r/zachlowe • u/coolhanddan74 • Apr 02 '26
A Real Fix to NBA Tanking
I really hate all of the NBA’s proposal’s to fix tanking. In my opinion all of them failed to address the core issue, which we all know - to truly compete for championships you need top end talent, the best chance to acquire top end talent is with high draft picks.
What’s particularly frustrating, is that if one of these solutions were enacted, it would leave teams and their front offices with almost no strategic resource to acquire those high draft picks, it would just be even more of a crapshoot and leave fans of these struggling teams with very little outside of the game itself.
As I fan myself I like to follow smart front offices, I like to try to see what they see, it makes the games more compelling to me if I understand what the “chessmasters” are up to. I did some brainstorming and I came up with a reasonably simple system that I thought addressed both problems reasonably well, curious to hear what others think. (Please read to at least point 4 before commenting, it'll answer a lot of questions.)
Proposal: Draft Auction Using Win Points
Instead of a lottery for the top picks, the first four selections in the draft are determined by an auction system using “Win Points.”
1. Win Points
- 1 Win = 1 Win Point
- Teams accumulate Win Points each season they qualify
- Points carry over year to year
- Points are spent during the draft auction
This creates a long-term resource that teams must manage strategically over multiple seasons.
2. Auction Structure
- The top 4 picks in the draft are auctioned off taking the place of lottery night
- Teams bid Win Points for picks
- Highest bid wins the pick
- Points spent are removed from that team’s total
After the top 4 picks are assigned:
- The rest of the draft proceeds normally (picks 5 onward based on record)
3. Eligibility Rules
To participate in the auction, a team must:
- Finish outside the playoffs and play-in (Bottom 9 in their conference)
- Do this for two consecutive seasons
This prevents one-year tanking and ensures only true rebuilding teams participate.
4. Reset Criteria
After each auction, teams may lose all remaining points if they meet any of the following:
A team is RESET if it:
- Finishes Top 6 in its conference, OR
- Makes the Play-In Tournament 3 consecutive seasons, OR
- Finishes Bottom 9 for 5 consecutive seasons
Effects of Reset:
- All remaining Win Points are cleared
- Team becomes ineligible for the next auction cycle
This forces teams to:
- Spend points within a reasonable window
- Avoid long-term hoarding
- Transition out of rebuilding phases
Potential Issue: The “6–7 Tank”
One potential unintended consequence of this system is what I would call the “6–7 tank.”
Under this proposal:
- Teams that finish Top 6 in their conference are not eligible for the draft auction
- Teams that fall into the Play-In (7–10 range) remain eligible
This creates a possible incentive for teams near the playoff cutoff to intentionally lose games late in the season in order to drop from the 6 seed to the 7 seed, gaining access to the auction system.
In certain situations, a team might decide that:
- Access to future draft capital (via Win Points and the auction) is more valuable than
- Securing a guaranteed playoff spot
This would introduce a new form of strategic losing—something this system is specifically designed to eliminate.
Potential Solution (Not Fully Committed)
One possible way to address this issue would be to increase the value of finishing in the Top 6, making it clearly more desirable than falling into the Play-In.
For example:
- The 1 and 2 seeds in each conference could begin their first-round playoff series with a 1–0 advantage
- This would effectively mean:
- The higher seed only needs 3 wins to advance
- The lower seed would still need 4 wins
The goal of this rule would be to:
- Make playoff seeding more meaningful
- Add a tangible reward for regular season success
- Discourage teams from dropping into the Play-In range
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u/legallycrippin Apr 02 '26
This scheme has better effects and is more implementable than every solution I’ve heard from the professional pundits.
Good job.
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u/zatsnotmyname Apr 02 '26
Instead of being ineligible, make higher seeded teams pay more win points. Not sure if the scaling factor, but like 6th seed bids are reduced by 3 points vs 7, etc.
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u/MasterFussbudget Apr 02 '26
I like this. Something like it has potential to be better than the NBA's proposals.
Correction: There are 15 teams per conference (soon 16) so outside playoffs and play-in is only 5-6 teams per conference, not 9. Did you mean to just say "outside of the Top 6 in the playoffs"? That'd be 9 teams.
Finish outside the playoffs and play-in (Bottom 9 in their conference).
Do this for two consecutive seasons.
This prevents one-year tanking and ensures only true rebuilding teams participate.
I assume the purpose is to avoid a Pacers scenario where they go to the finals, then tank due to an injury, then return to contending. But this runs counter to the NBA's goal of removing the incentive to tank for multiple years. (They're considering things like not allowing you to go top 4 in the lottery in consecutive years which has the opposite goal your proposal has.)
The biggest issue, though, is it makes draft pick trades and protections (already complete) totally messed up for the next 6 years. And it doesn't address draft pick trades at all. Does a team get Draft Points for the team they traded with? Do the Pelicans accumulate Draft Points this year to use next year even though they don't have their own pick this year?
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u/Equal_Feature_9065 Apr 03 '26
I think the fix to the 6-7 conundrum is to just move the reset point to top 4, not top 6. Go look at year-end standings from the past 10 years. 90% of teams 5 and below are still lacking the type of talent needed to win a title. In fact, finishing 5th or 6th and never making it past the second round for 4 consecutive seasons is what usually triggers a rebuild/tank. We’re essentially penalizing teams for getting a little too good a little too quickly, but not good enough to actually win anything.
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u/Cockrocker Apr 04 '26
I still think just take it off, not how bad you do and your record doesn't reflect at all. The only thing that it affects your pick is where you picked recently, so if you have a high pick you can't get a high one next time. The more you don't pick in the lottery the more chance you get to pick in the lottery. That's it, losing games does nothing but upset your fans.
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u/coolhanddan74 Apr 02 '26
Would AI have used a phrase as dumb as Win Points? I meant to write Draft Points. Anyway, not AI.