NBA draft lottery crusher: Charlotte Hornets finish 2nd in a race with only one Victor

That, my friends, was a killer.

The Charlotte Hornets came an inch away from landing generational draft prospect Victor Wembanyama on Tuesday night in the NBA draft lottery. Instead, they finished second, and I’m having terrible flashbacks of 2012 and Charlotte’s near-miss on Anthony Davis.

Was your heart beating fast as the envelopes kept getting unveiled, starting with the No. 14 pick, and the Hornets logo kept not getting shown? Mine was.

Wembanyama is the sort of player who can change both a franchise and a city. Can you imagine 5-foot-10 Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young and 7-foot-5 Wembanyama starting their careers in the same year in the same place, one mile away from each other, both as No. 1 overall picks? Can you imagine a photo of Wembanyama, super-imposed into the Charlotte skyline? For a few minutes, I certainly could.

And then the envelope for the second pick was unveiled on live TV, and there sat the Hornets logo, usually a friendly dose of teal but a buzzy monstrosity in that moment.

Meanwhile, some guy in a suit quickly yelled in jubilation on-stage, and it turned out he represented the San Antonio Spurs, who instead got the No. 1 pick and Wembanyama. And that seems entirely unfair for a team that already has employed David Robinson and Tim Duncan and ridden them to numerous NBA championships, while the Hornets have never even made it to the Eastern Conference final.

The Hornets will still get a good player on June 22, when the actual draft is held. In fact, they moved up from a pre-draft position of No. 4 to a post-draft position of No. 2. Mitch Kupchak, Charlotte’s general manager, optimistically labeled this “an incredible stroke of luck” in his post-lottery comments.

But the gap between Wembanyama — watching the draft lottery from a party at 2:30 a.m. in France — and everyone else appears to be a yawning one. Charlotte likely will end up with either Alabama’s Brandon Miller — who has major off-court issues that must be explored — or G League Ignite guard Scoot Henderson. Again, I’m getting 2012 vibes.

In the 2012 draft, the Hornets had a hard-earned 25% chance of winning the No. 1 pick (they got those good odds by finishing 7-59, the worst season by percentage in NBA history). But instead Charlotte ended up with No. 2, where they chose Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, a nice guy who could play defense but couldn’t shoot straight in a league where three-pointers have become the gold standard. They should have chosen Damian Lillard or Bradley Beal, of course, but hindsight is 50-50, as Cam Newton once said.

In Tuesday’s 2023 draft lottery, the Hornets had only a 12.5% chance of getting the No. 1 pick. They had only a 48% chance of getting a top-four pick. Of the 14 teams in the lottery, 12 would gladly trade places with the Hornets in a heartbeat. Charlotte has three times had the No. 2 pick in the NBA draft, and besides MKG, they ended up with Emeka Okafor and, best of all, Alonzo Mourning. This No. 2 pick will be the Hornets’ highest since 2012, and whomever it is will have the benefit of getting passes thrown by LaMelo Ball.

“I think a lot of people would say that there’s a clear-cut top three and then there’s the next level,” Kupchak said, without making it clear whether he’s one of those people.

And yet, it feels like the Hornets lost the lottery Tuesday, because they lost out on the player LeBron James has labeled an “alien.” Wembanyama, only 19 and the pride of French basketball, will be the best player in the NBA by his third season — at least that’s what ESPN insider Adrian Wojnarowski said on the telecast, anonymously quoting his league sources.

Comedian Jerry Seinfeld once had a great line about second place. He was talking about Olympic silver medals, but it can just as easily be applied here. Seinfeld said you should never finish No. 2, because “when you win that silver it’s like, ‘Congratulations, you almost won. Of all the losers, you came in first of that group. You’re the number one loser.”

And the Hornets, who haven’t made the playoffs since 2016? Well, this draft lottery didn’t do them any favors. Owner Michael Jordan is already at least exploring selling his majority stake in the team.

Would MJ have been more likely to stick around to see how Wembanyama and Ball worked together? I don’t know, but it sure sounds to me like something he would have considered.

Now, though, Wembanyama is going to be off to Texas. And the Hornets are off to try and figure out what to do with the No. 2 draft pick, and Hornets fans have another great question to ask in their continuing, dejected game of “What if?” They came in second in a race with only one Victor.