Foresight is 2020: 5 lottery teams that can jump into the playoffs next year
The NBA draft lottery is an absurd spectacle: an event that gathers representatives from the worst teams in the league to bear witness to a pingpong ball draw that will determine how long their teams remain bad.
Each year, a small handful of teams, usually with the help of the lottery, make the jump from springtime irrelevance to playoff participation. With the 2019 draft order now set, here's a look at five teams that could take that step next season.
Atlanta Hawks
The Hawks finished 12th in the Eastern Conference, 12 games back of eighth place, and failed to crack the 30-win barrier for the second consecutive season, yet I'm more confident in Atlanta's 2020 playoff hopes than any other East lottery team.
The league's sixth-youngest team stumbled out of the gate and entered mid-December with a 6-23 record. From there, Atlanta quietly rose to respectability after the majority of the basketball-watching public had tuned out.
Beginning with a Dec. 18 win over the Wizards, the Hawks went 23-30 over the final four months of the season, equivalent to a 35-win pace. Along the way, Atlanta recorded impressive wins over the Bucks, Jazz, and Clippers, as well as three victories over the Sixers.
No player was more responsible for the midseason turnaround than rookie sensation Trae Young, who averaged 21.2 points, 8.5 assists, 4.3 rebounds, and a steal with a true shooting percentage of 57.0 over his final 52 games. Those are sensational numbers for a 20-year-old, particularly considering how the undersized guard struggled to find his shot early in the season.
Young's defense is always going to be a liability, but he's already put together extended stretches of game-changing offensive production and should continue to flourish as a pick-and-roll threat with John Collins.
While Young made his late charge into the Rookie of the Year debate, Collins enjoyed the type of sophomore season that's sure to earn him some Most Improved Player votes. The 21-year-old power forward averaged 19.5 points and 9.8 rebounds on 56 percent shooting, flashing promise as a stretch-four by averaging 2.6 3-point attempts per game and canning 34.8 percent of them.
In Collins and Young, Atlanta already has the type of foundation most lottery teams crave, and Young, especially, has earned the respect of his elders around the league. That matters in free agency.
The Hawks were surely disappointed by where their picks fell in Tuesday night's lottery, but they enter June's draft with two top-10 selections. Between those picks, some cap space, and the continued development of their two young stars, it's not much of a stretch to project the Hawks as the type of team that can hover around .500 next season. - Joseph Casciaro
New Orleans Pelicans
Landing the No. 1 overall pick (i.e. Zion Williamson) reportedly hasn't changed Anthony Davis' mind about wanting out of the Bayou. Considering all the bridges he's burned there, that isn't particularly surprising. Still, it's funny to think he might actually have a better chance to contend with the Pelicans over the next few years than with a Lakers team led by an aging LeBron that would have to gut its roster to acquire him.
Call me crazy, but I think there's an outside chance new GM David Griffin can convince Davis to keep an open mind and give New Orleans a chance, which is the main reason the Pelicans are included here. If Williamson lives up to his billing in Year 1, he, Davis, and Jrue Holiday would form a pretty devastating trio that could carry the Pelicans to the playoffs even without much else on the roster. Add that to the $230-million super-max contract carrot the team can dangle, and Davis would have to think twice about forcing his way elsewhere.
Maybe Griffin can convince him to stick around and feel things out until the trade deadline. That would be a big risk for the team - Davis could get injured, and his trade value would diminish regardless - but it could be worthwhile given how dominant Davis and Williamson could conceivably be together for years to come. It's fanciful, but not impossible.
Even if the Pelicans do trade Davis this summer, they'll still have a lot going for them: a once-in-a-generation prospect, one of the game's best two-way guards in his prime, plenty of cap space, Griffin's shrewd decision-making, and whoever they get back in a Davis deal. They won't receive equivalent talent, of course, but they should be able to get multiple quality young players to replenish their depth and balance the roster.
This new Pelicans front office surely wants to avoid the mistakes of its predecessor. It won't try to fast-forward a rebuild around Williamson the way Dell Demps did around Davis. But if Williamson comes as advertised - if his combination of size, strength, skill, and freakish athleticism translates into immediate NBA success the way it did for, say, a young LeBron James - then an accelerated rebuild might be the only option. - Joe Wolfond
Los Angeles Lakers
Aside from landing the greatest player of his generation in free agency last summer, the Lakers have become one of the NBA's most poorly run organizations.
The only thing more comical than Magic Johnson's incompetence as team president was the bizarre manner in which he stepped down from the position. Still without a replacement for Johnson, the team then missed the boat on its top two coaching candidates. There is little reason to believe in the brain trust of Jeanie Buss, Rob Pelinka and ... Kurt Rambis? Yet despite it all, this 37-win team was a no-brainer inclusion on this list.
The Lakers still employ LeBron James, who averaged 27.4 points, 8.5 rebounds, 8.3 assists, and 1.3 steals in what was a "down year" by his royal standards. James loafed on defense, seemed to have lost the young players in his locker room by the end of the season, landed on the wrong end of too many memes, and missed 27 games - mostly because of a groin issue. But L.A. was still 28-27 with James in the lineup, and its net rating of 2.1 points per 100 possessions with James on the court would've ranked 12th overall and eighth in the West.
There's reason to believe, despite all the drama, that this would have been a playoff team had James not suffered the first serious injury of his career. Expect a humbled LeBron to come back ready to take names in October.
As for the rest of the Lakers, one of the NBA's legacy franchises heads into the summer with Lonzo Ball, Brandon Ingram, Kyle Kuzma, Josh Hart, the No. 4 overall pick, and max cap space to dangle in Hollywood. If management can't use those advantages and assets to acquire enough talent to at least help James into the playoffs, the Lakers are more of a lost cause than we imagine. - Casciaro
Sacramento Kings
The Kings haven't made the playoffs in 13 years - Bar Mitzvah boys in Sacramento have lived their entire lives without experiencing so much as a first-round game - but this past season was perhaps the first one of those years that brought legitimate optimism about the future. The Kings were maybe the most surprising, fun, feel-good team in the NBA, and they thrived on the strength of their young, rising stars. Can they build on that success and finally halt the league's longest active (and second-longest ever) playoff drought?
If there's reason to believe, it starts with point guard De'Aaron Fox, who went from looking lost at sea as a rookie to being the best sophomore in the NBA. Fox is already one of the fastest and wiliest players in the league, and both his jump shot and his passing improved enormously. If he has even another mini-leap in him next season, the Kings are going to be in very good shape.
Then there's Buddy Hield, who blossomed last year into a high-end scoring two-guard, continuing to hone his off-the-bounce game while shooting 42.7 percent from 3-point range on a massive volume of attempts (7.9 per game, nine per 36 minutes). Rounding out what should be a strong three-man core is Marvin Bagley - a physically gifted rookie big man who averaged 18.5 points and 9.2 rebounds after the All-Star break and has the goods to become a dominant multi-level scorer. He just needs to become more of a threat from outside and learn to finish with his right hand. Harry Giles and Bogdan Bogdanovic offer plenty of promise too.
It'll be interesting to see whether Harrison Barnes picks up his $25-million player option and whether the Kings can make productive use of their cap space. The Kings have to decide how Willie Cauley-Stein - who's set to become a restricted free agent - fits into their plans. And while it doesn't mean anything for their chances of continuing on their upward trajectory, it must be a bit of a relief that the draft pick they owed the Celtics this year (via the 76ers, courtesy of a spectacular botchery of a 2015 trade) only landed at No. 14.
Is this a superteam in waiting, as GM Vlade Divac drew guffaws for suggesting last year? Probably not. But a playoff team? Absolutely. That doesn't mean it'll necessarily happen next season. The Western Conference remains a torture chamber and there are two other West teams on this list, while none of this year's top eight look primed to fall out. But Sacramento has a chance.
It's maybe not the best sign, however, that the front office seemingly hasn't figured out how to stay out of its own way. The Bulls bailed Sacramento out of a bad offer sheet for Zach LaVine last summer. And firing head coach Dave Joerger, after he helped guide the team to its best regular season in more than a decade, was the kind of impulsive move that has railroaded the Kings in the past. (It doesn't help that Luke Walton, the guy they hired to replace him, is currently under investigation by the league and team for sexual assault.)
There's talent here, but the team's trigger-happy decision-makers don't inspire much confidence that they'll be able to stay the course. - Wolfond
New York Knicks
Spoiler alert: The Knicks may sign Kevin Durant, and possibly a second superstar free agent, this summer. If those rampant rumors come to fruition, New York would be a pretty safe bet to end its six-year playoff drought.
The Knicks exuded confidence in their ability to add two max free agents when they dealt would-be franchise player Kristaps Porzingis for salary flotsam and a pair of first-round draft picks at this year's deadline. But they've cleared the decks before only to strike out on their prime targets. Fulfilling that plan is really their only hope. The Knicks will either land Durant and become a playoff team, or they'll whiff and remain a laughingstock.
OK, not necessarily a laughingstock. It's possible to imagine a scenario in which they don't get Durant but do find their way into the playoff mix. They could still conceivably put their cap space to good use, but they'd have to lure two stars from the remaining free-agent pool - Kawhi Leonard, Kyrie Irving, Kemba Walker, Jimmy Butler, Klay Thompson, Khris Middleton, Nikola Vucevic - because it's hard to see one of those guys signing there on his own given the rest of the roster.
Their Zion dreams were dashed at the lottery Tuesday, but the Knicks still wound up with the third overall pick. They could turn that pick into RJ Barrett, or they could use it as a trade chip in an attempt to bolster the roster for the arrival of those free agents. They could try to swing a deal by packaging that No. 3 pick, one or both of the Dallas first-rounders, and one of their post-hype prospects like Dennis Smith Jr. or Kevin Knox. Mitchell Robinson should probably remain off-limits - unless Anthony Davis is the guy coming back - because Robinson has a chance to be really, really good.
So, there are ways the Knicks can rocket back to relevance even without Durant in the fold. Or, y'know, they can just sign Durant. - Wolfond