In four weeks, the worst NFL teams from 2025 begin to collect their bonuses for being bad. And while tanking has indeed happened in the NFL, the problem is far more obvious in the NBA.
On Wednesday, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver vowed to end tanking in basketball.
“We are going to fix it — full stop,” Silver said at a Wednesday press conference, via Tom Friend of Sports Business Journal.
“We’ve been hard at work on this issue for several months now,” Silver added. “Of course, we have a Competition Committee. They’ve been working on that issue with us. We’ve been talking separately to our General Managers. I do think ultimately this is a decision that needs to be made at the ownership level. It has business implications, has basketball implications, has integrity implications for the league.”
Friend reports that the NBA could give all non-playoff teams equal odds in the draft lottery. The playoff play-in teams also could be included in the power forward Powerball game.
“There is an aspect of team building that is called a genuine rebuild, rebuild with integrity,” Silver said. “The problem we’re having these days is it’s become almost impossible to distinguish between the tank and rebuild.”
The only way to truly eliminate tanking — full stop — is to give all teams equal odds at the first pick. In some years, a team that could make the playoffs on a non-play-in basis would be tempted to take the foot off the gas in order to get a chance at a generational talent.
The best approach would be to turn the draft concept on its head. The first pick is one of the spoils of victory. The champion gets the first pick. The worst team gets the last pick.
The current systems used by the NFL and NBA don’t punish ineptitude. They reward it. What better incentive to not suck than to put the worst teams at the back of the line?
Is it fair? What’s more fair? The first pick for the best team and the last pick for the worst, or the first pick for the worst team and the last for the best?
Or they could just get rid of the draft and let players pick their pro teams, the same way players do at the college level.
Of course, it’s too late for that. The ultimate reality show about nothing is too big. Too popular. Too ingrained as a Harry Potter-style sorting, instead of being a fair process for accomplished athletes to decide where they want to start their NFL careers.
The easy response is to say the existing draft formula promotes parity. The response to that is it promotes mediocrity. In an age of legalized gambling, it also undermines integrity.
If it didn’t, it wouldn’t be such a hot topic for the NBA and, potentially and eventually, the NFL.
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