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National Basketball Association Draft

The NBA draft is the National Basketball Association's (NBA) annual event, dating back to 1947, in which the teams in the league can draft players who declare for the draft and that are eligible to join their organization. The current NBA consists of 30 teams, and all thirty teams have at least one draft pick throughout the two draft rounds. Historically, the vast majority of players drafted into the NBA are college basketball players. It is now common for players to also be drafted from international professional leagues, the G League Ignite team, and youth professional basketball leagues. College players who have finished their four year college eligibility are automatically eligible for selection, while the underclassmen have to declare their eligibility and give up their remaining college eligibility. International players who are at least 22 years old are automatically eligible for selection, while the players younger than 22 have to declare their eligibility. Players who are not automatically eligible but have declared their eligibility are often called "early entrants" or "early entry candidates". The draft usually takes place near the end of June, during the NBA offseason. Since 1989, the draft has consisted of two rounds; this is much shorter than the entry drafts of the other major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada, all of which run at least seven rounds. Sixty players are selected in each draft. No player may sign with the NBA until he has been eligible for at least one draft. In the past, high school players were also eligible to be selected. However, starting in the 2006 draft, high school players were not eligible to enter the draft directly after graduating from high school. The eligibility rules for the draft now state that high school players will gain eligibility for draft selection one year after their high school graduation, and they must also be at least 19 years old as of the end of the calendar year of the draft. Some players have chosen to use that year to play professionally overseas for example, such as Brandon Jennings (Italy), Emmanuel Mudiay (China), and Terrance Ferguson (Australia). Thon Maker was eligible for the 2016 draft despite not going to college because he chose to undertake a postgraduate year, so he was technically one year removed from graduation.

Some players must be at least 19 years of age during the calendar year of the draft, and a player who completed basketball eligibility at an American high school must also be at least one year removed from the graduation of his high school class. Restrictions exist on players signing with sports agents and on declaring for, then withdrawing from, drafts—although most of them are enforced by the NCAA rather than the NBA. There had been only 44 draftees from high school to college to play in the NBA throughout this process. Any players who are not an "international player" must be at least one year out of the graduation of his high school class in order for them to qualify for the upcoming draft. Not many high school players went directly to the NBA draft for almost 20 years after Darryl Dawkins in 1975 because of the exposure of the college games. In the early years of the draft, teams would select players until they ran out of prospects. The 1960 and 1968 drafts went 21 rounds. By 1974, it had stabilized to 10 rounds (except 1977, when the rounds were eight), which held up until 1985, when the draft was shortened to seven rounds. By agreement with the National Basketball Players Association, the drafts from 1989 onward have been limited to two rounds, which gives undrafted players the chance to try out for any team. From 1956 through 1965, teams could use a territorial pick in which they forfeited their first round selection in order to choose a player from their immediate area. The player presumably had a strong local following to boost fan interest. From 2009 through 2015, the college underclassmen had until the day before the April signing period to withdraw their name from the draft and retain NCAA eligibility. Since 2016, players could enter the draft and participate in the NBA draft combine multiple times and retain NCAA eligibility by withdrawing from the draft within 10 days after the end of the mid May NBA draft combine.

The NBA draft lottery is an annual event held by the NBA, where the teams who did not make the playoffs in the past year participate in a state lottery style process in order to determine the order that the first several teams pick players in the draft. The lottery covered the first three picks until 2018, after which it was increased to the first four. The team with the worst record receives the best odds of receiving the first pick. The NBA introduced the lottery process in 1985. The league was attempting to counter accusations that certain teams were purposefully losing in order to gain a chance to participate in the annual coin flip, where the worst team in each division (each conference starting in 1971) flipped a coin to see who will receive the first pick in that year's upcoming draft. In the lottery system, the league uses "a lottery style ping pong ball machine with 14 balls numbered 1–14, and 1,000 four digit combinations are assigned to the 14 lottery teams." Attendees are not allowed cell phone or any other electronic access until the number one pick is revealed on the television broadcast. Yao has helped the NBA grow into a worldwide product. Beech (2003) goes on to write "Ratings for NBA games broadcast on Chinese TV have never been higher than this year as the nation keeps track of its new favorite team, Yao's Houston Rockets". On the other hand, the draft of 2000 has been regarded as the worst in NBA history, with Sports Illustrated calling its first round "a horrible group of players". The 2013 draft has also been called underwhelming, although Victor Oladipo and Rudy Gobert eventually became All Stars, and Giannis Antetokounmpo later became a two time NBA MVP.

The NBA draft has been televised since 1980, the same year the NFL and NHL televised (or publicized) theirs. USA Network broadcast the draft as part of its contract with the NBA until 1984; starting in 1985, TBS did so as part of its NBA on TBS package. From 1990 to 2002, TNT took over the draft as more NBA properties moved to the network (the NBA on TNT). When ESPN acquired the rights to the NBA from NBC in 2002, ESPN began broadcasting the draft (starting in 2003) with the NBA on ESPN, which it continues to do today. It was also televised on broadcast television for the first time on ABC in 2021. NBA TV has also produced its own coverage since coming under the purview of Turner Sports since 2008.