Many National Basketball Association executives and analysts claim that the best way to contend for a championship is to get very high draft picks, which may require losing many games. We test whether building through the draft promotes winning in several ways. We test whether having more and higher draft picks promotes improvement and whether giving draft picks more playing time helps teams win more. We find that the draft is not necessarily the best road to success. An excellent organization and General Manager better enable teams to succeed even without high draft picks.
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