After an eventful night in Times Square, we now know the order for next month’s NBA Draft, beginning with the Cavaliers, who remarkably won the top overall pick for the third time in the past four years.
But the ramifications of Cleveland winning the lottery go far beyond that it seems like the Cavs can’t stop getting lucky after their most unlucky moment — LeBron James leaving — happened in 2010. With that in mind, here’s a rundown of the impact of Tuesday evening’s proceedings:
What will Cavaliers do now?
We have to start in Cleveland, where the Cavaliers suddenly have gone from a franchise in a bit of disarray — working on hiring its third coach in three seasons and having just named David Griffin its permanent general manager last week — to one with plenty of options over the next month leading up to the draft.
By moving up from ninth to the top pick, Cleveland suddenly has another massive asset in its arsenal, along with several interesting young players — including Kyrie Irving, Dion Waiters, Tristan Thompson and last year’s disappointing top overall pick, Anthony Bennett — and extra picks in years ahead, including Memphis’ pick that could be an extra lottery selection next year.
A year after the team’s famously impatient owner Dan Gilbert made a scene and loudly proclaimed, “We won’t be back here again!” after winning the 2013 lottery, now the Cavaliers are in a position where they will have absolutely no excuses if they are back in New York in 2015. Because of that — as well as Gilbert’s penchant for the quick, dramatic fix — expect Cleveland to make a serious push for Timberwolves forward Kevin Love. The top pick in the draft is an automatically intriguing trade chip for a Minnesota team that could look to start over and deal the disgruntled star. If the Cavaliers do make such a move, you can bet it would be a precursor to a full-on push to bring James back to Cleveland and pair him with Irving and Love to form a new Big 3 and chase a championship.
Then there are the possibilities of what the Cavaliers do if they keep the pick. The top three picks in the draft — Andrew Wiggins, Joel Embiid and Jabari Parker — all fit for a variety of reasons.
At this point, only one thing is clear: For the next month, the NBA will be watching the Cavaliers closely.
A huge break for Charlotte and a huge blow for Detroit
An underrated aspect of Cleveland moving up was it meant Detroit moved back from eighth in the draft order to ninth. That meant the Pistons would send their pick to Charlotte as part of the miserable Ben Gordon-for-Corey Maggette swap a couple years back.
Now Charlotte — coming off one of the most promising seasons in franchise history after signing Al Jefferson last summer, hiring Steve Clifford as coach and then winning 43 games and claiming the seventh seed in the East — heads into the draft with the ninth and 24th selections, and should be able to add the scoring punch it needs to keep climbing up the ladder in the Eastern Conference.
On the other hand, it’s a crushing blow for Detroit, a franchise that could’ve used an extra young piece as part of its rebuilding effort under the recently hired Stan Van Gundy.
Multiple picks for Sixers, Magic
As part of earlier trades — Philadelphia moving Jrue Holiday to New Orleans last summer, and Orlando sending Dwight Howard to Los Angeles two years ago — the Sixers and Magic each have two picks. Philadelphia will take the third and 10th picks, while Orlando will have the fourth and 12th selections, giving both a chance to add a pair of young talents to their interesting, young cores.
Jazz miss their shot at Jabari Parker
It’s not often a star prospect with ties to the Mormon Church comes into the NBA, but that’s the case with Parker, and there was no secret the Jazz were desperate to have him wind up in Salt Lake City. That seems unlikely now, however, after Utah fell from fourth to fifth as Cleveland moved up.
Unless Utah tries to package some assets to move up in the draft, the Jazz will have to settle for one of the several other excellent players in the draft — not a bad consolation prize, but not quite what Parker would have represented to the organization.
Disappointment for the league’s signature franchises
The Celtics and Lakers, with the fifth- and sixth-best odds to win the lottery, respectively, hoped to move up in the lottery to get one of the draft’s elite talents or make a play for Kevin Love.
Now both seem unlikely to be real players for Love. The Lakers basically only have the seventh pick to offer. The Celtics have a lot of picks, but none higher than the one they currently have at sixth overall, meaning they will have to settle for players at the back end of the talented group at the top of the draft.