2021 NBA Draft Lottery: Who should each team take with the No. 1 pick?

In theory, the Thunder are firmly in best-player-available mode, which should lead them to Cunningham. They have some interesting young talent in Lu Dort, Darius Bazley and Aleksej Pokuševski and a burgeoning star in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. But they’re not close enough to contention or playoff-chasing to really worry about trying to fill specific holes at this point. But things are also so wide-open for the Thunder that they could take Mobley simply because they’ll have so many other options at the best-player-available apple.

There’s a roughly 5.5 percent chance that the Thunder not only win the lottery but also end up with the No. 5 pick as the Houston Rockets land outside their top-four protection and have to send their pick over. The Thunder also have the No. 16 and No. 18 picks this year and six total first-round picks (and a pick swap with the Clippers) over the 2022 and 2023 drafts. I’d probably take Cunningham if I were them, but I’m just a basketball blogger and maybe they’re seeing a long-game the rest of us can’t.