Consensus NBA Mock Draft: The lottery picks, starting with Wembanyama

Usually the top handful of picks in the NBA Draft are all but scripted and things don’t get interesting until further down the board. Not this year. The intrigue starts with No. 2 and whether Charlotte will even hold on to the No. 2 pick.

What follows is the NBC Sports NBA Mock Draft for the lottery picks. This is a consensus based on other mock drafts as well as talking to sources around the league about where they have players on their boards. I am not a scout, I don’t have their eye and haven’t watched hours of tape on all these players, which is why we are leaning on those that have — ESPN, The Athletic, the Ringer and more — but modified based on my sourcing.

Here is how the lottery shakes out in our NBA Mock Draft:

1. San Antonio Spurs Victor Wembanyama, 7’4″ center, France. The most hyped prospect of a generation, this is an easy call. The Spurs will bring him along more slowly than some of the loud voices in the NBA punditry would like, but the Spurs know what they’re doing. They have a guy who can do this.

Putback dunk off his own stepback 3