• The Boston Celtics have expressed interest in moving up into the lottery. The Celtics have the 21st and 22nd picks in the first round. Their number one target is reportedly Duke guard Austin Rivers, son of Celtics head coach Doc Rivers.
• The New Orleans Hornets also have Rivers atop their list for the No. 10 pick. This means that Boston would have to try and move into the top nine to take Rivers. The only teams who could conceivably move out of the top 10 are the Sacramento Kings or the Golden State Warriors although neither seems likely.
• Kings and Rockets trade talks for the No. 5 pick have intensified. The Rockets are looking to get the fifth pick to take Andre Drummond. Sacramento doesn’t seem to be sold on any player to draft except for Thomas Robinson. Once Robinson is drafted, if it is before No. 5, the Kings will likely pull the trigger on trading the fifth pick to Houston for a few of their first round picks and Kyle Lowry.
• The Charlotte Bobcats who have been shopping their No. 2 overall pick for awhile now have reportedly narrowed down the candidates to the Cavaliers and Rockets. The Rockets number one mission is to get pieces to send Orlando’s way for Dwight Howard. The Cavs have the 4th and 24th pick in the first round and any deal for the No. 2 pick with Charlotte would include both of those.
• This means the Thunder are 99% not trading James Harden. It never felt like it was really going to happen anyway.
• The player most teams seem to want to get at No. 2 is Bradley Beal, unless the pick stays with Charlotte in which case they’d likely pick Thomas Robinson. Beal will not drop past Washington at No. 3.
• If Beal is off the board at No. 3, the Wizards would still likely look for a shooter as opposed to picking Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. They went into the draft many believed having Harrison Barnes high on their board and would also possibly take Dion Waiters instead of MKG.
• The Portland Trailblazers really want Damian Lillard. They have the 6th and 11th overall picks. They have heard that Lillard will not be available at 11 so they may have to take him at 6.
• The Detroit Pistons will reportedly select John Henson at No. 9 if he is there. Drummond may drop to No. 9 but if he doesn’t, Detroit is probably going with Henson.
• The Thunder aren’t necessarily looking to pick a player at No. 28 that will play next year. That means they could be leaning toward Evan Fournier from France and also now Kostas Papanikolaou of Greece.

Here is our most recent 2012 NBA Mock Draft.

#	Team	Player	Pos	School
1	New Orleans	Anthony Davis	C	Kentucky
2	Charlotte	Thomas Robinson	PF	Kansas
3	Washington	Michael Kidd-Gilchrist	SF	Kentucky
4	Cleveland	Bradley Beal	SG	Florida
5	Sacramento	Andre Drummond	C	Connecticut
6	Portland	Damian Lillard	PG	Weber State
7	Golden State	Harrison Barnes	SF	North Carolina
8	Toronto	Dion Waiters	SG	Syracuse
9	Detroit	John Henson	PF	North Carolina
10	New Orleans	Austin Rivers	SG	Duke
11	Portland	Tyler Zeller	C	North Carolina
12	Houston	Jeremy Lamb	SG	Connecticut
13	Phoenix	Kendall Marshall	PG	North Carolina
14	Milwaukee	Meyers Leonard	C	Illinois
15	Philadelphia	Perry Jones III	PF	Baylor
16	Houston	Terrence Ross	SG	Washington
17	Dallas	Terrence Jones	PF	Kentucky
18	Houston	Arnett Moultrie	C	Miss. St.
19	Orlando	Moe Harkless	SF	St. John’s
20	Denver	Jared Sullinger	PF	Ohio State
21	Boston	Royce White	PF	Iowa State
22	Boston	Tony Wroten, Jr.	PG	Washington
23	Atlanta	Fab Melo	C	Syracuse
24	Cleveland	Andrew Nicholson	PF	St. Bonaventure
25	Memphis	Marquis Teague	PG	Kentucky
26	Indiana	Draymond Green	PF	Michigan State
27	Miami	Festus Ezeli	C	Vanderbilt
28	Oklahoma City	Evan Fournier	SG	France
29	Chicago	Doron Lamb	SG	Kentucky
30	Golden State	Quincy Miller	SF	Baylor

The only certainty about tonight so far is that Anthony Davis will be the No. 1 overall draft choice. After that just about every team is open to trades involving their picks.

• The Houston Rockets have been making the most moves so far. They have acquired the 12th, 16th and 18th picks in the first round. Their ultimate goal is to somehow trade with Orlando for Dwight Howard. The first step towards getting Howard to Houston is trading with the Kings first. The Rockets first offered Sacramento Kyle Lowry and two of their first rounders for Tyreke Evans and the 5th overall pick. The Kings turned down that offer.
• The Kings aren’t sold on any prospect yet at No. 5. They are hoping that Thomas Robinson could fall to that spot although that is pretty unlikely. Robinson is currently projected No. 2 overall to the Bobcats but the Bobcats reportedly have five offers on the table for that pick. The Kings were earlier rumored to have been eyeing Harrison Barnes with the fifth pick but now are possibly thinking Andre Drummond instead.
• The Bobcats have been shopping their No. 2 overall pick for awhile now. We first heard of them targeting James Harden for the pick. The Thunder have expressed interest in Bradley Beal but would have to part ways with Harden to move high up enough to draft him making that very unlikely.
• The Timberwolves have reportedly offered Charlotte Derrick Williams – last year’s No. 2 overall pick – for this year’s No. 2 overall pick. Williams wasn’t terrible this season but the idea of possibly pairing Kevin Love and Ricky Rubio alongside Beal or Michael Kidd-Gilchrist is enticing.
• The most likely deal to be made with Charlotte for the No. 2 pick would involve Cleveland and their No. 4 and No. 24 picks in the first round. The Cavs would most likely want to move up to jump Washington so they can pick Beal but it has been reported that Cleveland is considering Dion Waiters with the No. 4 pick as well.
• Waiters has been shooting up draft boards a ton these past few weeks. Now the Toronto Raptors are also interested in moving up to pick Waiters. Toronto has the No. 8 pick and has been projected to select a shooting guard with that pick from day one. If Waiters is not there for them, they could choose between Austin Rivers and Jeremy Lamb with the pick.
• Kidd-Gilchrist is considered by a lot of experts to have the second most potential of any player in this draft behind Davis. The Bobcats have showed little interest in him and he has been rumored to potentially slide as far down as No. 5 for Sacramento.
• The Los Angeles Lakers have put Pau Gasol on the market the past few days and have expressed some interest in MKG as well.
• The Atlanta Hawks are interested in dealing Josh Smith for Gasol but the Lakers haven’t shown much interest in that yet.
• Drummond is another prospect with tons of potential but also considered a risk. He could go in the top five or drop as low as nine. The Rockets would like to use some of their picks to move up to No. 7 if Drummond is there and trade with the Warriors.
• The Warriors are looking for a player to be an immediate impact. It would be hard to consider anyone other than Davis as an immediate impact player in this draft but if Barnes slips, the Warriors could try and move up to draft him.
• The Portland Trailblazers have two lottery picks at No. 6 and No. 11 and they intend to use both as opposed to packaging the two to move into the top five.
• The Boston Celtics would like to move into the lottery. They currently have the No. 21 and No. 22 picks in the first round. They were rumored also to have promised Royce White that they would draft him at that time if he is still available.

This is just the tip of the ice berg so far today in terms of NBA Draft rumors. We are just over five hours until the draft will begin and there will surely be plenty more stories developing until that time.

Christopher Hanewickel-US PRESSWIRE

The Oklahoma City Thunder weren’t supposed to make a lot of noise at the NBA Draft this year. The franchise that has made some of the best draft decisions in recent history would have just one pick in the draft at No. 28.

The rumors started picking up yesterday with seemingly every team in the lottery shopping their picks around. The Thunder’s name came up.

Oklahoma City and their GM Sam Presti are reportedly very interested in Florida guard Bradley Beal who is projected to be a top three pick right now. The Thunder appeared so interested in the reports that they would even consider trading up for Beal.

Getting into position to select Beal would mean one thing for sure: trading James Harden to the Charlotte Bobcats for the No. 2 overall pick.

It sounds crazy to think that OKC would trade away their third best player after making it to the NBA Finals this past season but there is some logic behind the possible move.

The Thunder have a decision to make with Harden this offseason. He will be eligible for an extension beginning July 1 and the Thunder are going to have to pay him quite a bit to keep him.

Harden would likely be able to get close to a max-deal with another team if he doesn’t extend with OKC. If he stays with the Thunder he’d be taking a few million less each season.

Harden has talked about sacrifice with this team and his role with this team but it would still be a lot of money for him to leave on the table.

The other factor is that the Thunder would also like to try and keep Serge Ibaka who is also up for an extension this summer. Ibaka isn’t worth as much as Harden but if the Thunder do extend both, that would leave them very little salary room to build around a core of Durant, Westbrook, Harden and Ibaka.

The Thunder would also most likely enter the luxury tax in the next few seasons which is now a much harsher penalty with the new CBA. Oklahoma City is a small market without a TV deal right now so avoiding the luxury tax is a priority for this franchise.

If the Thunder dealt Harden for Beal, it would make life a little easier on those constructing the roster. Beal would have a rookie deal barely affecting the cap at all, Ibaka would be extended probably along with Eric Maynor this summer and the Thunder would have some more cap room to bring in talent to surround Durant and Westbrook.

Harden is a great player who will only improve over the next few seasons and Beal would be more of a risk, obviously since he hasn’t played in the NBA yet.

Presti and the Thunder organization are all about building a team with not only talented players but players who fit the Thunder model. Harden certainly embodies that but if Beal also does, Presti might be closer to pulling the trigger on a deal.

Beal has been compared to Ray Allen (unfairly) but plays closer to an Eric Gordon or less athletic Andre Iguodala. He competes on both ends of the floor and is a good pick-and-roll ball handler, although Harden is one of the best in the league at this.

OKC would be taking a baby step back if they went through with this trade. They wouldn’t have the same fire power coming off the bench and even more responsibility would lie with Durant and Westbrook.

Durant and Westbrook could probably handle the increased responsibility but maybe not by next season. Harden was so integral in OKC’s playoff run this past season and took over games at times even with Durant and Westbrook on the floor with him.

Trading Harden seems crazy but maybe it’s not so crazy. The Thunder more than likely will not make this move. They know they came so close to winning it all this year and they want this core to play out to whatever potential they may have.

Williams has been involved in many rumors over the past year since being traded from the Utah Jazz to the Nets. Now, it looks like he’s narrowed down his choices to two teams.

Sources say Williams, in any case, already has instructed his representatives to advise any team that calls starting at 12:01 a.m. July 1 that he intends to either re-sign with the Nets or return to his hometown with the Mavericks after a glittering high school career in the Dallas area.

via ESPN’s Marc Stein

The Nets would be able to offer Williams more money with a 5-year deal worth around $100 million while Dallas can only give him 4-years, $75 million.

“I want to go to a place where I feel like they will have a chance to build and build fast,” Williams told the Los Angeles Times. “I’m not really in the mood for being part of a rebuilding process. I’m getting older. I’m about to be 28. I want to win. I want to win now. Also, I want to live in a place where I want to live and my kids will enjoy living. That’s pretty much it.”

The Nets were hoping acquiring Williams would help woo Dwight Howard to them but now that it looks like that won’t happen, Williams may flee leaving the Nets completely empty handed.

Dallas sacrificed putting up a legit fight to defend their title to clear cap space for stars like Williams and Howard.

Free agency officially begins July 1 at midnight and players will not be able to legally sign new contracts until July 11.