Relegation would never happen in the NBA, but as a huge soccer fan, I would love the thought of Philly and Milwaukee all of a sudden battling it out to stay in the league.
The NBA had this, it was changed immediately after Orlando won the lottery two years in a row, getting Shaq and Penny. I don't see them going back to this since they had this already.
It should be noted that right before the Harden trade, Morey stripped down the Rockets roster about just as much as Hinkie did with Philly this year. Morey hates the idea of tanking, and hates that its a strategy, but is more than willing to put his team in that strategy if its a last resort vs. spending stupidly in free agency while not having the ability to acquire a star.
I think it could be argued that the teams which suffer the most are the ones stuck in 'mediocrity 14th-pick hell', year after year. Terrible teams get high pick after high pick, do nothing with them, let those players go onto other teams, remain terrible, and continue to waste that talent, with every passing year. Meanwhile, the teams which are trying as hard as they can. but just lack talent, always seem to stay in the middle, too good to get a really great talent in the draft, but also never good enough to ever be a serious contender. (See: Rockets, last 15 years) Therefore, what about some kind of formula which would most benefit those teams in the middle, the ones who don't tank, but can't seem to get over the hump either. Those are probably the teams most deserving of a higher pick anyway. Perhaps something which takes into account winning percentage over, say, the last three seasons, favoring those closest to .500 first, then the worst teams, and then finally the best teams. With perhaps some kind of bonus bump for teams in those lower groups who have a higher % win total improvement from one year to the next. This would reward the teams for trying, while giving actual incentive to the lower teams to actually try harder and not deliberately tank. Seems to me, this would help push ALL teams to being good, and that's what we all would want, I assume? Good basketball all the way around, as much as possible anyway.. You'd have a 'churning' back toward the middle, in cycles, rather than the current system which has extremes at both end, causing teams to get 'stuck' at the bottom, or entrenched at the top. With higher-quality teams more spread out, 50 wins would actually mean something again.
I like that credits idea. You get a certain amount of credits based on the standings and you bid on players. Unused credits carryover to future drafts.
Morey says that now perhaps because there is almost no chance that the Rockets will see the lottery for the next half decade?
I think the lottery should be expanded to include all teams outside the top 8 records. If a team is going to tank to get to the 9th best record - then let them be insane. All teams in the lottery have an equal shot of getting any pick. It becomes a true lottery. So there is no incentive to tank unless you have the 8th best record in the NBA and you decide you're better off losing and risking HCA or seeding in the playoffs in order to have a chance at a better draft pick.
The other differences include; European teams keep the cash for all merchandise sales, American teams share revenue. European teams play in a free market system, ANY team can be started and promoted to any League. American teams play in a monopoly system, where franchises have to pay to get into the league with the permission of the other franchises. European teams have NO salary cap, they can pay as much as they want for their players, American teams have a strict salary cap. European teams have no roster limit, no age limit, they can sign anybody at any age. European teams also do not share TV money, so the more popular teams get way more TV money than the not popular teams. In short American sports is a socialist dream, European sports is a vicious free market. Without changing all the other aspects of each league, you cannot have relegation and promotion.
His desire to tank is only because it is currently one of the viable strategies by which to turn around the direction of a franchise. If that path wasn't available, Morey wouldn't want it. It's in players' & owners' best interest to try and compete every game, in terms of money making and success
8th seeded playoff teams get the 1st and 2nd picks bssed on record. All playoff teams pick 1 thru 16. The bottom feeders pick 17-30. It would make those owners(milwaukee, ect) spend money to give cities proper teams.
this is a great point. The league as a whole is not equalitarian enough which cause teams to take these extreme measures.
He's right. A straight lottery would increase the competition level across the league, as no record guarantees a better pick. The Heat could get the #1 pick five years in a row. The counterbalance to this is the salary cap, as they couldn't keep five extra awesome players around forever once their rookie deal runs out.
With that wheel idea, it said every team will get a top 6 pick every 5 years... So if a bad team ends up with a bust of a pick, they have to wait another 5 years until they can get a good draft pick again? That would take them even longer to improve than the way the draft is now...
Managing the salaries would be interesting; getting someone of ability to Utah or Milwaukee or Minny etc? Lotsa luck. It may be democracy. But do remember the purest form of democracy is the lynch mob. The will of the majority...
What if they made a rule where the bottom X amount of teams get no lottery pick. That way, teams would do everything they could to avoid being one of the bottom teams. Some teams will have to be the bottom teams, but it would at least create effort among the teams to try to not be at the bottom.
If the league were that stupid, I'd walk away from the game. I've been a fan for almost 40 years, but that would the the end for me. And the wheel is almost as bad, because some years are down tears and there are no true superstars.
The lottery is part of the problem, but the other part is the conferences. Bad teams in the east make the playoffs because their conference is bad, and with no high lottery picks, and no incentives for top free agents to come, they stay bad. Good teams in the west barely miss the playoffs and get better picks, staying just good enough to compete, but not good enough to really contend. So, are conferences outdated? What if you just did NCAA style seeding? Top team overall vs bottom team overall, 2nd best vs 2nd worse, ect. So with the standings by win % if the playoffs started today the matchups would be: 1st bracket: 1 vs 16 = Indiana vs Brooklyn 7 vs 10 = Clippers vs Phoenix 3 vs 14 = OKC vs Washington 5 vs 12 = Portland vs Toronto 2nd bracket: 2 vs 15 = Miami vs Minnesota 8 vs 9 = Dallas vs Golden State 4 vs 13 = San Antonio vs Chicago 6 vs 11 = Houston vs Memphis Only the worst 2 teams would have losing records at the moment in that set up, and the chances of locking up a spot where a game at the end of the season didn't matter at all would be significantly less. The playoffs would be more competitive from top to bottom, and no one gets an "easy" path to the finals due to a weak conference.
There is definitely something to this. I shake my head when I look at conference standings and see that the current 3-8 seeds in the East wouldn't even be in the playoffs in the West.
