ST. FRANCIS, Wis. (AP) - In a deep draft, missing out on the No. 1 pick didn’t sting as much to the Bucks.
Milwaukee had the league’s worst record last season and a 25 percent chance of winning Tuesday’s lottery. Instead, the first selection went to the Cleveland Cavaliers, whose odds were just 1.7 percent.
The solace for the Bucks is that they’ll still have a chance to draft Jabari Parker, Andrew Wiggins or Joel Embiid.
“Those guys all have a chance to be, I think, stars of this league, be All-Stars in this league, and are guys that you can build with and build a championship franchise,” general manager John Hammond said Wednesday.
Parker was the highest-scoring freshman in Duke history (19.1 points per game) and is the first freshman to lead the Blue Devils in scoring and rebounding.
Kansas’ Wiggins averaged a school freshman-record 17.1 points and nearly six rebounds. His teammate Embiid, a 7-foot center, averaged 11.2 points and 8.1 rebounds while blocking 72 shots and earning Big 12 defensive player of the year honors.
“I think to a certain extent there probably is a little less pressure on a second pick and maybe could be better for the player in the short term and long run and maybe better for us,” Hammond said.
Still, Hammond said he wouldn’t be surprised if there are more discussions in the future about refining the lottery system to give the worst teams a better chance at the top pick.
“I don’t want to say it’s broke, but I do think obviously people know that maybe adjustments need to be made and it does need at least to be tweaked,” he said.
Milwaukee, which went 15-67 this season, will base its pick on the best player available rather than filling a particular position, Hammond said.
“You want a high-character person, a guy you look and say he can be a building block, cornerstone, franchise piece,” he said. “You know this piece we are looking for is a piece that is going to help us move toward a championship-caliber team.”
The Bucks also hold the 31st, 36th and 48th picks in the second round of the draft, which is June 26.
Hammond said he didn’t foresee them trading the No. 2 to stockpile more picks.
Hammond said he thought great things were getting ready to happen with the draft pick and the team’s new owners. The NBA’s board of governors unanimously approved the sale last week of the team to New York investment firm executives Wesley Edens and Marc Lasry.
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