Oh my cleaveland..what nice draft picks you have.

[twinkleblur]

a 1st and a 4th overall draft pick? who knows they may get something good. it worked out for the bulls..sorta..ok maybe not they needed a 1st overall draft pick to make it this far.

[critterkiller]

what tha hell are you talking about! :O

[Pendulous]

what tha hell are you talking about! :O

The most retarded draft system that could every be conceived belongs to the NBA. Fortunately, Cleveland got what they deserved (the first overall pick).

[sheffield]

i smell conspiracy.. there, i said it

[Pendulous]

Actually, I take back what I said. I thought Cleveland had the worst record. Minnesota did, and didn't win the number 1 pick. Like I said, stupidest draft system ever.

[kunah]

Never understood the reasoning behind a lottery draft for the worst teams. Maybe they are trying to demotivate bad teams to tank the remainder of a bad season just to get the best draft picks.

But good news for the Cavs for a change of pace.

[conscript]

Never understood the reasoning behind a lottery draft for the worst teams. Maybe they are trying to demotivate bad teams to tank the remainder of a bad season just to get the best draft picks.

But good news for the Cavs for a change of pace.

Ya that is the exact point of the lottery, to prevent tanking. It serves its purpose pretty well I suppose since the worst team almost never wins the lottery in recent years so tanking doesn't really get you anything at all.

---------- Post added 2011-05-20 at 08:50 PM ----------

i smell conspiracy.. there, i said it

I put this up on Yahoo when they had their blog post about Kahn being an idiot for questioning the legitimacy of the lottery:

Percentage chance for the last 12 winners to have received the #1 pick:

2011- Cleveland Cavs 2.8% (They won it on the Clippers balls, not their own higher percentage chance)
2010- Washington Wizards 10.3%
2009- LA Clippers 17.7%
2008- Chicago Bulls 1.7%
2007- Portland 5.3%
2006- Toronto 8.8%
2005- Milwaukee 6.3%
2004- Orlando 25%
2003- Cleveland 22.5%
2002- Houston 8.9%
2001- Washington 15.7%
2000- New Jersey 4.4%

So in 8 of the last 12 years, the statistical probability that the winner would get the lottery pick is absurdly low. Since 1985 when they went to the weighted system, the only even remotely comparable years are Orlando in 1993 winning with 1.52% and Golden State in 1995 winning with 9.4% chance. Every other year was won by a team that should have won the lottery. Two times in the first 15 years, 8 in the last 12 years. Something seems off. Small sample size is small, but if I go to Vegas and win hand after hand of blackjack in situations where I have an incredibly small chance of winning, I will probably be leaving Vegas with a broken arm.

[Rennadrel]

Actually, I take back what I said. I thought Cleveland had the worst record. Minnesota did, and didn't win the number 1 pick. Like I said, stupidest draft system ever.

Is it a lottery system? If so then welcome to the NHL's drafting policy, it's the same thing. The worst teams have the highest chances of winning the draft lottery, though I am of the opinion that it should just go by points earned by a team during the season and eliminate the lottery factor completely.

[Makuul]

Something seems off.

Yeah, it's your terrible analysis.

You seem to have arbitrarily pegged "absurdly low" between Washington's 2001 pick at 15.7% and Washington's 2010 pick at 10.3%, which puts it right around the Top 3 cutoff in terms of percentages. The top 3 teams have a combined chance of around 60% to win the lottery, possibly even worse than that depending on where in between 15.7 and 10.3 that "absurdly low" gets defined, which means that around 40% of the time, a team with "absurdly low" chances will win the lottery. It's not Clips pick 2.8%, TWolves 97.2%.

[Pendulous]

Is it a lottery system? If so then welcome to the NHL's drafting policy, it's the same thing. The worst teams have the highest chances of winning the draft lottery, though I am of the opinion that it should just go by points earned by a team during the season and eliminate the lottery factor completely.

Yeah, same deal. Didn't know the NHL used the same.

[conscript]

Yeah, it's your terrible analysis.

You seem to have arbitrarily pegged "absurdly low" between Washington's 2001 pick at 15.7% and Washington's 2010 pick at 10.3%, which puts it right around the Top 3 cutoff in terms of percentages. The top 3 teams have a combined chance of around 60% to win the lottery, possibly even worse than that depending on where in between 15.7 and 10.3 that "absurdly low" gets defined, which means that around 40% of the time, a team with "absurdly low" chances will win the lottery. It's not Clips pick 2.8%, TWolves 97.2%.

Washington's 10.3% chance to win slotted them with the 5th highest chance to win the 1st overall pick. The teams above them had a 70.9% chance to win. They are on the high end of that spectrum. The Bulls in 2008 had a 1.7% chance to win with the teams above them combining for a 94.8% chance to win. Yes, teams with a "low" chance of winning should win on occasion. The group of teams that have a total chance of winning of 10-30% should not be winning year after year though. It should happen every couple of years. It shouldn't happen 8 times in a decade and change.

[buck008]

If you ran an NBA team is this the year you would want one of the first 5 picks? The weakest college class in a while headed into a potential lock out. Joy. They need to trade one of those picks for something they can actually use. I mean the top players right now are Kyrie Irving from Duke, Derrick Williams from Arizona, and... who? A couple foreign players, Kemba Walker, and Brandon Knight. The fact that Jimmer Fredette could potentially crack the top 10 speaks volumes since his upper limit seems to be in the JJ Reddick neighborhood.
Cleveland would either take Williams and whichever guard is still there at 4 (I like Brandon Knight) or take Irving and then Enes Kantor from Turkey at 4. I think Williams is a safer bet, because he's more of a known quantity, but if you are picking players for 2 years from now then the Irving/Kantor combo could be pretty deadly. Though Irving didn't play much at all at Duke so we're judging his talent based on high school and AAU games, so who knows what you're getting, and Kantor's knees are a problem. I'm just not seeing any superstars here.

[Makuul]

Washington's 10.3% chance to win slotted them with the 5th highest chance to win the 1st overall pick. The teams above them had a 70.9% chance to win. They are on the high end of that spectrum. The Bulls in 2008 had a 1.7% chance to win with the teams above them combining for a 94.8% chance to win. Yes, teams with a "low" chance of winning should win on occasion. The group of teams that have a total chance of winning of 10-30% should not be winning year after year though. It should happen every couple of years. It shouldn't happen 8 times in a decade and change.

Excuse me for not donning my tinfoil hat when a 40% probability turns up eight out of twelve times.

If you ran an NBA team is this the year you would want one of the first 5 picks? The weakest college class in a while headed into a potential lock out. Joy. They need to trade one of those picks for something they can actually use. I mean the top players right now are Kyrie Irving from Duke, Derrick Williams from Arizona, and... who? A couple foreign players, Kemba Walker, and Brandon Knight. The fact that Jimmer Fredette could potentially crack the top 10 speaks volumes since his upper limit seems to be in the JJ Reddick neighborhood.
Cleveland would either take Williams and whichever guard is still there at 4 (I like Brandon Knight) or take Irving and then Enes Kantor from Turkey at 4. I think Williams is a safer bet, because he's more of a known quantity, but if you are picking players for 2 years from now then the Irving/Kantor combo could be pretty deadly. Though Irving didn't play much at all at Duke so we're judging his talent based on high school and AAU games, so who knows what you're getting, and Kantor's knees are a problem. I'm just not seeing any superstars here.

I think you have to go Irving/Kanter. Unless Utah pulls something out of their ass and manages to move Al Jefferson's big contract, they'll pick Knight and try to shop Devin Harris, since he and his contract are much easier to move. But if you pick Williams, I think Minnesota picks Irving at 2 in a heartbeat and sees what they can fetch for him OR shops Rubio's rights to move past that whole situation. Either way, they get a trade chip to play with. Minnesota might pick Kanter there, but with Darko's contract still going and him playing passably, Irving as trade bait alone will be too much to pass up, let alone playing him. So Utah has to take Knight at 3 to fill their major need, and you end up without one of the two top rated PGs in a draft where the drop off after that is pretty big. They'll roll the dice with Irving/Kanter unless someone wants one of the picks.

Fredette, I think, has a ceiling of backup scoring point guard on a team's second unit, which isn't really bad value for this draft depending on where you get him. He just has to be athletic enough to come off baseline screens and pick-and-pops to get enough space to jack up threes or hit a cutter, against second units no less. I think that's reasonable given his college career.