Author Topic: My NBA anti-tanking proposal  (Read 6610 times)

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Re: My NBA anti-tanking proposal
« Reply #60 on: June 29, 2015, 01:40:12 PM »

Offline PhoSita

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The best idea I've heard came from Mike Greenburg.

Give the first pick to the best finishing non-playoff team and give the second to the second-best finishing non-playoff team.  etc. 

Tanking is such a gross disservice to fans.  Tickets cost far too much to have the continued  overt dog-and-pony shows by the sixers, knicks, and other tanking teams.

So ... what's the point of making the playoffs if you're not a contender?  That idea hugely increases the incentive to purposefully miss the playoffs, it just makes things even more squirrelly because you'll have teams trying to get really close but trying very hard to fall short.

The difference between finishing 8th and finishing 9th is picking 1st overall or picking 15th?  Talk about a toxic situation for fans.
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Re: My NBA anti-tanking proposal
« Reply #61 on: June 29, 2015, 01:47:32 PM »

Online Moranis

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I guess the simplest way to put it, Moranis, is that people would like "strategic losing" to have a much smaller role in the pursuit of winning CHAMPIONSHIPS.
That is what the lottery is for.  You aren't guaranteed the top pick.  I mean look at how many times the actual worst team ends up with the top pick.  Minnesota this year is by far the exception and not the rule. 

Getting the best players is how you win championships, in a sport like basketball where five players are on the court and you only have 15 roster spots, the draft is going to much more important than any other sport.  It is just the nature of the beast.
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Re: My NBA anti-tanking proposal
« Reply #62 on: June 29, 2015, 01:48:44 PM »

Offline fairweatherfan

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What's always odd about this topic is that NBA fans seem to do more hand-wringing about tanking than any other league, but the NBA is the only league that has implemented anti-tanking policies (the lottery). 

The short answer to reducing tanking incentives is to flatten the odds for the top picks and possibly draw for more than the top 3, but those in turn increase the incentives for missing the playoffs.  Look at how critical people here are of our making the playoffs - imagine if we had say triple the chance of landing somewhere in the top 5 picks as we would have had for the top 3 under this system.  You'd have fan bases openly calling for coaches to get fired for making the playoffs, which is even more perverse. 

...the core of the problem is to me the core of a lot of the league's problems - the regular season is almost completely irrelevant.  The relative ease of making the playoffs, the grind of 82 games a year, and the reductionist thinking of "only a championship means anything at all" are all components of that.  But every approach that addresses that reduces revenue, so it's even more of a no-go.

Re: My NBA anti-tanking proposal
« Reply #63 on: June 29, 2015, 01:56:45 PM »

Offline Finkelskyhook

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The best idea I've heard came from Mike Greenburg.

Give the first pick to the best finishing non-playoff team and give the second to the second-best finishing non-playoff team.  etc. 

Tanking is such a gross disservice to fans.  Tickets cost far too much to have the continued  overt dog-and-pony shows by the sixers, knicks, and other tanking teams.

So ... what's the point of making the playoffs if you're not a contender?  That idea hugely increases the incentive to purposefully miss the playoffs, it just makes things even more squirrelly because you'll have teams trying to get really close but trying very hard to fall short.

The difference between finishing 8th and finishing 9th is picking 1st overall or picking 15th?  Talk about a toxic situation for fans.

I was traveling 450+ miles every year to watch the C's play in OKC...300 to watch them play in Minneapolis...400+ to see them in Milwaukee.  When the team wasn't good but was competing every night.  Then I went home and had bought tickets to two games in 07 at the garden.  They were the two games after Pierce scored 50 to beat Orlando.  Pierce and the team's other best players were all shut down.  I had the privilege .....For $200+ I was treated to two games featuring NBDL talent that I'd just seen in Iowa for $10.  While perfectly healthy players were "injured".   I saw a coach find combinations within that team of marginal players that were able to make runs....Only to see those combinations shut down for the rest of the game.   There was no pretense of trying to win...Or even trying to be competitive.   (Stern actually got it right when the C's and all of the overt tanking teams got the worst possible lottery draft positions...)

I haven't bought a ticket to an NBA game since.   NBDL games are competitive and evenly officiated.....And cheap.  So I go there instead.

Whether it's Greenburg's idea...A hybrid of that.  Or just taking away the lottery picks of teams who disgrace themselves.....There has to be a better way for the fans than to see the garbage some of these teams are putting forth to scam a high draft pick.

Re: My NBA anti-tanking proposal
« Reply #64 on: June 29, 2015, 02:05:05 PM »

Offline PhoSita

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The short answer to reducing tanking incentives is to flatten the odds for the top picks and possibly draw for more than the top 3, but those in turn increase the incentives for missing the playoffs.  Look at how critical people here are of our making the playoffs - imagine if we had say triple the chance of landing somewhere in the top 5 picks as we would have had for the top 3 under this system.  You'd have fan bases openly calling for coaches to get fired for making the playoffs, which is even more perverse. 

Simple solution:

Everybody except for the very best teams (i.e. teams with HCA in the 1st round) get a chance at moving up in the draft.  Don't punish teams for making the playoffs!


You're right that the NBA does more now to combat tanking than any other league, yet fans are more concerned about it in the NBA than any other major league. 

The reason, as noted above, is because the draft means more in the NBA than in any other sport due to the difference that one really great player can make versus a handful of just pretty good players taken later in the draft.
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Re: My NBA anti-tanking proposal
« Reply #65 on: June 29, 2015, 02:17:25 PM »

Offline GC003332

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Teams are only allowed a maximum of 4 lottery picks over a 10 year period.Every time they go over that  their pick is put into a seperate lottery for the playoff teams. Teams that have participated in the playoffs the most over that 10 year period having the greatest odds of getting that pick.

Re: My NBA anti-tanking proposal
« Reply #66 on: June 30, 2015, 09:34:41 AM »

Offline D.o.s.

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The best idea I've heard came from Mike Greenburg.

Give the first pick to the best finishing non-playoff team and give the second to the second-best finishing non-playoff team.  etc. 

Tanking is such a gross disservice to fans.  Tickets cost far too much to have the continued  overt dog-and-pony shows by the sixers, knicks, and other tanking teams.

So ... what's the point of making the playoffs if you're not a contender?  That idea hugely increases the incentive to purposefully miss the playoffs, it just makes things even more squirrelly because you'll have teams trying to get really close but trying very hard to fall short.

The difference between finishing 8th and finishing 9th is picking 1st overall or picking 15th?  Talk about a toxic situation for fans.

I was traveling 450+ miles every year to watch the C's play in OKC...300 to watch them play in Minneapolis...400+ to see them in Milwaukee.  When the team wasn't good but was competing every night.  Then I went home and had bought tickets to two games in 07 at the garden.  They were the two games after Pierce scored 50 to beat Orlando.  Pierce and the team's other best players were all shut down.  I had the privilege .....For $200+ I was treated to two games featuring NBDL talent that I'd just seen in Iowa for $10.  While perfectly healthy players were "injured".   I saw a coach find combinations within that team of marginal players that were able to make runs....Only to see those combinations shut down for the rest of the game.   There was no pretense of trying to win...Or even trying to be competitive.   (Stern actually got it right when the C's and all of the overt tanking teams got the worst possible lottery draft positions...)

I haven't bought a ticket to an NBA game since.   NBDL games are competitive and evenly officiated.....And cheap.  So I go there instead.

Whether it's Greenburg's idea...A hybrid of that.  Or just taking away the lottery picks of teams who disgrace themselves.....There has to be a better way for the fans than to see the garbage some of these teams are putting forth to scam a high draft pick.

And so you vote with your wallet and don't go. I find it much easier to see the Celtics now that they're not one of the premiere teams in the NBA. ¯\_(*-*)_/¯
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