NBA draft 2024 - Pelton's updated top 30 prospects - ESPN

With the field set for next week's NBA draft after last Sunday's deadline for early entrants to withdraw, it's time for the final version of my stats-based projections for this year's prospects.

These projections are expressly not an attempt to predict where players will be drafted. That's the province of ESPN's Jonathan Givony and Jeremy Woo. However, my projections may be more telling for who some teams will draft than others.

Over the past five drafts (2019 to 2023), the three teams that have added the most value on a per-pick basis relative to what we would expect based on where they picked all have ties to the Houston Rockets' front office. Along with Houston, that group includes the Philadelphia 76ers, who hired longtime Rockets executive Daryl Morey in 2020, and the Sacramento Kings, who hired Monte McNair from Houston in 2020 as their lead executive. Those teams rank just ahead of the Golden State Warriors and Utah Jazz.

Although Morey oversaw only one of those drafts, the Rockets themselves are far and away No. 1 by this measure, getting almost double the expected value of their picks. Houston picked the two players who most exceeded the expectations for their draft spot, Alperen Sengun at No. 16 in 2021 and Cam Whitmore at No. 20 last year.

That makes the Rockets' No. 3 pick especially interesting this season. Depending on how the first two picks go, Houston could have its choice of the top two players in my projections, Kentucky guard Reed Sheppard and UConn center Donovan Clingan. The latest mock draft from Givony and Woo has the Rockets picking Sheppard.

My projections translate performance in NCAA Division I, the Nike EYBL AAU competition and top professional leagues to an NBA equivalent then adjust for age