The Race To The Bottom - theBigLip Tank Machine

[buzzkilloton]

Utah actually has alot of non tank players they need to make some trades to compete. Guys like Clarkson,Lauri,Conley, and Sexton are not who you want when you're tanking.

[theBigLip]

Adam Silver:

During the session, one employee asked Silver about tanking, a theme that is widely expected to dominate the league conversation with 7-foot-4 French phenom Victor Wembanyama -- a potentially franchise-altering prospect -- being projected to be the No. 1 pick in the 2023 draft.

"We put teams on notice," Silver told employees. "We're going to be paying particular attention to the issue this year."

[theBigLip]

Utah actually has alot of non tank players they need to make some trades to compete. Guys like Clarkson,Lauri,Conley, and Sexton are not who you want when you're tanking.

I think the Utah situation is hilarious. Ainge clearly wants to tank, but the remaining vets are going to keep winning until they get traded to a playoff team. Great drama to watch.

[buzzkilloton]

SAS pulled a upset over the sixers today. We lost to indy. OKC is tied with Den at the half.

I think we can pull off a bottom 5 record this season and still be entertaining to watch

[topsearch92]

Adam Silver:

During the session, one employee asked Silver about tanking, a theme that is widely expected to dominate the league conversation with 7-foot-4 French phenom Victor Wembanyama -- a potentially franchise-altering prospect -- being projected to be the No. 1 pick in the 2023 draft.

"We put teams on notice," Silver told employees. "We're going to be paying particular attention to the issue this year."

I feel like there’s no way they can enforce anything. Unless it’s completely behind closed doors. Would they take away lottery balls for another Shai shutdown? Doubt it

[buzzkilloton]

Adam Silver:

During the session, one employee asked Silver about tanking, a theme that is widely expected to dominate the league conversation with 7-foot-4 French phenom Victor Wembanyama -- a potentially franchise-altering prospect -- being projected to be the No. 1 pick in the 2023 draft.

"We put teams on notice," Silver told employees. "We're going to be paying particular attention to the issue this year."

I feel like there’s no way they can enforce anything. Unless it’s completely behind closed doors. Would they take away lottery balls for another Shai shutdown? Doubt it

Hes not going to put this extreme of a rule into play during the season. He knows the tank race is gonna be media hyped and everyone is gonna get in. Could be some type of change next season due to this years race though.

Honestly were finishing up our tank at the perfect time. A stacked class with one of the best prospects ever. Commish about to make some crap rules for tanking or something. After we get VW no need to return to the lotto for a good 15 seasons.

[Manocad]

Adam Silver:

During the session, one employee asked Silver about tanking, a theme that is widely expected to dominate the league conversation with 7-foot-4 French phenom Victor Wembanyama -- a potentially franchise-altering prospect -- being projected to be the No. 1 pick in the 2023 draft.

"We put teams on notice," Silver told employees. "We're going to be paying particular attention to the issue this year."

I feel like there’s no way they can enforce anything. Unless it’s completely behind closed doors. Would they take away lottery balls for another Shai shutdown? Doubt it

I’d definitely be more inclined to believe that there is SOME way to enforce it, behind closed doors or not, otherwise Silver’s comments would just be empty rhetoric. Fining the team? Loss of future picks? I don’t know, obviously. And maybe it is just empty rhetoric after all, i.e. Silver has to acknowledge it and say SOMETHING so he doesn’t come off like a blind idiot.

[Snakebites]

I'm not really seeing how they can enforce anything, other than fining teams for straight up shutting down healthy players before the season is over.

And Silver's words being empty rhetoric is absolutely a possibility that should be considered.

[Snakebites]

I'm not really seeing how they can enforce anything, other than fining teams for straight up shutting down healthy players before the season is over.

And Silver's words being empty rhetoric is absolutely a possibility that should be considered.

[Cowology]

I'm not really seeing how they can enforce anything, other than fining teams for straight up shutting down healthy players before the season is over.

And Silver's words being empty rhetoric is absolutely a possibility that should be considered.

Yeah, I dunno how you prove intent. And frankly it's perfectly reasonable to sit vets and focus on developing young guys if you know you aren't competitive. And because it's somewhat subjective it'll be difficult to draw the line. How do you decide to fine one team but not another when half the league is tanking?

[Snakebites]

I'm not really seeing how they can enforce anything, other than fining teams for straight up shutting down healthy players before the season is over.

And Silver's words being empty rhetoric is absolutely a possibility that should be considered.

Yeah, I dunno how you prove intent. And frankly it's perfectly reasonable to sit vets and focus on developing young guys if you know you aren't competitive. And because it's somewhat subjective it'll be difficult to draw the line. How do you decide to fine one team but not another when half the league is tanking?

Yeah that was the only thing I thought there was even a chance of them being able to pin on a team, short of some team straight up announcing their intentions.

The lottery system was modified in part to discourage tanking- giving worse odds to the worst teams, and making the late lottery slightly less of a pit of despair. The play-in was primarily a cash grab but there was also hope that giving more teams a chance at the playoffs would discourage the practice and make late lottery more appealing By that metric both have failed.

[FloridaMan78]

I'm not really seeing how they can enforce anything, other than fining teams for straight up shutting down healthy players before the season is over.

And Silver's words being empty rhetoric is absolutely a possibility that should be considered.

Yeah, I dunno how you prove intent. And frankly it's perfectly reasonable to sit vets and focus on developing young guys if you know you aren't competitive. And because it's somewhat subjective it'll be difficult to draw the line. How do you decide to fine one team but not another when half the league is tanking?

Yeah that was the only thing I thought there was even a chance of them being able to pin on a team, short of some team straight up announcing their intentions.

The lottery system was modified in part to discourage tanking- giving worse odds to the worst teams, and making the late lottery slightly less of a pit of despair. The play-in was primarily a cash grab but there was also hope that giving more teams a chance at the playoffs would discourage the practice and make late lottery more appealing By that metric both have failed.

Relegation would solve that really quick. I would imagine they would give at least a 1 year warning for that.

[Absolutia]

They could just award lottery picks with a two year delay. It might seem drastic, but the system would be very hard to cheat and everybody would be in the same boat.

It would take a brave GM to try and anticipate a draft class two years in advance.

[ComboGuardCity]

Silver has to say this right? There is nothing he can actually do without majority owner buy-in

[Kalamazoo317]

1. Relegation would be hilarious. I’d love to see it. But it’s probably too hard to implement

2. I think the changes are working. I think the league is stacked with talent and there are very very few dumpster fires

3. How many teams are really actually tanking this year? Obviously Utah wants to (but is failing). San Antonio wants to. Charlotte is just bad and probably has no choice. Anyone else?

[DBC10]

Silver has to say this right? There is nothing he can actually do without majority owner buy-in

This right here. Silver is the rep for the Governors after all so unless they all agree on unanimous consent to fine each other or other etc etc for blatant tanking, nothing probably happens

A few years down the line, I can see them doing something at least, but when Wembanyama is the prize, I'd imagine the tanking teams will contest everything and stall any sort of progress on that end

[theBigLip]

Utah wins again! This is way too funny. Any bets Ainge trades a vet this week?

[ducler]

I'm not really seeing how they can enforce anything, other than fining teams for straight up shutting down healthy players before the season is over.

And Silver's words being empty rhetoric is absolutely a possibility that should be considered.

Yeah, I dunno how you prove intent. And frankly it's perfectly reasonable to sit vets and focus on developing young guys if you know you aren't competitive. And because it's somewhat subjective it'll be difficult to draw the line. How do you decide to fine one team but not another when half the league is tanking?

I remember Spurs being fined because of sitting at least one of TD, TP or Manu in away games. If Shai, Cade or others are sit while healthy, fines can happen, at least on the road.

[Collymore]

Will this be the first ever NBA wins model that busted on a team after 12 games?

[whitehops]

there's been some surprises so far but really all the suspected candidates are at the bottom of the standings:

1-2 - pistons and pacers
0-3 - magic, thunder, rockets
0-3 teams that should pick it up - lakers and kings

i think the jazz will slow down but still be in the tier above the bottom (along with the pacers, kings and lakers imo). the jazz have too many competent vets and skilled young players to totally bottom out without sitting guys.