With the 2014 NBA Draft less than two months away, all the talk for the Los Angeles Lakers will be about which pick they will end up with in the NBA Draft Lottery and who will be available. While the Lakers finished with the sixth worst record in the NBA, they have a 6.3 percent chance of getting the first overall pick.
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With Kentucky’s Julius Randle officially declaring for the draft on Tuesday, he joins one of the most anticipated drafts in recent years that will also feature Jabari Parker, Andrew Wiggins, Joel Embiid, and Dante Exum. While the top-five teams will get a potential All-Star, much of the discussion has been able who the number one overall pick will be.
In a recent poll by ESPN, they asked 30 NBA executives who they would pick with the number one pick and Duke’s Jabari Parker came away with 17 votes:
Jabari Parker: 17 votes
Joel Embiid: 8 votes
Andrew Wiggins: 5 votes
Over the past couple of months, all three players have been in the conversation and the debate will surely continue leading up to the draft in June. While Parker is considered the most NBA-ready, Wiggins and Embiid potentially have the higher ceilings.
Since the Lakers have the sixth worst record, they will hope to land a top-three pick on May 20 as they are unable to get the fourth or fifth pick in the draft. With the Lakers looking to be competitive next season, GM Mitch Kupchak recently acknowledged that trading the lottery pick was a possibility.
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