For at least another year, the NBA Draft will take place over two nights, beginning with the first round at 8 p.m. ET on Wednesday from the Barclays Center before the second round concludes on Thursday with a broadcast from the ESPN Studios at the Seaport from Manhattan.
This will be a trial run for a new deal reached during the league’s last collective bargaining with the players’ union, and so early feedback on this new format will prove crucial in shaping the future of the second round of the NBA Draft. Under this new structure, teams will have an entire night and until the following afternoon to negotiate trades and potential salary structures with player agents for draft prospects, while the second round will offer now also four minutes by choice instead of the usual two minutes.
For this move to happen in a draft that carries a lot of uncertainty about Wednesday’s first round, team executives are preparing for significant trade activity throughout the second round, league sources told Yahoo Sports. The NBA plans to invite several prospects from its green room invitation list to the second-round broadcast, sources said, if they are not selected among the top 30 picks. And there are players like Houston point guard Jamal Shead and UCLA big man Adem Bona who hold clear first-round grades for some teams, sources said, but who also could be available in the 30s “We’re trying to figure out who will be there,” said an executive from a team selected among the top sections of the second round, “and it’s impossible.”
The introduction of an extra day has also prompted various NBA teams to speak with NFL staff, league sources told Yahoo Sports, to gain possible insight into how to handle a window at night and early in the morning between tours. The NFL Draft now takes place over three days. “Is there a game we are not aware of?” » asked an NBA official who spoke with an NFL team.
An NFC executive who spoke with three NBA teams tried to shed some light on each.
“I’ll be honest,” the executive told Yahoo Sports. “I’ll be surprised if a team hasn’t done it (consult the NFL).”
The Philadelphia 76ers are owned by a management group led by Joshua Harris, who also led a recent acquisition of the Washington Commanders. All teams under the Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment umbrella collaborate regularly, and the Sixers and Commanders held a meeting on how to approach the second night of this year’s NBA Draft, according to a source with knowledge of those discussions. Philadelphia is expected to pick 41st on Thursday night.
Several teams among the NBA’s top five second-round picks have also consulted with NFL personnel on how best to maximize those trade opportunities, sources said.
NFL executives share ideas with NBA teams
The NFC executive who has advised three NFL teams talked less about how teams should spend Thursday morning than about how they I should not.
The executive urged teams to weigh contingencies and establish their trade parameters days, weeks and sometimes even months before the draft. Of course, a longer draft allows more time to sort through possibilities and “more bandwidth to do stupid things.” But the best decisions will be weighted and rooted in data gathered before the project’s emotions peak, the executive said. Know what a “winning” proposal would look like, they insisted; also know when you are willing to “lose” according to a pattern because your team is very eager to secure a lead.
“Maybe your organization is really high on this player (so) you’re just like, ‘F*** him,’” the executive said. “But at least it’s already been discussed, and it’s not a point in the project where people are just like, ‘Oh shit, what just happened?'”
Some NFL executives interviewed by Yahoo Sports disagree on whether their advice is helpful to the NBA.
NFL teams are willing to trade picks or pick packages far more often than they trade players in the draft. They’re hungry for first-round picks with a cost-controlled fifth year, but can find immediate starters long after the No. 100 pick.
Last year, a pool of 259 NFL draft picks eclipsed the 58 available to NBA teams this year.
It is essential to filter any information through its appropriate lens.
“It’s a completely different dynamic with the NBA,” an AFC general manager told Yahoo Sports, “given the small number of players and the steep slope of talent degradation in their draft.”
A second NFC executive questioned whether the second day of the NBA draft would be more like the NFL’s third and final day than the second, given the amount of greater medical and personal information that NFL teams have access with lighter agent influence than NBA player representatives, and a different range of trading algorithms.
Is this an apples to oranges comparison?
“I think it’s apples and cantaloupes,” the NFC’s second-ranked executive told Yahoo Sports. “That’s a whole different math, but it’s a fascinating question.”
NBA Second Round Trade Landscape
Toronto acquired the No. 31 pick — the first of the second round — as part of its trade deadline deal that brought in Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett in exchange for OG Anunoby. “The Raptors are sitting on gold,” said one Eastern Conference staffer.
Toronto could theoretically field trade inquiries for much longer than the four minutes the Raptors will have once the second round begins. Utah, who currently holds the 32nd pick, has engaged in various trade scenarios to advance to the first round, according to sources. All of Milwaukee (No. 33), Portland (No. 34) and San Antonio (No. 35) are considered creative front offices that will evaluate deals with those picks, sources said. For these teams to stay, or for any team looking to move in, there will be plenty of value in adding second-round picks to expensive rosters, with tax savings becoming increasingly critical under the second apron of this new CBA and its series of penalties.
“If you can find a player that you like who could help you with a team-friendly second-round contract, that’s pretty interesting,” one general manager told Yahoo Sports. “You can go up, you can go down.”
Prices for a top pick in this year’s second round could reach four future second-round picks, several team executives told Yahoo Sports. There is precedent for Indiana, which holds the No. 36 pick in Thursday’s second round, having received three second-round picks from Miami in 2019, so the Heat could use the No. 32 pick to select KZ Okpala .
This year, agents are preparing to spend Wednesday night talking with teams about the potential guaranteed money their clients would seek, should the teams ultimately select their client first in the second round. A player could also be drafted at a certain slot in the second round if he agrees to sign a two-way contract in advance. The hours Wednesday extends into Thursday morning can be filled with clandestine conversations that determine teams’ selection of players before the second round even begins. How smoothly and efficiently this process goes could be a deciding factor for the team’s staff on whether they would support the continued two-night format for the NBA Draft moving forward.