NBA Draft Lottery Odds

The 2006 NBA Draft Lottery, where ping-pong balls supplant basketballs as the tools of determining supremacy, will be held on Tuesday, May 23, at the NBA Entertainment Studios in Secaucus, New Jersey. The 22nd annual edition of the NBA Draft Lottery will determine the order of selection for the first 14 picks of 2006 NBA Draft.

Fourteen ping-pong balls numbered 1 through 14 will be placed in a drum. There are 1,001 possible combinations when four balls are drawn out of 14, without regard to their order of selection. Prior to the Lottery, 1,000 combinations will be assigned to the 14 participating Lottery teams (New York’s pick goes to Chicago via a previous trade) by a computer.

The Portland Trail Blazers finished the season with the NBA's worst record (21-61), so they will be assigned 250 combinations. Utah, the best team in the lottery at 41-41, will have five combinations out of 1,000.

Four balls will be drawn to the top to determine a four-digit combination. The team that has been assigned that combination will receive the number one pick. The four balls are placed back in the drum and the process is repeated to determine the number two and three picks. (Note: If the one unassigned combination is drawn, the balls are drawn to the top again.)

The order of selection for the teams that do not win one of the top three picks will be determined by inverse order of their regular season record. Thus, Portland can pick no lower than fourth, Chicago (via New York, 23-59) no lower than fifth and Charlotte (26-56) no lower than sixth.

The actual Lottery procedure will take place in a separate room prior to the national broadcast with NBA officials and representatives of the participating teams and the accounting firm of Ernst & Young in attendance.

Following the drawing, team logo cards will be inserted into envelopes marked 1 through 14 by an Ernst & Young representative. These envelopes then will be sealed and brought on-stage, where the announcement of the Lottery results will be made by NBA Deputy Commissioner Russ Granik. A second representative from each participating team will be seated on-stage. Neither the Deputy Commissioner nor the team representatives will be informed of the Lottery results prior to the opening of the envelopes.

The team whose logo is in the last envelope opened will pick first in NBA Draft 2006, to be held on Wednesday, June 28, at The Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York City.

Following are the chances out of 1,000 for teams in 2006 NBA Draft Lottery:

Following are the 14 teams in 2006 NBA Draft Lottery who did not qualify for the NBA Playoffs 2006. Each team will be assigned a certain number of combinations out of 1,000. The third column below lists the number of combinations each team will have in the NBA Draft Lottery. The three columns on the right list the percent chances that teams have at getting one of the top three picks.

TEAM	Wins	Losses	Chances	1st Pick	2nd Pick	3rd Pick
Portland	21	61	250	25%	21.48%	17.72%
Chicago (from New York)	23	59	199	19.90%	18.78%	17.07%
Charlotte	26	56	138	13.80%	14.25%	14.54%
Atlanta	26	56	137	13.70%	14.16%	14.48%
Toronto	27	55	88	8.80%	9.64%	10.65%
Minnesota	33	49	53	5.30%	6.02%	6.96%
Boston	33	49	53	5.30%	6.02%	6.96%
Houston	34	48	23	2.30%	2.69%	3.21%
Golden State	34	48	22	2.20%	2.57%	3.08%
Seattle	35	47	11	1.10%	1.30%	1.57%
Orlando	36	46	8	0.80%	0.95%	1.15%
New Orleans/Oklahoma City	38	44	7	0.70%	0.83%	1.01%
Philadelphia	38	44	6	0.60%	0.71%	0.87%
Utah	41	41	5	0.50%	0.59%	0.72%