What is the NBA Draft Green Room and who has been invited this year?
Chet Holmgren, Paolo Banchero and Jabari Smith are the top three names in a group of 20 from this year’s draft class heading to Brooklyn for the NBA Draft.
The Green Room. It sounds like something at a tv studio, or maybe a place where tropical plants are put on display, or maybe the name of a terrible scary movie. The NBA Draft Green Room in fact not a scary place at all, although nerves are a plenty on the selection day.
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No sleep til Brooklyn
The biggest names of the upcoming draft class have been invited to be in attendance for the 2022 NBA Draft this Thursday from the Barclays center. The 20 players who got the official invite to live the moment live from Brooklyn will wait for their name to be called as their NBA dream becomes a reality.
For the first time since 2019 players waiting to be drafted will be able to attend the selection show in person after the last two Drafts were carried out virtually due to the COVID pandemic. College basketball’s best will return to the Green Room in the Barclay’s Center, a place that has hosted the draft since 2013, COVID years excluded.
If you have seen the draft before, than you have most certainly seen the Green Room, even if you didn’t realize that’s what is called. It’s the area where the invited players sit, usually at their own table around family and their representation, in the area in front of the Draft stage where the commissioner calls out the names and shakes hands with the newest members of the league.
Green Room invited doesn’t secure first round selection
So far 20 of the best players from this years class have been invited to attend the draft at the Barclay’s Center. Jabari Smith, Chet Holmgren, Paolo Banchero, Jaden Ivey, Keegan Murray, Bennedict Mathurin, Dyson Daniels, Shaedon Sharpe, Jalen Duren, AJ Griffin and Johnny Davis were the first group of players invited on Thursday. Jeremy Sochan, Ochai Agbaji, Mark Williams and Malaki Branham received their invites on Monday, while TyTy Washington, Tari Easton, Jalen Williams and MarJon Beauchamp got what are assumed as the last invitations to be in attendance on Thursday.
The invitations are made based on conversations between the league and front office staff. Presidents or general managers of teams with first round picks draw up a list of 25 players they expect to be drafted in the opening round.
Getting invited to the Green Room is generally a great sign at a players chances of being selected in the first 30 picks, but not always a sure shot. Bol Bol, Deyonta Davis Nic Claxton, Maciej Lampers and Rashard Lewis were at the Green Room but had to wait until the second round to hear their names called.
The Orlando Magic have the first pick in the 2022 NBA Draft that will tip off on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. ET