2025 NBA Draft Winners & Losers
Scott Morris | July 2, 2025
If you blinked, you might have missed it. The 2025 NBA Draft was here and now it’s gone. The league held its annual draft on Wednesday, June 25, and Thursday, June 26. The first overall pick was no surprise. Duke’s Cooper Flagg was expected to go No. 1 before the college basketball season ended.
There were some surprises after Flagg and a number of NBA teams made some big moves. Some of those were viewed as positive moves, others, not so much. So, who won and who lost in the 2025 NBA Draft?
Let’s take a look.
Dallas Mavericks – Big Winner
The Mavericks are, of course, the big winner with the selection of Cooper Flagg at No. 1. He is a generational talent who has the ability to lead despite his age. Dallas has a strong cast around him – Dereck Lively II, Daniel Gafford, PJ Washington, Klay Thompson, Anthony Davis, and the injured Kyrie Irving.
You can question Nico Harrison’s decision to ship Luka Doncic out of Dallas, but he is building something that could be very special over the next few years with Flagg as the catapult. Don’t forget, despite all their turmoil last season with Luka and injuries, Dallas still made the play-in tournament. Getting Flagg was a huge win on draft night.
Giddy Up Spurs
The Spurs took Victor Wembenyana with last year’s first pick and are laying building blocks around him with two first-round picks in this year’s draft. Remember, the Spurs picked up De’Aaron Fox at the trade deadline and now have a do-it-all hybrid player in Dylan Harper.
Harper is a 6-5 guard with a 6-10 wingspan that will help him improve defensively in the NBA. He can shoot and score from anywhere. Plus, the Spurs added former Arizona F Carter Bryant. He’s a 6-7 and is a strong two-way perimeter player.
Those two plus Marquette G Kam Jones made it one successful draft for the Spurs.
Hornets Find Some Sting
It was a bit of a surprise that Charlotte took Flagg’s Duke teammate Kon Knueppel with the fourth overall pick. However, Knueppel has all the makings of an outstanding All-Star caliber pro. He hit 41 percent from three-point range and 91 percent from the free throw line at Duke last year. He’s a solid passer and a very smart player.
The Hornets also got UConn’s Liam McNeeley at the end of the first round. McNeeley’s stock dropped a bit as he missed a bunch of games last season with an ankle injury, but he is a great shooter. He’s a career 38 percent three-point shooter, though he struggled at UConn when he came back from the injury. He can become an instant rotation player because of his ability to shoot.
No Pick But a Winner
The Atlanta Hawks selected Maryland C Derik Queen and then traded him to New Orleans. The trade allowed the Hawks to move down to No. 23 in the first round and pick one of the sleepers in the draft – Georgia F Asa Newell.
Not only do the Hawks add a power forward who can essentially do it all, they also get an unprotected first round pick in next year’s draft. That pick will be the best pick available owned by New Orleans or the Milwaukee Bucks. That could be another top 10 pick for a Hawks team that is so close to becoming a contender.
What Were the Pelicans Thinking?
If the Hawks won on the previously mentioned deal, the Pelicans are the losers. They selected Jeremiah Fears, a guard out of Oklahoma, who was not projected to go at No. 7. Then, the Pelicans traded up to 13 to acquire Derik Queen, who they probably could have got at No. 23.
Instead, New Orleans will now give up next year’s first round pick, probably a top 10 pick too. One NBA assistant GM commented that this is the worst trade, minus the Luka deal this year, that the NBA has seen in a decade.
Five Picks for the Loss
The Brooklyn Nets had five first-round picks in the 2025 draft. They used them all. Most figured they would trade at least one of the final two picks at No. 26 and No. 27. The Nets wound up selecting a few players much higher than most thought they would have gone.
The Nets took Egor Demin at No. 8. Demin is probably the best passer in the draft, but he leaves much to be desired in the rest of his game. The Nets took three more guards – Nolan Traore, Ben Saraf, and Drake Powell – in the round. Traore is from France and Saraf from Israel. Powell played at North Carolina last season.
The best of their picks was likely 6-11 Michigan F Danny Wolf at No. 27. He’s got great perimeter and passing skills and probably should have gone higher. He’ll have an opportunity to play right away in Brooklyn, but the rest of the crew is suspect at best.
Big Rip City
The Trail Blazers did it again. They did add the pick at No. 16 and another unprotected pick in the 2028 draft. They also got two future second-round picks, but they turned around and used their first-round pick on 7-foot–1-inch Chinese C Yang Hansen.
Sure, he’s big. He’s got a 9-foot-3-inch reach, but he is slow-footed, and will need time to adapt to the NBA, especially on defense. He is China’s best prospect in years, but most NBA executives gave Hansen a second-round grade. Time will tell, but the Trail Blazers could have selected a more proven big man at No. 16.
