Sacramento Kings: 6 bold predictions for the 2020-2021 season

Prediction #6: Kings get top-4 pick in 2021 Draft

There are a couple of ways that the Sacramento Kings can secure themselves a top-4 pick in next year’s draft, one being a bit more feasible than the other.

There is a chance that the Kings are one of the worst teams in the league by season’s end. While they have a few nice pieces to begin the year, the team could undergo drastic changes before and around the trade deadline. There are contracts that the new regime would like to rid themselves of, and they belong to veteran players who are major contributors. Should Sacramento be the sellers that many expect them to be, there will be very few tallies in the win column coming down the stretch. The Kings should be one of the Western Conference’s worst teams by season’s end, even if they start out surprisingly well.

The other path to a top-4 pick is a bit less likely. Should the Kings modestly surpass expectations and finish, say, in 9th place in the lottery, then they will have roughly a 20 percent chance of landing near the top. This would take some serious help from the Basketball Gods, who blessed Sacramento in 2018, who in turn made a massive draft blunder. But Vlade Divac is gone now, and Monte McNair, and the entire organization for that matter, deserve a shot at a high-ranking prospect.