[GRANTLAND] The NBA's Possible Solution for Tanking: Good-bye to the Lottery, Hello to the Whee

Why doesn't the NBA just penalize teams for losing? The most average team then gets the first pick in next years draft. The 2nd most average gets the 2nd pick and so on.

Since teams can't finely control being average (wins and losses), this eliminates the problem of tanking and it forces teams to try when they are on a losing streak.

 

You can address it with a much simpler solution:

After two years in college, a player is draft eligible. A team can then draft you and attain player rights for the particular player even if he decides to stay an extra year. It would be hard to see how a college player would pass up the opportunity to go pro in this situation and risk injury.

 

Honestly, I think the NBA is looking at tanking wrong.

Carl Herrera was right in saying that the biggest problem with tanking is public perception. Although fans may openly cheer for their team to mail-it-in, the overall product suffers and viewership drops.

Take a look at the NFL. As bad as some of the teams were, folks watched just in case Josh Gordon, Kirk Cousins, Vincent Jackson or Keenum/AJ caught fire. Even though some of these teams were undoubtedly terrible, people still watched because there are only 16 games.

In both leagues, the general public perceives the worst teams as having a poor shot at winning. However, the NFL does a much better job at convincing the public to buy-in to the young talent on those bad teams. This has nothing to do with a lack of talent: Gordon Hayward, MCW, The Alphabet, Vucevic and the Kings are all talented and can be fun to watch.

IMHO, the NBA needs to do a better job at improving the perception of the quality of their product. I'm not sure whether this is by marketing the young players better or instituting a tournament for the non-playoff teams, etc.

The bottom line is, when people are not willing to watch Anthony Davis and Ryan Andersen wreak havoc because the Pelicans are under .500, something is wrong.

 

Thinking off the top of my head...The NBA should reverse the current system. I think the top teams that don't make the playoffs should have the highest chance of winning the lottery.

This will allow the teams that are close to making the playoffs a better chance of making it to the playoffs and to make noise.

The purpose of the game is to Win...

 

I agree to the extent that I don't see the players on the floor in a given game or string of games trying to lose. What i do see is GM's making trades and other moves so that the team on the floor cant win too many games.

 

While I agree that the former would be the much worse problem, it doesn't mean that the latter is not an issue and is not impacting revenue, attendance, etc.

Ultimately, we'll need to see the math and the economic model to decide, but it just seem that the current system is leading to fans of both bad and even average teams to root against their team winning-- and in many instances they are reasonable to do so. I just can't see how this is good for business.

 

The economic model in the business sector outside of sports would have poorly run organizations fail and cease to exist when they cant be competitive.

Sports is obviously different. And I am not advocating we should just flush bad teams.

But bad teams are allowed to be perpetually bad given that in certain towns, these teams still make money. And even when a bit of money is being lost, the franchises themselves become more valuable irregardless of whether its a losing one or not.

It might change things considerably if the above were not the case. If your on court performance were more directly tied to profits, owners might run tighter and more competitive ships.

 

I'm not comfortable with the idea of a team being able to win a championship and still get a top prospect. Or free agents picking destinations based on the draft wheel.

Why not a lottery of all the teams without HCA that factors in your previous 3 season records?

 

In all honesty, a player like that, if you were just buying time to go to the lakers, you'd make yourself ineligible by taking endorsement money, in fact companies from the area that you're waiting for would be lining up, and a giant circus would follow you all year for "living the lakers brand". No point playing and risking injury while staying poor, just keep training with the money you're getting.

 

the NBAPA would never agree to that.

 

Making the decision to rebuild isn't tanking in my eyes.