NBA thread

[superrific]

I don’t believe it was rigged, but I do think it shows the NBA lottery system isn’t working. The goal of a draft is to allow the bottom teams to acquire talent so they can improve. They established the lottery to avoid teams tanking. That hasn’t worked as more teams are tanking than ever. But there are too many teams in the lottery, and the worst team has never won the first pick. They need to limit the ability to win the first pick to the bottom 4 or 5 teams.

There are currently 14 teams in the lottery. They should eliminate the play-in losers from the lottery and their draft position should be determined by their finish like playoff teams. That leaves 12 lottery-eligible teams. Have 3 separate lotteries to determine the first four picks among the four worst teams, a separate drawing for teams 5-8, then 9-12. They can weight the teams chances within the different buckets if that is preferable, but it eliminates teams jumping from 12 or 14 to number 1. That will avoid teams barely missing the playoffs getting the top pick. And we should just forget the notion of stopping tanking because nothing they have tried has worked.

I agree with your sentiment here but I think it's more complicated than that because of tanking. Tanking is the predictable result of hard cutoffs for things like draft picks.

For instance, Philly this year won I think 3 games after the all-star break. That's because their draft pick was top 6 protected. They needed to finish worse than the Nets to have a good chance to keep it (they doubled their odds by finishing a game behind the Nets in the standings). But the Nets were also trying to lose. They were running out D-league teams, and not even good ones. The Warriors also lost like 12 straight games to close a season so they could keep the first round pick that became Harrison Barnes.

I disagree that nothing has worked re: tanking. The Mavs are actually a good example. Yes, they traded Luka, but they didn't tank. The whole team got hurt, but that's a different story as (from what I understand) the injuries were all legit. Irving isn't faking a torn ACL. They wouldn't have gained enough by tanking. Plenty of other teams that might have tanked in the past -- e.g. Indiana -- haven't because the rewards for tanking are so inconsistent.

There will always be tanking teams, simply because tanking is actually a hopeful strategy. If your team is going to lose 60 games, at least let it mean something. Otherwise you're telling your fans to come watch the team get destroyed and there isn't necessarily a lot of hope for the future. But there's a difference between two teams tanking and 10.

Obviously more has to be done re: tanking. The draft lottery doesn't solve the problem entirely. An easy step would be to eliminate pick restrictions or radically streamline them. You should be able to protect a first round pick at top 3 or at lottery and nothing else.

As for the lottery I'd like to see a rule that no team can be in the top 3 more than once every three years, unless they have one of the two worst records in the league AND they can point to some sort of extenuating circumstance justifying a redo. For instance, if the whole draft is bad, you shouldn't hold that against the team that happens to win the lottery that year. Or if they have some sort of injury problem that won't easily get better, like Brandon Roy and maybe Embiid.

 

[superrific]

Agree with all of this, but it's really, really hard not to think the NBA rigs the lottery, not just this year but on the regular. The odds of the Mavs and the Spurs getting 1 and 2 were extraordinarily slim.

But why would the NBA do that? And more importantly, who would do it? Adam Silver, on his own accord? If anyone found out, he'd be in massive trouble, potentially criminal even -- def would lose his cushy job. A majority of the other owners, none of whom want the #1 pick that badly? Or who don't care if Dallas creates a juggernaut with the #1 pick and Davis/Irving?

And what would the league get? What does the league get out of Dallas having Cooper Flagg and not Washington or Utah?

 

[lawtig02]

I don’t believe it was rigged, but I do think it shows the NBA lottery system isn’t working. The goal of a draft is to allow the bottom teams to acquire talent so they can improve. They established the lottery to avoid teams tanking. That hasn’t worked as more teams are tanking than ever. But there are too many teams in the lottery, and the worst team has never won the first pick. They need to limit the ability to win the first pick to the bottom 4 or 5 teams.

There are currently 14 teams in the lottery. They should eliminate the play-in losers from the lottery and their draft position should be determined by their finish like playoff teams. That leaves 12 lottery-eligible teams. Have 3 separate lotteries to determine the first four picks among the four worst teams, a separate drawing for teams 5-8, then 9-12. They can weight the teams chances within the different buckets if that is preferable, but it eliminates teams jumping from 12 or 14 to number 1. That will avoid teams barely missing the playoffs getting the top pick. And we should just forget the notion of stopping tanking because nothing they have tried has worked.

On further reflection, I would only do a lottery for teams 1-5, and I would have the following weighted odds:

1 - 40%
2 - 30%
3 - 15%
4 - 10%
5 - 5%

Starting with team 6, no lottery, just straight order of finish.

 

[dcf2]

I wonder if the Sixers will use #3 to try to get off of the George and/or Embiid contracts?

I wonder what the Mavs can get for Gafford? Perhaps packaged with #14?

Zion's contract can be waived - making it oddly valuable in the 2nd Apron environment. If Tatum is down for 25-26 - could you get Brown for Zion and #7?

 

[lawtig02]

But why would the NBA do that? And more importantly, who would do it? Adam Silver, on his own accord? If anyone found out, he'd be in massive trouble, potentially criminal even -- def would lose his cushy job. A majority of the other owners, none of whom want the #1 pick that badly? Or who don't care if Dallas creates a juggernaut with the #1 pick and Davis/Irving?

And what would the league get? What does the league get out of Dallas having Cooper Flagg and not Washington or Utah?

I know. I hear you and my head says the league couldn't possibly be stupid enough to rig it, but such incredibly improbably things happen on such a regular basis, most of which benefit the higher profile teams, that it's hard to think it's really all just chance.

As for Dallas and Flagg, if I'm a conspiracist, the key was getting Luka to LA. That trade made no sense for the Mavs -- UNLESS they were promised Flagg in exchange.

 

[dcf2]

The East/West talent imbalance is already stark but we now have the #1 and #2 picks going to the West, may see Giannis traded to the West, and seem to have lost Tatum.

Orlando might want to push in some chips and go for it next year.

 

[sringwal]

But why would the NBA do that? And more importantly, who would do it? Adam Silver, on his own accord? If anyone found out, he'd be in massive trouble, potentially criminal even -- def would lose his cushy job. A majority of the other owners, none of whom want the #1 pick that badly? Or who don't care if Dallas creates a juggernaut with the #1 pick and Davis/Irving?

And what would the league get? What does the league get out of Dallas having Cooper Flagg and not Washington or Utah?

The league got Luka playing for the Lakers, which is a huge ratings boost over him playing for the Mavs, particularly once Lebron retires.

 

[superrific]

I know. I hear you and my head says the league couldn't possibly be stupid enough to rig it, but such incredibly improbably things happen on such a regular basis, most of which benefit the higher profile teams, that it's hard to think it's really all just chance.

As for Dallas and Flagg, if I'm a conspiracist, the key was getting Luka to LA. That trade made no sense for the Mavs -- UNLESS they were promised Flagg in exchange.

All right. Why does any other NBA owner want Luka in LA so badly? It's not going to meaningfully improve the league's revenues. It might help with the Lakers' revenues. But NBA owners would be having to screw themselves double: the Lakers get a star that they can't get, and then Dallas also gets a star they can't get. What's in it for anyone but the Lakers and Mavs?

I'm not sure that the NBA draft lottery is that incredibly improbable. There have been a lot of them. Longshots will win if you give them enough chances.

Remember that the relevant factor isn't the probability of the Mavs winning. You'd have the same complaint if the #9 worst team won the lottery. So we have to ask, "how often does a team outside the top 5 win the draft lottery" and I suspect the answer there would be pretty close to the adjusted odds.

 

[sringwal]

On further reflection, I would only do a lottery for teams 1-5, and I would have the following weighted odds:

1 - 40%
2 - 30%
3 - 15%
4 - 10%
5 - 5%

Starting with team 6, no lottery, just straight order of finish.

You could also do something where the lottery is done for all non-playoff teams, but balls only get added in when you are 5 places away from where you finished. Teams 1-6 would start out in the lottery, and then the 7th team's balls get added in after the first team was picked, etc.

 

[superrific]

The league got Luka playing for the Lakers, which is a huge ratings boost over him playing for the Mavs, particularly once Lebron retires.

Empirically I do not think this is true. It will be a boon for the Lakers' finances. It won't make much difference for the NBA. Certainly not enough for the other owners to authorize a weird under-the-table deal that primarily benefits Dallas and the Lakers.

 

[superrific]

The East/West talent imbalance is already stark but we now have the #1 and #2 picks going to the West, may see Giannis traded to the West, and seem to have lost Tatum.

Orlando might want to push in some chips and go for it next year.

Well, the lottery has been mighty kind to the West recently.

But this is actually expected in a league with unbalanced schedules. Which is why it's important to balance them. If the West has most of the talent, then the good West teams will crush the bad West teams, pushing down the bad teams record and then setting them up for further talent acquisition via the draft. In reality, the bad West teams are probably better than the bad East teams but that's not how the lottery sees it.

Of course, that's not what happened this year exactly (arguably for the Spurs, maybe) but it has in the past.

 

[sringwal]

Wild NBA Draft Lottery night opens door to blockbuster trade possibilities

Could the Mavericks, Spurs and/or Sixers shop their unexpected top-three picks? What will happen in Boston?

www.nytimes.com

"So much for the idea of Cooper Flagg going to a 20-win team. Instead, a statistically improbable Dallas Mavericks-San Antonio Spurs-Philadelphia 76ers-Charlotte Hornets top four upended all our previous assumptions about what might happen in the lead-up to the NBA Draft. The odds of the Mavs and Spurs landing 1-2 were 1 in 1,000; the Mavs-Spurs-Sixers combo in the top three was 1 in 10,000."

NBA Draft Lottery History - RealGM

NBA Draft Lottery History - RealGM

basketball.realgm.com

 

[dcf2]

Well, the lottery has been mighty kind to the West recently.

But this is actually expected in a league with unbalanced schedules. Which is why it's important to balance them. If the West has most of the talent, then the good West teams will crush the bad West teams, pushing down the bad teams record and then setting them up for further talent acquisition via the draft. In reality, the bad West teams are probably better than the bad East teams but that's not how the lottery sees it.

Of course, that's not what happened this year exactly (arguably for the Spurs, maybe) but it has in the past.

It might also be worth exploring seeding the playoffs 1-16 and the playin 13-20. They will either need to realign of break geography if they expand to include Vegas and Seattle anyway - seems a good opportunity to balance as you suggest. If the players object to more travel you might just make the season a week longer and add more rest days.

 

[sringwal]

While we're at it, trading the 2nd and 14th picks for the #1 pick might be enticing for the Spurs. Flagg fits in nicely on their roster. And it's certainly a better trade for the Mavs than the Luka/Lebron one was.

 

[superrific]

While we're at it, trading the 2nd and 14th picks for the #1 pick might be enticing for the Spurs. Flagg fits in nicely on their roster. And it's certainly a better trade for the Mavs than the Luka/Lebron one was.

There's a 0% chance, in my view, of the Mavs trading the #1 pick.

If the Spurs want to trade with them, AD is more likely. But I don't think that happens either. I think the Spurs take a PG and build around Castle, Wemby and the PG.

 

[sringwal]

There's a 0% chance, in my view, of the Mavs trading the #1 pick.

If the Spurs want to trade with them, AD is more likely. But I don't think that happens either. I think the Spurs take a PG and build around Castle, Wemby and the PG.

I agree that it is highly unlikely, but I'd have said the same about the Mavs trading away Luka.

I highly doubt that the Spurs would be interested in AD. He is well past his prime.

Going after a PG also works as Harper is probably the best available, but I don't see how he fits in with Castle and Fox.

This is probably just wishful thinking on my part, as a Spurs fan, but a lineup of Castle, Fox, Barnes, Flagg, Wemby has a chance to be extremely dangerous, and is probably Barnes' best shot at getting a ring.

You also have Vassell coming off the bench, so the Spurs are already extremely deep at the guard spot, regardless of what happens with Paul.

 

[Icky Mettle]

That is only true since 2019, when lottery odds were flattened. It would be cosmically improbable for the worst team to have never won the first pick. As of now, it's merely unlucky.

Since 1985– the year of the first lottery— the team with the worst record has won the lottery (that is, got the #1 pick) 8 times. It happened 4 times in a row between 2015 and 2018.

 

[Icky Mettle]

On further reflection, I would only do a lottery for teams 1-5, and I would have the following weighted odds:

1 - 40%
2 - 30%
3 - 15%
4 - 10%
5 - 5%

Starting with team 6, no lottery, just straight order of finish.

I’d be cool with dividing the lottery up into sections. Worst three teams for picks 1-3, then next three worst for 4-6, then same thing with 7-10, then 11-14.

 

[duluoz]

I agree that it is highly unlikely, but I'd have said the same about the Mavs trading away Luka.

I highly doubt that the Spurs would be interested in AD. He is well past his prime.

Going after a PG also works as Harper is probably the best available, but I don't see how he fits in with Castle and Fox.

This is probably just wishful thinking on my part, as a Spurs fan, but a lineup of Castle, Fox, Barnes, Flagg, Wemby has a chance to be extremely dangerous, and is probably Barnes' best shot at getting a ring.

You also have Vassell coming off the bench, so the Spurs are already extremely deep at the guard spot, regardless of what happens with Paul.

You mean “another ring…” Barnes already has a ring

As does McAdoo (x2) on that Dubs squad.

 

[superrific]

Since 1985– the year of the first lottery— the team with the worst record has won the lottery (that is, got the #1 pick) 8 times. It happened 4 times in a row between 2015 and 2018.

Well, the lottery is about 35 years old, and the odds of the worst team getting the #1 pick are 25%, so you do the math.