Twenty players have received invitations to attend the 2022 NBA draft and sit in the green room, sources told ESPN.
Jabari Smith, Chet Holmgren, Paolo Banchero, Jaden Ivey, Keegan Murray, Bennedict Mathurin, Dyson Daniels, Shaedon Sharpe, Jalen Duren, AJ Griffin, Johnny Davis received the first batch of 11 invites last Thursday, followed by Ousmane Dieng, Jeremy Sochan, Ochai Agbaji, Mark Williams and Malaki Branham on Monday.
TyTy Washington, Tari Eason, Jalen Williams and MarJon Beauchamp received what’s believed to be the final four invitations on Wednesday. The green room is a staging area in front of the NBA draft podium where players, families and agents await commissioner Adam Silver to call a player’s name upon selection.
The process of deciding which players to invite to the draft involves communication with presidents or general managers of teams picking throughout the first round. Teams are asked to vote on the top-25 players they expect to hear their names called first. This is to ensure that players aren’t sitting for very long under the bright lights before a national television audience as the second round approaches.
Receiving an invitation is considered a positive sign for a player’s draft stock, although there have been instances in the past of prospects falling to the second round while sitting in the green room. For example, Bol Bol, Deyonta Davis, Nic Claxton, Maciej Lampe, Rashard Lewis and others in the past.
All 20 players invited are currently projected among the top-23 prospects of the latest ESPN Top 100 rankings.
Jonathan Givony is an NBA Draft expert and the founder and co-owner of DraftExpress.com, a private scouting and analytics service utilized by NBA, NCAA and International teams.
Source : ESPN
