Restoring a competitive team demands a lot - usually high draft picks, player development, trades and free agent signings, and skilled manipulation of the salary tax thresholds.
Getting high draft choices means absymal records and lottery luck, often aided by "tanking." Nobody wants to watch teams "not fully trying to win."
The NBA plans to institute rules to limit tanking. What could that include:
1) Fines for "detectable" lack of effort (how do you know?)
2) Fines or penalties for holding out players
3) "Play out" tournament where low end teams compete to "win" the better draft choices.
How is the NBA planning to address this?
Current player participation rules
Rules that function as “soft” anti-tanking tools
The Player Participation Policy (resting “star” players triggers scrutiny/fines; teams can’t sit multiple stars for “rest”). It’s more about availability/load management, but it’s been used as an enforcement lever when behavior looks tank-like.
“Draft wheel” (rotating draft order over multiple years that removes incentive to lose).
Post-elimination incentives (draft position based partly on wins after a team is eliminated “you must compete late” in season).
“Other” ideas under discussion
Freeze/lock lottery odds at the trade deadline (decrease late-season impacts of losing).Flatten lottery odds more (reduces benefit of worst records).
Use multi-year records for lottery odds (e.g. a two-year performance window - similar in spirit to how the WNBA has used multi-year records).
Limit repeated top-of-draft rewards (e.g. no top-4 picks in consecutive years).
Expand “lottery eligibility” concepts to play-in teams (decrease incentive to favor the lottery over the play-ins).
Reduce pick protections in trades (protected picks can make tanking “cleaner” easier).
ATTN Basketball Coaches:
— Matt Hackenberg (@CoachHackGO) January 30, 2025
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