years, but the team does not have to sign with them.
The earlier a player is selected in the draft, the higher his value will be. The first player selected in the draft is usually called the "number one pick" and they are usually the best players among all the players participating in the draft. However, just because a player is selected with the first pick in the first round does not mean that the player will definitely become a superstar in the future. Michael Jordan was selected with the third overall pick in the first round of the 1984 NBA Draft, but he is widely regarded as the greatest player in NBA history. One of the two players selected before Jordan was "Big Dream" Olajuwon, and the other was Sam Bowie. Olajuwon was elected to the NBA Hall of Fame after experiencing a great career. , and Sam Bowie ended his career hastily due to constant injury problems and did not achieve anything at all. All of this shows that there is no inevitable direct connection between NBA draft results and the future development of players. Players selected later in the draft are not necessarily worse than players selected earlier.