After months of monitoring the NBA's reverse standings, refreshing Tankathon.com and studying the intricacies of base odds and random drawings, we now know what the Sixers' exact odds for each draft slot will be when the NBA Draft Lottery is held on May 12 in Chicago.
As they near the conclusion of a 2024-25 season that has been hellish from start to finish, the Sixers have one possible saving grace: their first-round pick, which only stays in their own hands if it falls in the top six picks. If the pick lands at No. 7 or lower, it will belong to the Oklahoma City Thunder as a result of Sixers President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey's first move upon taking over the Sixers, a trade back at the 2020 NBA Draft which helped the Sixers shed Al Horford's contract.
Now, this much is official: the Sixers will finish this season with the fifth-worst record in the NBA. A team occupying the No. 5 slot in the lottery standings has nearly a 2-in-3 chance of finishing in the top six, and a 10.5 percent chance of winning the entire lottery. Bookmark this, as it will help you out for the next month. These are the Sixers' odds of having their pick land in each spot within their range of outcomes:
| Draft Pick | Percentage chance |
| 1 | 10.5% |
| 2 | 10.5% |
| 3 | 10.6% |
| 4 | 10.5% |
| 5 | 2.2% |
| 6 | 19.6% |
| 7 | 26.7% |
| 8 | 8.7% |
| 9 | 0.6% |
For those of you who would rather not do the mental math or use a calculator, here is the bottom line when it comes to the Sixers having a top-six pick or coming away empty-handed:
| Outcome | Percentage chance |
| Sixers keep pick | 64.0% |
| Sixers lose pick | 36.0% |
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As dreadful as the Sixers' final months have been, every loss they piled up mattered, as they enabled the team to avoid the No. 6 slot in the lottery where they would have had less than a 50 percent chance of keeping their pick.
If the Sixers do end up keeping their first-rounder this season, their obligation to Oklahoma City will not be extinguished: the Sixers would then owe the Thunder their 2026 first-round pick with a top-four protection. If that pick also did not convey, the top-four protection would be in effect once again as the Sixers owe their 2027 first-rounder to Oklahoma City. Only at that point, if the pick still has not conveyed, the Sixers would be out of the woods, merely owing their 2027 second-round pick to the Thunder.
Another note: this locks the Sixers' second-round pick into the No. 35 slot. The Sixers were initially slated to not have any picks in the second round in 2025, but when they sent Caleb Martin to the Dallas Mavericks in exchange for Quentin Grimes, the Sixers also regained their own second-round pick this June while sending out their 2030 second-rounder. That deal continues to look better for the Sixers.
And now, we wait for one month and another day for the main event…
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