Ever since the New York Knicks won the lottery (and the opportunity to draft Patrick Ewing) in 1985, the process of the NBA Lottery has been a magnet for conspiracy theories. The NBA Lottery is a game of luck for basketball teams to potentially win the first pick in the NBA draft. NBA.com describes the lottery like so: “Fourteen ping-pong balls numbered 1 through 14 will be placed in a lottery machine. There are 1,001 possible combinations when four balls are drawn out of 14, without regard to their order of selection. Prior to the lottery, 1,000 of those 1,001 combinations will be assigned to the 14 participating lottery teams.” The system used to consist of the commissioner of the NBA picking folders out of spinning wheel, but now has evolved into a much more efficient, fair process. The weighted system gives the team with the NBA’s worst record a 25 percent chance to win, the second-worst club a 19.9 percent chance, the third-worst a 15.6 percent chance and on down the line to the 14th and final non-playoff team with a 0.5 percent shot at the No. 1 overall pick.

The NBA Lottery has been deemed rigged in the past by many people around the US. This is mainly due to the lottery pick in 1985, when the New York Knicks were selected as the first overall pick, picking up superstar Patrick Ewing. In 1985, the lottery was still being decided by the NBA commissioner drawing envelopes from a wheel. The commissioner at the time had strong connections with the New York Knicks, which conjured more conspiracies after the Knicks won. Many people believe that the envelope containing the New York Knicks Logo was either frozen or folded before entering the spinning glass wheel. By doing either of those to the envelope, it would make it clear for the commissioner to tell which one was the Knicks’. Video evidence has attempted to show the flaw of the envelope, yet nothing has come of it. Although this case remains unsolved, it had led to many discussions about the fairness of the original lottery. The new system placed in is much more fair and efficient and makes it impossible to predetermine who the picks will be.