The New Orleans Hornets won the rights to the first overall selection in the 2012 draft. The Hornets were a league-owned team prior to the draft, leading to continued conspiracy theories about the lottery process. Further suspicions were raised in 2016 and 2017, where former 76ers player Dikembe Mutombo congratulated Philadelphia for winning the first overall pick in the 2016 draft early via Twitter and recently hired Lakers president of basketball operations Magic Johnson and coach Luke Walton stating that the Lakers were going to get a Top 3 pick in the 2017 draft despite having higher odds of losing the pick to Philadelphia weeks before the draft lottery even began that year respectively. The latter selection also had the Lakers be in prime position to take Lonzo Ball, a prime high school and college standout point guard from nearby Chino Hills, California, with his father LaVar talking about him being on the Lakers months before the event took place.