The first round of the 2024 NBA Draft is in the books, so what have we learned?
Things went expected for a while, then went off the rails entirely, then settled in for a long and relatively uneventful night. Zaccharie Risacher went No. 1 to the Atlanta Hawks as expected, with the Washington Wizards following up with Alex Sarr at No. 2.
As it turns out, those two picks set the tone for the draft. Here are five takeaways from the 2024 NBA Draft first round.
1. The top of the draft went chalk — at least the top four picks.
Risacher was the favorite to go No. 1 the last few weeks, but Reed Sheppard caught late buzz Wednesday and was getting significant steam from bettors in the hour or two leading up to the draft after Adrian Wojnarowski mentioned he was on the table.
But the Hawks stuck with the guy everyone had expected in Risacher, Sarr went second, and then Sheppard was the pick in Houston, again just as everyone expected if the Rockets kept the pick. That was the 1-2-3 exacta with some of the shortest odds all along, and bettors who bet chalk profited on Wednesday night.
Stephon Castle was chalk at No. 4 to the Spurs, too. But that's when things finally got interesting.
Ron Holland was all over the map in mock drafts and had fallen well out of the top five in most books but went No. 5 anyway, and relative unknown Tidjane Salaun was perhaps the biggest surprise of the night at No. 6.
Zach Edey was another surprise into the top 10 — he was +750 to do so earlier this week when we bet it — and the Wolves pulled off a shock trade into the top 10 for Rob Dillingham. We'll get back to that one.
2. The French pipeline to the NBA is wide open.
This is the second straight season a French player has gone No. 1 in the NBA draft, with Risacher following Victor Wembanyama last year, but the French connection was only just getting started with the first pick.
Sarr played ball in Australia this year but is French himself, meaning France went 1-2 atop the draft, and Salaun's surprise selection at No. 6 means France had half of the top six. Pacome Dadiet was another surprise pick later in the first at No. 25, yet another Frenchman getting his name called on Wednesday night.
For years, the French national team has been competitive internationally with the likes of Tony Parker, Rudy Gobert, and Boris Diaw, but the list of NBA names wasn't long after that.
Now it looks like France is ready to compete at the highest level, and this as we get ready one month from today to head to Paris for the Summer Games, where the American team will be huge favorites to win gold in men's hoops.
Already, the league has been getting more and more international. Nikola Jokic is from Serbia, Luka Doncic from Slovenia, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is from Canada, and Joel Embiid is Cameroonian-born.
Those are four of the brightest stars in the NBA, and Wembanyama will soon join the list if he hasn't already. But this time, he could have an entire French pipeline of talent coming up along with him. Will Team USA finally meet its match on the international stage?
3. The Timberwolves made the biggest trade on draft night.
Not many would have expected Minnesota to be much of a story on Wednesday night.
Don't forget, the Wolves don't exactly have a heap of picks in the war chest. This team already emptied the cupboards in the Rudy Gobert trade. Minnesota still owes Utah picks or swaps in 2025, 2026, 2027, and 2029.
The earliest pick the Timberwolves could even trade away is as far out as 2031 — and that's exactly what Minnesota did. The Wolves traded that pick along with swap rights in 2030 to swoop in from out of nowhere right into the top 10, where Minnesota took slight-of-frame Rob Dillingham, a microwave scorer who doesn't play much defense but can fill it up in a hurry.
That might be exactly what these Timberwolves need, and they were certainly short on scoring options outside of Anthony Edwards. This is a team that clearly believes it's close right now, and one that believes Dillingham can help them these next few years while Gobert and Mike Conley are still helping the team contend.
But man — this is a risky trade.
Whatever you think of Dillingham, it is simply bad process in a draft everyone agrees is the worst in at least a decade to trade away potentially two firsts, almost entirely unprotected, to move up for a big swing. The No. 8 pick in 2024 may not even be a lottery pick in many drafts, and that's before considering if Dillingham is the right pick or fit for this team, with a similar scoring skill set to Edwards.
Minnesota didn't have many pathways to adding talent, and this was one way to get there. The Timberwolves are all-in. It remains to be seen whether this playoff run was as close as this iteration of the team will ever get.
4. A quieter, later trade may have a bigger impact on next year's title picture.
It didn't happen until near the end of the first round, but a trade between the Nuggets and Suns could quietly end up impacting basketball next May and June more than anything else that happened Wednesday night.
Denver had been heavily connected to Dayton's DaRon Holmes leading up to the draft but didn't know if it could land him at No. 28, so the Nuggets paid three second-round picks to move up to No. 22 and get their man.
Holmes is a versatile do-everything big man who can dribble, pass, and shoot. He's probably going to be a bench guy caught between the four and the five, but Denver has long needed a reliable backup to Nikola Jokic and never got that from DeAndre Jordan or Zeke Nnaji this season.
This is an investment in Jokic's future, and it's a bet on a big man that hit 39% of his 3s and improved his shot each year in school. Makes a lot of sense in Denver.
The team on the other end of that deal was the Suns, and they made out pretty well too. Phoenix actually needs those extra second rounders, as thin as the roster is and with so few draft picks in the war chest, and the Suns walked away with a guy I had ranked in my personal top 10 anyway in Ryan Dunn.
Dunn is maybe the best wing defender I've ever evaluated in the draft, and though he is almost as bad offensively, what team in the NBA more badly needs defense but not offense than these Phoenix Suns? Dunn is a perfect fit, and if he can find a shot or any offensive value, he could be a steal à la Herb Jones or other All-Defense candidates buried in the draft that found offense later.
Don't be surprised to see both DaRon Holmes and Ryan Dunn play featuring roles in next year's playoffs.
5. Bronny James didn't find a home… yet.
There were a few surprise round one omissions — Duke's Kyle Filipowski was especially surprising — but the big name to watch in Thursday's second round is Bronny James, LeBron's son.
Bronny was never really expected to go in the first round, but the Lakers are sitting on a No. 55 pick right before the end of the draft, and Los Angeles has been heavily linked to Bronny the entire draft process and favored just as strongly by sports books.
Bettors should be careful betting on the Lakers to be the team that drafts Bronny. Most books have language specifying that the winner of that bet will be whichever team drafts Bronny, regardless of trades. The second round is traditionally chock full of teams trading picks and even effectively buying them, and the Lakers certainly have the cash.
Everyone expects Bronny to be a Laker one way or another by the end of Thursday, but that doesn't mean it's a lock, nor that it will happen the way everyone expects.
And if Bronny isn't a Laker by the end of Thursday… well, then let's just say dad might just become the big story of this draft, since that could be the signal that LeBron is unhappy with the Lakers and ready for a move.
Anyone up for one last Summer of LeBron?
See you in round two.
