What to expect from Europe in the 2026 NBA Draft
It’s only January but the early draft boards seem to indicate it won’t be a Euro-heavy NBA Draft in 2026. An off year for the continent is not surprising but there is a longer trend that surprised Emmet Ryan.
As things stand, there might only be one European player that goes as a lottery pick in the 2026 NBA Draft. A consensus of the big boards has 10 Europeans expected to go across the two rounds.
Yet there’s balance when it comes to those expected to get drafted, with either a 4/6 or 5/5 split between guards and forwards depending on how you define Andrej Stojakovic. That points to the crisis in Euro guard development perhaps not being as stark as first thought.
The terrific 10
I’ve gone from the consensus of the better acknowledged big boards when putting this together. Given how largely wild the second round of the NBA Draft tends to be, I fully expected some of these to not get picked and some other Euros to get in that are on the outside right now.
For now, the terrific 10* are: Hannes Steinbach, Neoklis Avdalas, Dame Sarr, Henri Veesaar, Aday Mara, Sergio De Larrea, Tomislav Ivišić, Andrej Stojaković, Johann Grünloh, Adam Atamna.
Of these, only Steinbach is currently predicted on most boards to go in the lottery. Even then he’s at the tail end of it. That Sam Vecenie has him projected there has me somewhat confident that, barring injury, Steinbach will go to a lottery team.
*The list is based on a consensus of major NBA draft big boards, including the Athletic, ESPN, Tankathon, CBS Sports, and No Ceilings.
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Now lets look at a pattern
European players drafted in the NBA since 2006, showing annual totals and guard vs non-guard splits.
The trend, at least in my head, was that guards from Europe haven’t been getting drafted as frequently as they used to. As you can see clearly, that’s simply not the case. If anything, there has been an uptick in recent years based on the graph above.
Only twice in the last 20 years have more European guards been drafted than forwards. Proportionately that makes sense but it’s worth noting that the last two drafts have seen guards outperform every NBA Draft by volume except for 2016.
With the current split, as stated above, being either 4/6 (perfectly proportional) or 5/5 (which seems more rational as Andrej Stojakovic is rarely mentioned as 3 and really is a SG), that trend looks set to continue. The forecast drop to 10 is a bit of a slump compared to the past two years but still in line with the overall upward long-term trend.
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The obvious value pick
There’s a reason that I put him as the image for this article. Sergio De Larrea is forecast somewhere between picks 30 and 33 across the big boards in the 2026 NBA Draft. Should he stay there, that is comically good value for whoever gets him in June.
De Larrea has built up some real grown-man experience in the past 18 months. He was clearly Spain’s most comfortable ballhandler in a disappointing EuroBasket campaign for the national side. More impressive still has been his work with Valencia, where despite his minutes not being heavy in Euroleague they have been extraordinarily efficient.
In heavier usage in Liga Endesa, he’s managed to largely maintain that level of efficiency. Considering how well Valencia are performing right now (14-7 in Euroleague and 11-3 ACB) that’s far from shabby. He’s got the efficiency and he’s passing the eyeball test to be able to slot into grown-up ball at the top level right now. If he’s still on the board where he’s currently projected, he screams of a bargain.
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