Raptors Locked into 13th Spot in Draft Lottery With 1% Chance at Top Selection

The Toronto Raptors will have the 13th spot in the NBA Draft Lottery with a 1% chance to select Victor Wembanyama with the No. 1 pick

Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports

It almost couldn’t be worse.

Masai Ujiri had it right two years ago when he wondered aloud “play-in for what?” He and the Toronto Raptors knew what was coming. Had they played out the season in Tampa they could have been a play-in team, maybe a playoff team, and bowed out early with a mediocre first-round pick. But instead, they pivoted. The “Tampa tank” as Ujiri later called it, falling as low as the sixth-best lottery odds, before landing Scottie Barnes with the No. 4 pick.

This time around, Ujiri opted to go the other way. Rather than sell off assets at the trade deadline, Toronto chose to go for it.

Oops.

A loss to the Chicago Bulls in the play-in opener ended Toronto’s playoff hopes and losses Friday night by the Bulls and Oklahoma City Thunder has slotted the Raptors in the No. 13 spot in the draft lottery scheduled for May 16. The only worse spot would have been No. 14, now occupied by the New Orleans Pelicans.

For the Raptors, that means there’s a 92.9% chance the team lands the 13th pick in the draft on June 22. The worst-case scenario would be moving down in the draft, if New Orleans were to hit on its 2.3% chance of jumping Toronto.

Then there’s the dream scenario that Toronto exercised the last time the Raptors were in the lottery, albeit with much better odds. Toronto has a 1% chance to jump all the way up to No. 1 to select Victor Wembanyama, the 7-foot-2 superstar French prospect. There’s a 2.1% chance Toronto moves up into the top two and a 4.8% to move up into the top four.

As for the 13th pick, it has been a pretty lucky spot in the past. Tyler Herro, Donovan Mitchell, Devin Booker, and Zach LaVine were all selected with the 13th pick, as were Richard Jefferson, Kobe Bryant, and Karl Malone.

Further Reading

Gary Trent Jr. has big goals that Raptors may not be able to fit as free agency looms

Pascal Siakam says he'd 'love' to be in Toronto but his Raptors future remains complicated

Scottie Barnes acknowledges DeMar DeRozan's daughter may have effected Raptors