The odds are established, and they are immutable. However, the NBA draft lottery is an individual sample, a one-shot deal. Over time and multiple drawings, the odds would play out as expected. With only one shake of the balls, things can get weird. Can we affect that single sample with ritual? I don't know, but I'm not just gonna sit here and not try.
... which is why we're putting envelopes in freezers. 30 years ago, the Knicks won the opportunity to draft Patrick Ewing when David Stern randomly selected their lottery envelope as the one to receive the first pick ... or it wasn't random and someone, they say, froze the envelope to guide Stern's hand. Which was it? Who knows!? Probably the first thing. But as a tribute to those fortuitous odds, and as an offering to the basketball gods, I suggest we freeze envelopes today and leave them in there until the night of the 2015 NBA Draft lottery. Why not?
I decided to write the name of my favorite prospect on an envelope ...
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... and stick it in the freezer:
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It'll stay there until May 19. Other members of my household have been sternly warned not to remove it. If it works and the Knicks get the top pick, I will praise the basketball gods and bathe in the glorious May rains. If it doesn't, I will forget this ever happened and/or forsake the gods.
Got an envelope and a freezer? Join in! Write whatever you want in/on on the envelope and make it nice and chilly. If not, there will be more offerings to the gods over the next month. This is but the first.