The right combination of ping-pong balls in Sunday’s NBA draft lottery would change the Clippers’ immediate future. Another combination gives them a 2031 draft asset that they could use in a variety of ways.
All of this will be determined by how the lottery odds play out for the Indiana Pacers.
The Clippers and Pacers are directly linked in this year’s lottery because of the trade deadline deal that sent longtime Clippers center Ivica Zubac to Indiana in exchange for a 2026 protected first-round draft pick and a 2029 unprotected Pacers first-rounder, along with Bennedict Mathurin and Isaiah Jackson.
If the Pacers land among the top four lottery teams on Sunday (noon PT, ABC/Ch. 7) – and they have a 52.1% chance to do so – they will retain their pick. But if the lottery drops them outside the top four to No. 5 or No. 6, the Clippers inherit the selection and have the opportunity to add another valuable young piece from a talent-laden draft that could help reset their future.
If Indiana keeps its pick, the Clippers then get the Pacers’ 2031 first-rounder instead, which would be fully unprotected and valuable as a potential trade chip down the road.
There is a 27.8% of the Clippers ending up with the No. 5 pick and a 20.1% chance for the No. 6 slot, and either scenario could certainly aid the team’s quest to build a title contender as it heads into an uncertain offseason.
This year’s draft class includes top prospects such as BYU’s AJ Dybantsa, Kansas’ Darryn Peterson, Duke’s Cameron Boozer, North Carolina’s Caleb Wilson and Arkansas’ Darius Acuff Jr., among others.
“Either way, we’re going to get the team better,” Lawrence Frank, the Clippers’ president of basketball operations, said last month after the team finished ninth in the Western Conference at 42-40 before being eliminated by No. 10 seed Golden State in the first round of the Play-In Tournament.
“There are so many different potential options, some within our control, some that aren’t, but it’s our job to literally turn over every stone, every rock to figure out how we can get this team back to contender status.”
The Clippers’ 2026 first-round pick (unprotected) already belongs to the Oklahoma City Thunder as part of the Paul George trade in 2019. It currently sits at No. 12 with a 7.1% chance of landing in the top four.
The three worst teams this season – Washington, Indiana and Brooklyn – all have 14% odds of winning the lottery. Utah and Sacramento each have an 11.5% chance of winning. The drawings will be conducted to determine the first four picks, and the remaining lottery teams will select in positions five through 14 in reverse order of their 2025-26 regular-season records.
Last year, the Clippers selected center Yanic Konan Niederhauser with the 30th overall pick. They took guard Kobe Brown in the same position in 2024.