Jazz's Markkanen: Tanking is a failed concept

[Tracymcgoaty]

However, I believe rewarding losing in sports entertainment makes for a worse product than relegation - promotion -system.

Rewarding losing in the NBA allows us to have championship-level teams in Cleveland or Oklahoma, this is by far a better product than any league without salary cap and draft.

I think building academies and having relegations would be cool for the NBA.

Yeah, it would be soooooooo cool to see all the talent in the world playing for the Lakers and the Knicks.

Yeah New York and LA would probably have the most nba players being produced along with Chicago and Philly.

Probably too much to keep them all in the same team. Talents would still move around to start on other teams.

Plenty of young prodigies getting bought at a young age in sports like football.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

Tanking will exist until the league has a hard cap and no draft.

Let well managed teams be rewarded, and let players decide where they want to go. Easy solution but it won’t happen because the players want to go over the cap, and the big city team fans would bitch they can’t just bankroll a winning team. But it is the solution.

the only thing that real stop tanking is a relegation system.
you might remove the incentives to lose, but still there would be no incentive to win. both n terms of team building and to avoid injuries in the second part of the season.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

However, I believe rewarding losing in sports entertainment makes for a worse product than relegation - promotion -system.

Rewarding losing in the NBA allows us to have championship-level teams in Cleveland or Oklahoma, this is by far a better product than any league without salary cap and draft.

I think building academies and having relegations would be cool for the NBA.

Yeah, it would be soooooooo cool to see all the talent in the world playing for the Lakers and the Knicks.

the NBA regular season is not a better product, at all.
just, with so many games, fans can ignore those teams who aren't even trying.

[doogie_hauser]

Maybe Lauri should focus on playing in a single playoff game before commenting on tanking.

Maybe the Jazz shouldn't have sat him, Collins, Sexton and Kessler routinely with bogus injury reports since DECEMBER.

The tanking job the Jazz did this year is the most disgraceful one in NBA history. Most teams wait until the ASB at least, these guys started it not even two months from the beginning of the season.

Oh please, The Sixers tank job was far worse

Hope they get a top 3 pick just to annoy you (rooting for the Wizards to win the Lottery)

[JujitsuFlip]

What’s one of relegation-promotion problems , name me one ?

Massively unpredictable revenues.

That’s not exactly fans problem , not even the players as most of the contracts is guaranteed

Relegated teams adjust their budget all the time when relegated or promoted, does this for over 100 years , as a club owner I can see your point , but then again if you suck as an owner Ishbia , Tsai , Dolan for most part you being relegated , not rewarded with high draft picks

The Stockton Kings who just won the G League Championship have a collective payroll of less than $1 million.

The Jazz, worst record in the NBA this season have a collective payroll of $154 million.

That's issue #1.

Stockton's Arena only holds 11,000 people. That would by far be the smallest venue in the NBA but imagine if the Southbay Lakers won, their home games hold 750 people. But most G League squads venues only hold between 2,000 to 5,000 people.

That's issue #2.

G League play what 34 games per season vs 82 in the NBA?

That's issue #3.

The G League uses buses to travel to some games. Can you imagine going from a private NBA jet to a bus for MOT?

That's issue #4.

Most importantly the NBA is a union and they're going to lookout for the best interest of their players, relegation isn't one of those things.

That's issue #5.

[doogie_hauser]

However, I believe rewarding losing in sports entertainment makes for a worse product than relegation - promotion -system.

Rewarding losing in the NBA allows us to have championship-level teams in Cleveland or Oklahoma, this is by far a better product than any league without salary cap and draft.

I think building academies and having relegations would be cool for the NBA.

Yeah, it would be soooooooo cool to see all the talent in the world playing for the Lakers and the Knicks.

the NBA regular season is not a better product, at all.
just, with so many games, fans can ignore those teams who aren't even trying.

People bring up the European Soccer system being better/more equal, whence in fact its the same rich clubs dominating the major European comps and Champions League's comp year in, year out (frankly it's a miracle my German League Team Bayer Leverkusen stopped Bayern Munich's stranglehold on the Bundesliga last season)

European Soccer/Football only rewards the rich/powerful clubs. That system is not for US Sports where small market teams actually have a fighter's chance to compete and win chips

[The Master]

the NBA regular season is not a better product, at all.
just, with so many games, fans can ignore those teams who aren't even trying.

Yeah, they can. But those teams have also chances to create a great team, in soccer - Cleveland or Oklahoma are forever mid-teams at best happy to get a win against big markets once for a while.

Since 2005, 5 clubs won English Premier League titles (by far the most competitive league in football) and Manchester City won 40% of titles in that span. It would suck to witness something like that in the NBA. People right now are complaining about big markets and their power, and we're talking about BY FAR more even playing field than in any no-draft system. In the past 20 years, 10 different organizations (33% of the league) won NBA titles. Isn't that great? And this is based on draft/salary cap system.

There are minor things you can improve in NBA draft system, but the whole concept is fantastic. You're Charlotte Hornets' fan and you have realistic chances to get a borderline generational talent like Cooper Flagg. Imagine you're a fan of Leganes or Sheffield United dreaming about Lamine Yamal. Nothing is perfect, though, nor is NBA system.

[knicksfan974]

I'm sure it sucks to go from a losing team to another losing team to another losing team, but at the end of the day, Markkanen will probably make close to a half a billion dollars playing a kid's game. If something he should be quite happy about his life, no matter if he never plays in a playoff game in his career.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

the NBA regular season is not a better product, at all.
just, with so many games, fans can ignore those teams who aren't even trying.

Yeah, they can. But those teams have also chances to create a great team, in soccer - Cleveland or Oklahoma are forever mid-teams at best happy to get a win against big markets once for a while.

Since 2005, 5 clubs won English Premier League titles (by far the most competitive league in football) and Manchester City won 40% of titles in that span. It would suck to witness something like that in the NBA. People right now are complaining about big markets and their power, and we're talking about BY FAR more even playing field than in any no-draft system. In the past 20 years, 10 different organizations (33% of the league) won NBA titles. Isn't that great? And this is based on draft/salary cap system.

There are minor things you can improve in NBA draft system, but the whole concept is fantastic. You're Charlotte Hornets' fan and you have realistic chances to get a borderline generational talent like Cooper Flagg. Imagine you're a fan of Leganes or Sheffield United dreaming about Lamine Yamal. Nothing is perfect, though, nor is NBA system.

the equal opportunity comes primarily from the cap and revenue sharing, rather than the draft.
What creates the inequality we see in European football are the enormous differences in terms of spending power, sometimes funded at loss by russian oligarchs or gulf monarchs.

[Bloodbather]

Maybe Lauri should focus on playing in a single playoff game before commenting on tanking.

Really?

He was on the cusp of it with the Cavs. After the trade, he transformed into an All-Star and was leading the Jazz to the Playoffs before management pulled the plug on the season to tank and they've been tanking ever since.

Massively unpredictable revenues.

[b]In soccer, the Premier League in the UK has parachute payments for relegated clubs to compensate for the drop-off in revenue. Could easily introduce a scheme like that[/b].

Which is kind of unfair to the 2nd division teams because the relegated teams are often paying Premier League salaries (which is why the parachute payment is needed) in a division where nobody is earning close to PL money. Relegated teams often cherry pick the good talents in the 2nd division to help them push for promotion again, which then resulted in the birth of the yo-yo clubs.

If you look at the top of the 2nd division right now, you'll see 3 recently relegated teams (2 of them relegated last season). There are clubs that aren't good enough for the PL, and too good for the 2nd division, so they spend years getting relegated and promoted until one day they fail to get promoted and we won't hear from them for years (like West Brom).

I'm aware of this, but you'll never have full parity unless you do away with competition and hand out participation trophies or make winning random. Some teams will inevitably lose out.

The question here is, 'is this better than creating a false incentive (rewarding losing) with the draft system?' For me, it is.

If you took the PL model and had a salary cap on it, it's as good as a model gets, imo.

[The Master]

the equal opportunity comes primarily from the cap and revenue sharing, rather than the draft.

One doesn't work without another. Cavaliers are a small market team and the chances to create contenders without LeBron, Kyrie, Mobley or Garland from top of the draft are much smaller. Then, they have chances to keep LeBron for 11 years because from rules perspective they operate on the same level as any other team. It's still doable, but much more difficult.

I guess I don't have to explain that (on average) rewarding the worst teams with the best talent stimulates parity. Any draft reform that changes this scheme is long-term decreasing parity. If you don't care about parity, just say it, but the whole 'oh no, losing is rewarded' misses the point. And it's not like you're actually beneficial of losing if you are poorly run organization - NO had CP3, AD and Zion, and they won like two playoff series in this span, Kings, Hornets are cooked for years as well, Wolves have had one decent season in 20 years. So I guess it's not that simple.

Re: Markkanen - didn't he sign an extension with Jazz like a year ago? While everyone knew they're in rebuilding phase now? After 31-51 season? I mean, I get it that from good players' perspective playing on a bad team isn't that fancy, but I guess he was happy with 240$ million extension from one of those teams, so cry more.

[monopoman]

There are a dozen ways to make tanking less palatable but until those things happen, there will always be tanking especially when a draft has a likely generational talent.

You are kidding yourself if teams wouldn't fall over themselves trying to lose if the upcoming draft had a player of LBJ's caliber potentially. One player means a hell of a lot more in the NBA, than any other league. A great QB still needs solid players around him to win, and even beyond that the defense matters also meanwhile in the NBA if you get a top 3 player in the league it can change everything by itself.

Anyways some reasonable ideas to make tanking less useful, a team can't get a top 3 pick back to back years no matter what. If a team wins a #1 pick they are excluded from that pick for at least three seasons.

People always want to go to extremes to stop it, when doing what I talk about above would slow it down. Stopping it is a pipe dream, and really the average NBA watcher doesn't give a **** about it. Crap, even the people here aren't bending over backwards to watch the Jazz lose a ton of games, so tanking only affects people in the abstract since most don't watch tanking teams.

[axeman23]

What’s one of relegation-promotion problems , name me one ?

Massively unpredictable revenues.

NOT if you don't tank/suck...

[Wingy]

Jazz ruined Lauri's career by tanking.

he wanted this to get paid, so he should be quiet about it now.

generational money was more important. stop whining about it.

He doesn’t break out like he did unless a team caters everything to him, like the Jazz did. Jazz and Hardy made him rich as hell.

[MoneyTalks41890]

Both OKC and Houston just showed how a tight tank and good asset management can vault you from the basement to the upper tiers. It’s the only way small markets can compete.

Hard to say what Lauri was told by the team, but he signed a pretty sweet raise and extend deal with the Jazz getting paid off shining on a bad team. He could’ve forced a trade instead or required the Jazz to make certain moves before he would sign. But it seems like he didn’t care that much.

Even with flattened lottery odds, teams are still clamoring to be bad rather than be stuck in the middle.

[hauntedcomputer]

Clearly, Markannen is the failed concept.

Dude can't even make a play-in.

[Mavrelous]

Markannen got paid, and while doing that he had the choice to sign on August 6th and be eligible for trade and chose to sign later and not get traded knowing full well the direction of the franchise, he chose this TBH, I feel for guys like Sexton who are stuck on a team that doesn't want to win and haven't gotten their bag yet.

[7seventynine9]

The Jazz should have traded his this past off season. He'll probably get traded this summer but it will be for significantly less than he would have gotten last year.

He had an off year this season but I'd guess he'd rebound some playing with better talent.

I'm not sure any up and coming team would want Lauri as their 2nd option and I'm not sure any contending team has the required pieces to move. What does a Lauri trade even look? MPJ and a few protected 1st rounders? They should have traded him this past off season. He has no value on a tanking Jazz team that isn't going to compete for at least 3-4 more seasons barring some incredible luck. Even if they get Cooper, they still have a way to go and Lauri doesn't really fit in the window.

[Ryoga Hibiki]

the equal opportunity comes primarily from the cap and revenue sharing, rather than the draft.

One doesn't work without another. Cavaliers are a small market team and the chances to create contenders without LeBron, Kyrie, Mobley or Garland from top of the draft are much smaller. Then, they have chances to keep LeBron for 11 years because from rules perspective they operate on the same level as any other team. It's still doable, but much more difficult.

I guess I don't have to explain that (on average) rewarding the worst teams with the best talent stimulates parity. Any draft reform that changes this scheme is long-term decreasing parity. If you don't care about parity, just say it, but the whole 'oh no, losing is rewarded' misses the point. And it's not like you're actually beneficial of losing if you are poorly run organization - NO had CP3, AD and Zion, and they won like two playoff series in this span, Kings, Hornets are cooked for years as well, Wolves have had one decent season in 20 years. So I guess it's not that simple.

Re: Markkanen - didn't he sign an extension with Jazz like a year ago? While everyone knew they're in rebuilding phase now? After 31-51 season? I mean, I get it that from good players' perspective playing on a bad team isn't that fancy, but I guess he was happy with 240$ million extension from one of those teams, so cry more.

what I am saying is that, in terms of what causes the difference in parity between European Football and the NBA, the vast majority comes from the fact teams have roughly the same budget to invest on players and that you can't just throw money at a player.
Sure the draft helps, but it's not the primary driver.
San Antonio had such a run also because Timmeh didn't have alternatives willing to pay him twice as much.
The draft is why he got there, the cap and max salary is why he stayed his whole career.

[Onus]

Maybe Lauri should focus on playing in a single playoff game before commenting on tanking.

Lauri didn't ask to be traded to Utah. Weird comment

Lauri chose to re-sign with Utah to get his money now rather than trying to get to a winning situation.