A look back to the biggest NBA Draft Lottery conspiracy theory: Did a frozen envelope land the Knicks the No. 1 pick?
The New York Knicks were transformed by the addition of Patrick Ewing in 1985 but rumors have swirled about behind-the-scenes dealings.
The 2025 NBA Draft Lottery will take place on Monday evening, a key event in the annual sporting calendar. When there is a stand-out talent in the player pool the stakes are raised and Duke’s Cooper Flagg looks to be a generational talent.
This year the Utah Jazz, Washington Wizard and the Charlotte Hornets are joint favorites to snatch the No. 1 overall pick, with a 14% chance for each. The mechanics behind the draw are carefully managed to maintain the integrity of the competition, but that hasn’t stopped rumors circulating about rigged lotteries in the past.
Perhaps the most widely-repeated is the conspiracy regarding the 1985 NBA Draft Lottery, an event that would prove to be a landmark in league history. That year was the first of the ‘lottery era’ and Georgetown star Patrick Ewing was a lock as No. 1 pick in the draft. The winner of that inaugural draft stood to gain a generational talent.
The New York Knicks were one of seven teams in contention to get the first pick after a 24-58 season in 1984/85. The Knicks had not made it past the Conference semi-final stage since winning a championship in 1973 and rumors had suggested that the NBA was desperate to have a successful New York team to help fuel the league’s commercial growth.
At the first-ever NBA Draft Lottery in 1985 an envelope containing the New York Knicks logo was indeed plucked from the hopper first, ensuring that they got the No. 1 draft pick. As expected they took Ewing and he went on to become and 11-time NBA All-Star during his 15-year association with the Knicks.
Since then, conspiracies about a fix have emerged, with some claiming that the envelope containing the Knicks logo was frozen, so then-Commissioner David Stern could distinguish it from the others. Others have claimed that the accountant from Ernst & Whinney who placed the envelopes in the hopper deliberately banged one against the side to create a small dent, enabling Stern to recognize it.
Of course, the fact that Stern was a New York native also helped to fuel the myth.
But now, 40 years on, there has never been any genuine evidence to suggest that there was anything untoward in the awarding of the No. 1 pick to the Knicks that year. Which, given the scale of the conspiracy that would have been required to manufacture the lottery result, does suggest that it was all above board.
And the arrival of Ewing, while undeniably significant, did not bring championships to New York. Ewing famously never won a championship during his 17-year professional career and the Knicks’ most recent triumph remains those distant championships in the early 1970s.
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