NBA postpones annual Lottery and Combine
With the National Basketball League suspending play back in March, the league confirmed on Friday that it has decided to postpone the 2020 Draft Lottery and Draft Combine. It was believed that this would be the direction the NBA would go in for a while now, but it wasn’t made official until Friday.
There are a whole host of issues with conducting the Draft Lottery and Draft Combine prior to the conclusion of the 2019-20 campaign – or at least a decision on whether the season will be cancelled or not. The Draft Lottery provides teams at the bottom of the standings with the greatest opportunity of landing the number one pick in the Draft, however with no finalized standings it is difficult decide what teams’ odds will be set at.
Furthermore, the league continues to suggest that it is hoping to still be able to carry out the remainder of the season, despite no firm timeline of a return yet in place. If that is the case and the league does manage to finish the season, it would be much more logical to conduct the Draft Lottery and Draft Combine then.
The lottery was originally scheduled to take place in Chicago on May 19th with the combine running from May 21-24.
“There are no target dates. There are more target responsibilities,” San Antonio CEO R.C. Buford said earlier in the week. “And there’s still questions. We just got the early entry candidates list in the last couple days. That at least gives some kind of clarity on who the draft pool will be. But from there, we don’t have clarity on the Chicago pre-draft or medicals or all the things that go on with draft preparation.”
The league tends to invite around 70 of the top prospects to the combine that allows NBA clubs and scouts to interview payers, watch them workout, and organize scrimmages ahead of the actual draft taking place. Unlike in most other professional sports leagues, the NBA only has two rounds in its entry draft, so it is crucial for the future of a franchise that a team gets their selections right.
The 2020 NBA Draft was originally scheduled to take place on June 25th and has not yet been postponed, but don’t be surprised if that announcement was made in the coming weeks as well. With no lottery or combine taking place, it is highly unlikely a draft would take place.
The NFL is the only professional sports league to conduct its annual draft since the coronavirus outbreak, holding all seven rounds virtually. However, their season was over at the beginning of February and they have not yet had to cancel any games as a result of the coronavirus outbreak.
As it stands, last year’s NBA finalists the Golden State Warriors sit dead last in the standings with the least number of wins in the entire league. They have just 15 victories in 65 games and will be hoping that when all is said and done, they prevail with the first overall pick.
