How An NBA-Style Lottery Would Change The NFL Draft

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A Lottery Structure For The NFL Draft

One realistic model for an NFL draft lottery would be to borrow from the NBA, which has spent years adjusting its system to discourage tanking while still giving struggling teams access to elite prospects. Instead of automatically awarding the No. 1 pick to the team with the worst record, the NBA uses a weighted lottery among non-playoff teams to determine the top of the draft order. Under the current NBA format, the league’s 14 non-playoff teams are entered into the lottery, with the worst teams receiving the best odds but no guarantee of landing the top selection. Drawings are used to determine the first four picks, while the remaining lottery teams then select in reverse order of their regular-season records. In practice, that means only the top four slots are randomized, while picks five through 14 still follow the standings. The current probabilities to receive the No. 1 overall pick in the NBA Draft are:

• Team 1: 14.0%
• Team 2: 14.0%
• Team 3: 14.0%
• Team 4: 12.5%
• Team 5: 10.5%
• Team 6: 9.0%
• Team 7: 7.5%
• Team 8: 6.0%
• Team 9: 4.5%
• Team 10: 3.0%
• Team 11: 2.0%
• Team 12: 1.5%
• Team 13: 1.0%
• Team 14: 0.5%

INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA - FEBRUARY 26: Eli Stowers of the Vanderbilt Commodores speaks to the media during the 2026 NFL Draft Combine at the Indiana Convention Center on February 26, 2026 in Indianapolis, Indiana.(Photo by Vanderbilt Athletics/University Images via Getty Images)

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For this analysis, that same framework was applied to the NFL’s bottom 14 teams. The first four picks were determined using the NBA’s current lottery odds, while the remaining selections followed the NFL’s traditional reverse standings format. It offers a practical look at how a lottery could reshape draft incentives in the NFL and reduce the value of late-season losing.

Assigning Value To Picks In The NFL Draft

To evaluate a draft lottery through a business lens, draft position needs to be translated into something measurable. Simply saying a team moved from the No. 3 pick to the No. 7 pick does not fully capture what was gained or lost. The more useful question is how much draft capital changed hands. This analysis uses the widely cited NFL draft trade value chart. The chart assigns a numerical value to every pick based on the traditional model originally developed by former Dallas Cowboys coach and executive Jimmy Johnson.

INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA - FEBRUARY 28: Denzel Boston of the Washington Huskies participates in a drill during the 2026 NFL Scouting Combine at Lucas Oil Stadium on February 28, 2026 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Stacy Revere/Getty Images)

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Under that system, the top selections carry far more value than picks later in the round. For example, the No. 1 overall pick is worth 3,000 points, compared with 2,600 for No. 2, 2,200 for No. 3 and 1,800 for No. 4. By Pick No. 10, the value drops to 1,300 points, while Pick No. 14 is worth 1,100 points. This matters because the draft is effectively an asset market. Teams routinely package picks to move up, trade down for volume, or use selections as part of broader roster-building strategy. A small change in draft order can represent a meaningful change in value, especially near the top of the board where elite quarterback prospects often come off first.

To analyze how a lottery system would affect the NFL Draft, each team’s lottery odds are paired with the point value of every possible pick to calculate expected draft capital.

How A Lottery Would Affect Expected NFL Draft Value

Expected NFL Draft Position

To estimate how an NBA-style lottery would change draft value in the NFL, this analysis modeled the bottom 14 teams using the NBA’s current lottery odds. The top four picks were treated as lottery selections, with each possible ordered combination of four teams evaluated directly. For every possible top-four outcome, the probability of that exact sequence was calculated from the assigned lottery odds, and the remaining picks were then slotted in reverse standings order, just as they are in the NBA. For any specific top-four order of teams a, b, c, d, the probability is:

The probability for any specific top-four order of teams a, b, c, and d where w_i represents the lottery weight assigned to team i, and ∑w is the total weight across all 14 lottery teams.

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That produced an exact probability matrix showing how often each finish position in the bottom 14 would land each draft slot from No. 1 through No. 14. The probability matrix makes clear that an NBA-style lottery would flatten the draft incentives at the bottom of the NFL standings. Under the current NFL system, the worst team is guaranteed the No. 1 pick and each team behind it is locked into its corresponding slot. Under the lottery model, that certainty disappears. The worst team still has the best chance at the top selection, but only a 14.0% chance rather than a guarantee. It also has meaningful probabilities of falling to No. 2 (13.4%), No. 3 (12.7%), No. 4 (12.0%) and most notably No. 5 (47.9%). That means the league’s worst record would result in a top four pick a little over half of the time and otherwise be guaranteed the No. 5 pick, not the No. 1 pick.

Exact probabilities for each of the bottom 14 NFL teams to land every draft position under an NBA-style lottery model. Rows represent finish rank among the bottom 14 teams (1 = worst record), while columns represent final draft position. The top four picks are determined by lottery odds, with remaining selections assigned in reverse standings order. The results show that the worst team would have only a 14.0% chance at the No. 1 pick and would most often fall to No. 5, illustrating how a lottery would reduce the reward for finishing last while increasing upside for other struggling teams.

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Further down the standings, teams that would normally be locked into mid-lottery slots gain some upside. The ninth-worst team, for example, still has a 4.5% chance at No. 1, while the 10th-worst has a 3.0% chance. At the same time, teams closer to the playoff bubble would still most likely draft near their natural position. The 14th-worst team lands at No. 14 roughly 97.6% of the time, and the 13th-worst remains at No. 13 about 92.9% of the time. So the lottery primarily reshuffles the top of the board rather than the entire first round.

Expected NFL Draft Value

From there, expected draft position and expected draft value can be calculated for each team. A team’s expected value under the lottery is the sum of the value of each draft pick multiplied by the probability of receiving that pick.

Using those probabilities, expected draft position and expected draft value can then be calculated for each team where P(i→k) is the probability that team i receives Pick k, and V_k is the trade-chart value of that pick.

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Those expected values are then compared with the current NFL system, where draft order is deterministic and each finish position maps directly to a single pick. A lottery does not eliminate the advantage of finishing near the bottom, but it does compress the gap between finishing worst and finishing just a few spots higher. In economic terms, it lowers the marginal return to tanking by replacing a guaranteed reward with a probabilistic one.

The sharpest impact would be felt by the league’s worst teams. The team finishing with the worst record would see expected draft value decline by 30.7%, while the second-worst team would fall 20.8% and the third-worst 7.3%. Those teams still retain the best odds at premium picks, but they lose the certainty that currently comes with occupying the very bottom of the standings.

Expected NFL draft pick value for the bottom 14 teams under the current standings-based system versus an NBA-style lottery model. Values are based on the Pro Football Reference draft trade value chart. The lottery sharply reduces the payoff for finishing with the league’s worst record while increasing expected draft capital for teams finishing just behind the bottom three, flattening the incentive curve tied to late-season losing.

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The primary winners would be teams just behind them. A team finishing fourth-worst would gain 9.9% in expected draft value, the fifth-worst would gain 11.4%, and the sixth-worst would rise 13.3%. Gains continue through the middle of the lottery field, peaking at 16.5% for the eighth-worst team. Rather than being locked into lower selections, those franchises gain a realistic path into the top four. Even teams closer to the playoff bubble would benefit modestly. The ninth-worst team improves 14.0%, the 10th-worst gains 10.4%, and the 14th-worst team still posts a 2.7% increase in expected value. While those clubs would still most often draft near their natural position, the lottery introduces upside that does not exist in the current system.

The broader takeaway is that a lottery redistributes draft capital away from the bottom three teams and across the rest of the non-playoff field. Bad teams would still be rewarded, but the outsized premium attached to finishing with the league’s worst record would be significantly reduced.

What The NFL Draft Lottery Results Really Show

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The results point to a clear conclusion: an NFL draft lottery would not eliminate the value of being a bad team, but it would materially reduce the premium attached to being the very worst team in the league. Under the current system, finishing last guarantees the No. 1 pick and the full asset value that comes with it. Under a lottery, the worst team would still hold the best odds at the top selection, but it would no longer fully control that outcome. Instead, some of the draft capital now concentrated at the bottom of the standings would be redistributed across several struggling franchises.

The biggest beneficiaries would be teams that are bad but not broken. Clubs finishing fourth through eighth from the bottom would gain the most expected draft value because they would retain relatively strong positioning while adding a realistic chance to move into the top four. A lottery would still reward weakness, but it would place a higher value on competitiveness than the league’s current model.

This article was originally published on Forbes.com