One topic that has been the talk of the NBA recently has been the persistent (and perhaps increasing) efforts that “rebuilding” teams are making to actively fall down the standings. Commonly known as “tanking.”
The idea behind determining draft order starting with the worst teams getting the best picks is common among sports leagues. It promotes parity and at least attempts to give the impression that any team can get better over time if they are managed properly.
The draft lottery was put into place
in order to stop teams from blatantly losing on purpose. A few pretty good teams won the lottery when the odds were flat across all non-playoff teams, so they tweaked the odds. The NBA has continued to tinker with rules changes, incentives, and penalties over the years and they are threatening to do so again.
Based on this season and what everyone expects to see down the stretch, I don’t think their efforts have done much to fix things.
So we get to my daily topic discussion: Is there anything the NBA can do to adjust the rules to at least make this tanking problem, …less of a problem?
Here are some of the suggestions the league is considering.
In recent years, multiple teams have either shut down players early or sat players for games to try to improve their draft positioning, often tied to a protected pick. Sources said multiple ideas were proposed as a brainstorming measure to combat tanking, including:
Limiting pick protections to either top four or 14 and higher, which would eliminate the problematic mid-lottery protections
No longer allowing a team to draft in the top four two years in a row
Locking lottery positions after March 1
Which of these options do you like the best? Are there other ideas not mentioned above that the league should consider? Or will each of these cures end up being worse than the disease in the long run?
What do you think? Leave your suggestions and reactions in the comments below.
