The NBA’s draft lottery is changing, and the timing is worth noting. On May 28, 2026, the league’s Board of Governors approved the “3-2-1 Lottery,” a system that expands the field from 14 to 16 teams starting with the 2027 draft. Until then, the format introduced in 2019 still applies, and the results from this year’s lottery show exactly how those rules play out in practice.
The Washington Wizards make the case better than any hypothetical could. Washington finished 17-65, the league’s worst record in 2025-26. Even so, the Wizards’ odds of landing the No. 1 pick on May 10 in Chicago were just 14.0%. Indiana and Brooklyn carried the exact same number. Three teams, three identical chances, and only one envelope came back with Washington’s name inside. That is the whole point of the current system.
How the ping-pong-ball drawing actually works
Fourteen numbered ping-pong balls drive the actual drawing. Four are pulled at a time, without regard to order, which produces 1,001 possible combinations. One thousand of those combinations are assigned to the 14 lottery teams before the machine even starts; the one leftover combination just gets redrawn if it happens to come up. Balls are mixed for 20 seconds before the first ball is pulled, then for 10 seconds before each of the next three. Whichever team holds the winning combination gets that pick, and the whole process repeats for selections two through four, according to NBA.com’s official lottery explainer. Picks five through 14 are then set in reverse order of regular-season record, and picks 15 through 60, the rest of round one and all of round two, go strictly by reverse record. Players taken that late, plus most undrafted rookies, tend to open their careers on two-way contracts rather than standard rookie-scale deals.
Why the top three teams share identical odds
Before 2019, the format rewarded losing far more directly. The league’s single worst team had a 25% shot at the top pick, the second-worst had 19.9%, and the third-worst had 15.6%. Owners flattened those numbers so the three worst records now each carry a 14.0% chance, a direct response to teams openly tanking for a specific finish late in lost seasons. The odds taper quickly from there. Utah and Sacramento, tied at 22-60, each held 11.5% in the 2026 lottery. Memphis sat at 9.0%. Charlotte, the healthiest team still in the field at 44-38, had just 0.5%.
Which teams actually make the lottery
Every club that misses the playoffs qualifies, 14 teams under the current format. Not every one of those picks stays with the team that earned it. Indiana’s 2026 lottery selection carried protections that could send it to the LA Clippers, and Milwaukee’s could have gone to Atlanta by way of a prior trade with New Orleans, depending entirely on where the balls landed. Protected and conveyed picks like these are a routine byproduct of deals made years earlier, and they mean a rebuilding season does not always give a front office control over its own lottery outcome. A rookie taken with a healthy, unprotected pick, by contrast, is on the standard track toward restricted free agency once his four-year rookie contract runs out.
What actually changes in 2027
The 3-2-1 Lottery, in effect for the 2027, 2028 and 2029 drafts, pulls two extra teams into the field by adding the Play-In Tournament losers. Non-playoff, non-play-in teams get three lottery balls apiece, except that the three worst records lose one ball each under a new “draft relegation” rule meant to sharpen the incentive to win games late in the season. The No. 9 and No. 10 play-in seeds in each conference get two balls, and the losers of the 7-vs-8 play-in games get one. All 16 teams can now fall no lower than the 16th pick, and a relegated team is guaranteed no worse than 12th. The league also barred any team’s own pick from landing at No. 1 in back-to-back drafts, or in the top five three years running, regardless of whether that pick has been traded away, per the NBA’s official announcement of the reform.
Rules for the lottery beyond 2029 are not settled yet. The Board of Governors is set to revisit the format again before the 2030 draft, which means front offices building around high picks right now are, in effect, negotiating two different rulebooks at once.
