Daily NBA Fix 5-21-14: God Doesn’t Hate Cleveland, But You Probably Do

Apparently God Loves Cleveland Now

The only thing more drastic than the jump Edens’ number of Twitter followers made after representing the Milwaukee Bucks in the draft lotto was the Cleveland Cavaliers, who had a 1.7 percent chance at the No. 1 pick, earning that highly coveted top spot. The Cavs have now won back-to-back draft lotteries and three of the last four, yet they haven’t made the playoffs since LeBron James left. What used to be “God hates Cleveland” has turned into “God doesn’t hate Cleveland, but you probably do now.”

Other than Cavaliers fans, the near-unanimous reaction to the news that Cleveland would AGAIN be bailed out with a No. 1 draft pick was some combination of shock, confusion and outrage as cries of corruption and conspiracy filled the air. After pretty much whiffing on three top-4 picks in the last three seasons (not to mention nabbing first-rounders Tyler Zeller in 2012 and Sergey Karasev in 2013), it appears that the answer to the question, “How many more No. 1 picks do the Cavs need to get LeBron back?” is one more. Let the conspiracy-to-commit-LeBron back to Cleveland begin.

Though it’s pretty hard to go wrong with a top-3 pick in this particular draft, there’s a ton of pressure on Cleveland to get this one right. Whomever the Cavaliers draft is the key to keeping Kyrie Irving happy and giving LeBron more incentive to at least think about returning home after this season. Obviously we don’t want any young budding stars to get hurt, but wouldn’t it be the most Cleveland Cavaliers thing ever if they drafted Joel Embiid and the big man’s minor health concerns became major ones? Here’s hoping that No. 1 pick goes more in the way of Kyrie Irving than Anthony Bennett!

Unfortunately for Edens, the Milwaukee Bucks will settle for the No. 2 pick in the draft. However, this takes a ton of pressure off the Bucks to nail the first pick and they’ll have a much easier decision to make based on what the Cavs do. The Philadelphia 76ers, for all their miserable tanking this season, will settle for the No. 3 pick and quite possibly the easiest decision of any team in the first round, most likely taking whoever is left of the Andrew Wiggins-Jabari Parker-Joel Embiid trio.

Fortunately for conspiracy theorists, the Cavs were the only team to conspicuously benefit from draft lottery oddities, since the Los Angeles Lakers and Boston Celtics were bumped back to No. 7 and No. 6, respectively. The Detroit Pistons lost their draft pick to the Charlotte Hornets since it fell outside the top eight, while the Minnesota Timberwolves didn’t have to send their pick to the Phoenix Suns since it didn’t fall to No. 14. That fresh-to-death suit almost worked, Markieff Morris.