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My Draft Lottery Thoughts

ONE LOVE said:
I think any system that puts the fate of who you pick squarely on the results of the teams is dangerous. At least with the ping pong balls you have some uncertainty which may prevent teams from wanting to tank HARD. If a team knows that it'll need a win percentage of 20% to get the #1 pick this coming year, it'll do its absolute best to lose that many game.


I think the proposed lottery was a step in the right direction, it just needed to be tweak a bit more to be less 'flat' at the top end, giving the 5-6 worse teams slightly better odds.
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Sorry, I was thinking it would determine the order of the lottery. I quickly calculated what the lottery would have looked like last season based on last 3 years records (with 50% of the weight from current record and 25% for the previous 2)


Collective Records Lottery
1. Bucks (same)
2. Kings (increased 5 spots)
3. Magic (same)
4. 76ers (decreased 2 spots)
5. Cavaliers (increased 4 spots)
6. Pistons (increased 2 spots)
7. Pelicans (increased 3 spots)
8. Jazz (decreased 4 spots)
9. Celtics (decreased 4 spots)
10. TWolves (increased 3 spots)
11. Lakers (decreased 5 spots)
12. Suns (increased 2 spots)
13. Knicks (decreased 1 spot)
14. Nuggets (decreased 3 spots)

And then you would do the lottery from there. I don't think this is how it should necessarily be, but I think it could be something to work with. It would be much harder to intentionally tank 3 consecutive years.
 
MDAV28 said:
Sorry, I was thinking it would determine the order of the lottery. I quickly calculated what the lottery would have looked like last season based on last 3 years records (with 50% of the weight from current record and 25% for the previous 2)


Collective Records Lottery
1. Bucks (same)
2. Kings (increased 5 spots)
3. Magic (same)
4. 76ers (decreased 2 spots)
5. Cavaliers (increased 4 spots)
6. Pistons (increased 2 spots)
7. Pelicans (increased 3 spots)
8. Jazz (decreased 4 spots)
9. Celtics (decreased 4 spots)
10. TWolves (increased 3 spots)
11. Lakers (decreased 5 spots)
12. Suns (increased 2 spots)
13. Knicks (decreased 1 spot)
14. Nuggets (decreased 3 spots)

And then you would do the lottery from there. I don't think this is how it should necessarily be, but I think it could be something to work with. It would be much harder to intentionally tank 3 consecutive years.
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OK but I think the issue here is still the fact that it 'could' potentially encourage long term 'tank', which is possibly worse than a 1-2 year tank.


That would be one of the 'unintended consequences' Adam Silver and the owners were talking about. If a team had sucked for 2 years, why not suck 1 or 2 more years and get multiple lottery picks? It becomes like a bad habit, the team's value goes down, bad for the league overall.


I still think rejigging the lottery odds as I propose above is still the better way to go. Something that sits between what the current odds are and what the rejected odds were.
 
ONE LOVE said:
OK but I think the issue here is still the fact that it 'could' potentially encourage long term 'tank', which is possibly worse than a 1-2 year tank.


That would be one of the 'unintended consequences' Adam Silver and the owners were talking about. If a team had sucked for 2 years, why not suck 1 or 2 more years and get multiple lottery picks? It becomes like a bad habit, the team's value goes down, bad for the league overall.


I still think rejigging the lottery odds as I propose above is still the better way to go. Something that sits between what the current odds are and what the rejected odds were.
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See I think you could look at it the opposite way, if you suck the last 2 years, it's kind of like a safety blanket for actually TRYING to be good. If your record is bad the last 2 years, you still could have a better lottery pick than you normally would if you actually try to win. I'll just use the TWolves for example, the 2 years before last season they were under .400. Then last season they do better and get close to .500, but in this situation they end up with 10th best odds instead of 13th.

Also look at it based on the Jazz situation last off season. There's no way we just let Jefferson and Millsap walk and make that salary dump trade from Golden State because even with a terrible season, we ended up with only the 8th best odds in that situation.

Like I said, I don't think that is the solution, but I think it is something that could be worked with.
 
oldtimer said:
I still like my idea of a three year weighted average for all nonplayoff teams. No team can have the number 1 pick in back to back years. Very few teams would tank 3 years in a row just to get the number one pick. This helps the teams that are truly bad but also has a little protection against bad franchises losing year after year. I wish the competition committee would propose something like that.
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I don't know how I missed this before my posts. I'm with you.
 
MDAV28 said:
See I think you could look at it the opposite way, if you suck the last 2 years, it's kind of like a safety blanket for actually TRYING to be good. If your record is bad the last 2 years, you still could have a better lottery pick than you normally would if you actually try to win. I'll just use the TWolves for example, the 2 years before last season they were under .400. Then last season they do better and get close to .500, but in this situation they end up with 10th best odds instead of 13th.

Also look at it based on the Jazz situation last off season. There's no way we just let Jefferson and Millsap walk and make that salary dump trade from Golden State because even with a terrible season, we ended up with only the 8th best odds in that situation.

Like I said, I don't think that is the solution, but I think it is something that could be worked with.
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OK so I think it comes down to which system would you rather have: Weight Average vs Rejigging Lottery Odds.


I think it comes down to whether you would rather have: Long Term Tank VS One Off Tank.


I think the league is OK with One Off Tank, ala what the Jazz is doing, they've only really 'tanked hard' last year and looks like they should improve this year. What I don't think the league is happy with is what the 76ers are doing which is a systematic Long Term Tank:

- Drafted injured guys 2 years running (Noel in 2013, Embiid in 2014)

- Drafted a guy that cannot come over for 2 years (Dario Saric)


It is a systematic, Long Term Tanking plan they've got going there in Philly. The Weight Average system will not solve what the 76ers are doing - if anything it would enhance it, and I think that would be a concern for the league.
 
ONE LOVE said:
OK so I think it comes down to which system would you rather have: Weight Average vs Rejigging Lottery Odds.


I think it comes down to whether you would rather have: Long Term Tank VS One Off Tank.


I think the league is OK with One Off Tank, ala what the Jazz is doing, they've only really 'tanked hard' last year and looks like they should improve this year. What I don't think the league is happy with is what the 76ers are doing which is a systematic Long Term Tank:

- Drafted injured guys 2 years running (Noel in 2013, Embiid in 2014)

- Drafted a guy that cannot come over for 2 years (Dario Saric)


It is a systematic, Long Term Tanking plan they've got going there in Philly. The Weight Average system will not solve what the 76ers are doing - if anything it would enhance it, and I think that would be a concern for the league.
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I guess I just don't see it that way. I don't think the 76ers would have been as intentionally bad as they were in hopes of getting 11.9% chance (4th odds) at the number 1 pick.

I don't think a team that is just plain, unintentionally bad for two seasons, would want to continue to be bad. The system would make it worth it to be better because you will still end up with an OK pick based on your last two seasons.

To be honest, I think a bigger concern with that system would be if a team in a situation to push for a the playoffs as a low seed and likely to be knocked out early, or just miss the playoffs and end up with a top 10 pick and better chances at moving up based on their average from the previous seasons.
 
MDAV28 said:
I guess I just don't see it that way. I don't think the 76ers would have been as intentionally bad as they were in hopes of getting 11.9% chance (4th odds) at the number 1 pick.

I don't think a team that is just plain, unintentionally bad for two seasons, would want to continue to be bad. The system would make it worth it to be better because you will still end up with an OK pick based on your last two seasons.

To be honest, I think a bigger concern with that system would be if a team in a situation to push for a the playoffs as a low seed and likely to be knocked out early, or just miss the playoffs and end up with a top 10 pick and better chances at moving up based on their average from the previous seasons.
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Yup agreed with all that too.


At the end of the day if I were a small market team I'm more likely to vote against the weighted average system because I would need to be bad for 3-4 years to get a decent pool of talent, and that certainly would hit me HARD in the pocket.
 
I'm more a proponent of a sliding scale system. Teams 1-14 are ranked 1 to 14 worst to best.

Team 1 can draw for picks 1-3 and given 4
Team 2 can draw for picks 1-4 and given 5
Team 3 can draw for picks 1-5 and given 6
Team 4 can draw for picks 1-6 and given 7
Team 5 can draw for picks 2-7 and given 8
Team 6 can draw for picks 3-8 and given 9
Team 7 ---------------------4-9------------10
8 5-10 11
9 6-11 12
10 7-12 13
11 8-14
12 9-14
13 10-14
14 11-14


And I'd make it even odds for each pick drawn for those teams that qualify for that pick. In this scenario, teams can only gain three slots but keep the scenario where you can only drop 3 slots.

Tanking will still occur, but I believe there'd be less mid range tanking.

EDIT: This scale is very malleable. Can stretch it out to have guaranteed picks later, or start the draw for better teams earlier. Can also stretch guaranteed picks out. Guarantee pick for, say, Team 2 to be 2 picks after Team 1.

Tiebreakers are easy. Can be done two ways. Can draw tied teams before the lottery, forcing one team into the better team position, or you can give both teams the same starting point, and draw for if neither team draws a pick, like what is done now. For example, two teams tie for Team 6 position. The both are entered into the drawing at pick 3, but neither draw after pick 8, at that point the tiebreaker draw delegated pick 9 to the winner and pick 10 to the loser.
 
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oldtimer said:
I still like my idea of a three year weighted average for all nonplayoff teams. No team can have the number 1 pick in back to back years. Very few teams would tank 3 years in a row just to get the number one pick. This helps the teams that are truly bad but also has a little protection against bad franchises losing year after year. I wish the competition committee would propose something like that.
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So reward bad GMs who consistently draft busts, sign the wrong players, etc. Nah.....
 
The issues with tanking is overrated.

The key should be to even out the talent in the league not penalize the already struggling bottom. The salary system makes it easier for players to team up thus making the top end teams the clear favorites while all the other tier teams really have no shot to be competitive for a title. The key to fixing tanking is to even out the talent. The way you do that is to end max contracts. The fix is not in wheels or lotteries. This just lessens the chance a bad team becomes remotely talented before that star player bolted to a bigger market. So even if the cream of the crop wanted to play in the mega markets they'll either have to leave an insane payday to team with other talented players which would be forced to make the same sacrifice, or they would take a salary closer to their market value, but be without the top end running mates. The only way to end tanking is to give bad team a far chance at free agents other wise it's best to be bad and take your chance with the lotto. Even if the odds are shifted.
 
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