Deep inside a sterile room perched on the edge of Lake Michigan, a quiet "yes" broke the tension. Austin Ainge couldn't help but smirk as he later explained his outburst. "Well, I couldn't just sit there and do nothing."

The Utah Jazz's president of basketball operations had spent the past year on a mission: create some much-needed lottery luck where none had existed before. After guiding his team to 60 losses—securing the fourth-best odds in the draft lottery—Ainge took nothing for granted. He personally surveyed every potential draft room representative, searching for the one with the best fortune.

The search revealed the battle scars of the past four years. Ainge gathered his front office executives and asked, "Who wants it?" One by one, his colleagues' luck ran dry. "Justin Zanik said he'd already gone and lost," Ainge recalled. "Danny Ainge, same thing. Ryan Smith went and didn't get the pick."

With a mix of determination and humor, Ainge made his decision. "You're all fired, I said. I'll be the one to go." And when the ping-pong balls finally fell his way, that single "yes" echoed through the room—a small but significant victory in the high-stakes world of NBA draft positioning.