Dikembe Mutombo congratulates 76ers on lottery...before it begins

The NBA lottery and conspiracy theories seem to go hand in hand, and Dikembe Mutombo fostered another one Tuesday afternoon.

Yes, that's right -- the former All-Star center congratulated one of his former teams, the Philadelphia 76ers, on winning this year's lottery. The only problem? He sent out the tweet hours before the lottery was due to be held.

Current 76ers center Joel Embiid, as seen above, was one of the people who caught Mutombo's tweet before it was deleted. Mutombo quickly issued an apology.

Regardless of what happens Tuesday night (8 ET, ESPN/WatchESPN), Mutombo will be hearing about this one for a while.