Since its debut in 1985, the National Basketball Association (NBA) Draft Lottery has been one of the most controversial events in sports history. Suspicious coincidences and shady practices have left fans with the impression that the NBA is up to no good.

   The Draft Lottery is something that takes place before the draft that sets the top 14 picks. This is to try and minimize teams “tanking,” which is when teams intentionally lose games to try and get a better pick. Although, the worst teams do have the best chance of winning the lottery.

   Today, ping pong balls numbered one through 14 are placed into a “lottery machine” to mix them up. Four are pulled separately, and the team with the group of four numbers pulled first gets the number one pick. The process is done privately, which has stirred some suspicion among fans. 

   Watching the results of the lottery each year, I can’t help but notice some interesting coincidences that happen season after season. Teams with horrible odds of winning getting the first pick after making a bad trade, or players falling into perfect, almost story book scenarios.

   The first, and perhaps most infamous, lottery occurred in 1985. Back then, seven envelopes were placed into a glass sphere, which was then mixed. The envelope that Commissioner David Stern selected would have the first pick. 

   The easy, number one pick that year was Patrick Ewing, who was one of the best centers to ever come out of college. The New York Knicks had been struggling for a while, and it would make sense to put the best player in the draft in one of the biggest markets in New York.

   The NBA had a third party named Jack Wagner place the envelopes in the sphere. Wagner was a partner at an accounting firm called Ernst & Whitney. Wagner audited a company called Gulf & Western, who owned the Knicks at the time.

   In the video, Wagner bangs one of the envelopes on a metal bar that goes through the sphere, which gives it a bent corner. He doesn’t do that with any of the other envelopes. The envelope that Stern ended up selecting was the one with the bent corner, which gave the Knicks the first pick, allowing them to select Ewing.

   This wouldn’t be the last time the event seemed rigged. In 1992, the expansion team Orlando Magic won the first pick, and they drafted Shaquille O’Neal.

   The next year, the Magic won the first pick again, which they used to trade for Penny Hardaway, instantly making the Magic a contender in the East.

   Not only did they win the draft twice in a row, but in 1993 they had just a 1.52 percent chance. Orlando was also a new, big-market team, supposedly incentivising the NBA to help them out.

   2010 started a chain of four consecutive suspicious Draft Lotteries. That year, LeBron James left Cleveland for the Miami Heat. Afterwards, the Cavaliers ended up winning three of the four next draft lotteries, which is unprecedented luck. 

   In 2011, the Cavaliers made what seemed like an insignificant trade at the time with the Los Angeles Clippers. Cleveland gave away Mo Williams and Jamario Moon for the Clippers 2011 first round pick and Baron Davis. While the players ended up not doing much, the first round pick would be the real prize for Cleveland.

   In the 2011 Draft Lottery, the Clippers ended up winning the first pick with just a 2.8 percent chance. Unfortunately, because of that previously insignificant trade, the pick now went to Cleveland.

   In 2012, the New Orleans Hornets were sold after complications from Hurricane Katrina. Since nobody wanted to buy them, the Hornets were owned by the NBA at this time. 

   Coming into the draft, Anthony Davis was set to be a star once he got into the league. Getting a player like Davis to the Hornets could boost ratings, allowing the league to sell the Hornets. Sure enough, New Orleans won the lottery even though they only had the fourth best odds. Two months later, the NBA were able to sell the Hornets.

   League officials were outraged by the result, and many predicted that Davis would somehow land in New Orleans, which he did.

   In 2013, the Cavaliers had the third best chance of winning the lottery, but they still won. The very next year, they beat the odds once again and won the first pick with just a 1.7 percent chance.

   With these three first overall picks, Cleveland selected superstar Kyrie Irving, Anthony Bennett, and Andrew Wiggins. 

   Just a couple weeks after drafting Wiggins, LeBron James announced that he’d be returning to Cleveland after four seasons with the Heat. Cleveland then used Wiggins and Bennett to trade for All-Star Kevin Love.

   Using these three picks, the Cavaliers were able to create the big three of James, Irving, and Love that would bring them to four straight NBA Finals appearances with one title.

   It is theorized that the NBA wanted Cleveland to win these picks to try and entice James to return to Cleveland, because a hometown hero returning to his former team and winning an NBA Finals would be amazing for television ratings.

   Although David Stern retired as commissioner in 2014, Adam Silver took over, but the rumors didn’t stop. In 2019, the New Orleans Pelicans (formerly the Hornets), won the Lottery with just a six percent chance. One month later, they traded the previously mentioned Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers, teaming him up with LeBron James.

   The Lakers immediately won the next championship in 2020, and the Pelicans drafted one of the best prospects in a long time: Zion Williamson. It’s rumored that the NBA wanted Davis in Los Angeles. to try and help him win the title with James, and they gave the Pelicans the first overall pick as compensation.

   This wouldn’t be the last time Davis would be involved in a suspicious Draft Lottery. In 2025, the Dallas Mavericks traded Luka Dončić to the Lakers for Anthony Davis and two other players. This is widely regarded as the worst trade in sports history.

   However, in that years’ Draft Lottery, the Mavericks won the first pick with just a 1.8 percent chance. They then drafted Cooper Flagg, who won Rookie of the Year this past season, and has looked amazing for Dallas.

   Dončić going to Los Angeles not only gives James one final chance to win an NBA Finals, but it gives one of the biggest markets in the league a superstar for years to come.

   If the NBA wants these rumors to stop, all they have to do is have the selection process be done on live television. If it isn’t rigged, then they’d have nothing to hide.

   The National Hockey League has pretty much the same system the NBA has to determine its top picks, and they do it on live television. There’s no reason why the NBA can’t do this, and the NBA themselves don’t really have an official reasoning on why it’s done in private.

   Of course there’s always going to be fans that’ll say it’s still rigged, and you can’t change the past coincidences. But doing the process live will increase the league’s credibility, as well as calm down fans.

   While the evidence for a rigged draft may be lacking, all of the weird coincidences stacking up are hard to ignore. Even through two commissioners, the suspicion has remained.