Behind The Scenes Of The NBA Draft Lottery

If you play the Pick 4 on a daily basis, you have a pretty good idea as to what the Philadelphia 76ers are preparing for in just under a week’s time.

While the 2007 NBA Draft is still well over a month away, the 23rd annual edition of the NBA Draft Lottery will be held on Tuesday, May 22 at the NBA Entertainment Studios in Secaucus, New Jersey. It is at that point that the final order of selection for the first 14 picks in the upcoming draft will be determined.

As it currently stands, the Sixers have the 12th pick in the draft – thus giving them a 0.7% chance of hitting a combination that would award them the first overall pick on June 28. The chance of winning the second overall pick is at 0.8%. The odds of receiving the third pick stand at 1.01%.

There have been 1,000 combinations assigned to the 14 participating Lottery teams by a computer, but the Sixers will be looking for one of the following combinations next Tuesday night, which would move them into the top 3 on Draft night:

8 11 12 13 - PHL (1)

8 11 12 14 - PHL (2)

8 11 13 14 - PHL (3)

8 12 13 14 - PHL (4)

9 10 11 12 - PHL (5)

9 10 11 13 - PHL (6)

9 10 11 14 - PHL (7)

BEHIND THE SCENES:

The Draft Lottery is not as complicated as it may appear, but it is a there is not one detail overlooked. Here, take a quick check behind-the-scenes for what happens the night of the Lottery.

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.

The Memphis Grizzlies ended the season with the NBA's worst record, so they will be assigned 250 combinations. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Clippers – the best team in the lottery at 40-42 – will have five combinations out of 1,000. The Sixers combinations are listed near the top of the story.

Four balls will be drawn to the top of the drum 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.

The actual Lottery procedure takes place in a separate room prior to the national broadcast with NBA officials, representatives of the participating teams and the accounting firm of Ernst & Young in attendance. Senior Vice President of Business Operations Lara Price will be the Sixers’ representative during the drawing.

Following the sequestered 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.

A second representative from each participating team – in the Sixers case, it will be team President Billy King – will be seated on-stage for the televised announcement. 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 2007NBA Draft to be held on Wednesday, June 28.