1968 ABA draft

The 1968 ABA draft was the second draft done by the American Basketball Association (ABA), an upstart rivaling league to the National Basketball Association (NBA) that they would eventually merge with as a part of the NBA nearly a decade later. This year's draft saw an increased number of overall rounds utilized with the draft, with most teams going up to at least 15 rounds as opposed to the 12 rounds most teams used from the previous year's draft. Much like their first ever draft, this draft was also held as a "secret draft", though the more specific aspect of this draft had the first five rounds in mind be held as a "secret evaluation draft" by having the first five rounds of this year's draft be conducted in Louisville, Kentucky (home of the Kentucky Colonels) weeks before the 1968 NCAA University Division basketball tournament concluded in order to have the young talents get an early jump into professional basketball before they entered the 1968 NBA draft on April 1 for the first round before having a second chance to play for the ABA again on both April 27 and May 5 (with those two draft days being held in Los Angeles and Minneapolis (home of two out of four future relocated ABA teams) respectively) before the NBA continued their own draft properly on May 8. However, the early "secret evaluation draft" proved to be a bust for the ABA in terms of getting key star talents to successfully sign up with the ABA instead, as both the #1 pick that year in Elvin Hayes and Wes Unseld both decided not to join the nearby teams that drafted them (the Houston Mavericks via the University of Houston for Hayes and the Kentucky Colonels via the University of Louisville for Unseld respectively) and instead play for the San Diego Rockets and Baltimore Bullets (now Houston Rockets and Washington Wizards) in the NBA respectively, though the ABA would find a couple of other underrated gems this year despite those initial failures. This draft also became the last draft that the Anaheim Amigos would participate in under that name, as following the end of the "secret evaluation draft" in March, the team would move to nearby Los Angeles, California to become the Los Angeles Stars, taking on that franchise's entire history and draft stock in the process entering the rest of that draft period in April and May. After this draft period concluded, it would also become the last draft period for the Minnesota Muskies and New Jersey Americans as well, as after their own drafts ended, the Muskies moved to Miami, Florida to become the Miami Floridians, while the Americans permanently moved up to the New York City area for the rest of their ABA tenure to become the New York Nets going forward. (The defending champion Pittsburgh Pipers also moved during this season as well, with them going to Minnesota to become the Minnesota Pipers (potentially as a means of having an ABA team remaining in their city's headquarters at the time), though this wouldn't be the last season they'd draft under the Pittsburgh Pipers name.) This draft was also notable for it being the first area of interest where the ABA had potential legal grounds to allow for a merger with the NBA to occur due to them discovering a leaked document from the NBA by a disgruntled ex-NBA employee revealing grounds for a potential antitrust lawsuit to occur otherwise (the ironic part is the ABA would later admit to engaging in the same sort of practices that the NBA did at the time as well, though they didn't write their specific plans down on paper, which made such grounds for a lawsuit more likely on their end).