Read it and weep: on the failure of Tanking

[The Midnight]

but, you know, this year's draft is deep...

It's not actually THAT deep, the quality's just higher than usual at the top.

 

[doubledribble]

We don't have to look at the championship teams: there were to few of them to see the trends and much of that stuff happened a while ago and may not be relevant in the current NBA. Lets look at this year contenders (Miami, Indiana, San Antonio, Oklahoma, Clippers, and Houston.


Only two teams out of six could be classified as the teams that are contenders now because they blew up a roster, sucked and got a star or two with a high pick (Oklahoma and Clippers). One (Miami) is partially in this group, owning much more of their current power to the Decision than to the lottery balls. SA was a good team that lucked out due to the injury to their star player, but they still contend due to their culture and ability to keep their stars. And Indiana and Houston assembled their team through spending time in the dreaded "not bad enough" land.


In short, these days you can build a contender in many different ways. Becoming awful on purpose could well be the riskiest and least productive path statistically.

 

[gomretat]

Since the Jazz are not tanking I guess this is a good thing for us? If you watch what teams do that tank versus what the Jazz have done it is quite different.

 

[green]

So how exactly this "ONLY way to win a title" worked out for Celtics, Cleveland, Charlotte and Orlando? I mean, for those teams that actually drafted the majority of the stars that you mentioned?

Uhh....the point I've been trying to get across for the last five months:

IT'S NEXT TO IMPOSSIBLE FOR A SMALL MARKET TEAM TO WIN A TITLE.

I think the only exception is SA and Miami. Miami was able to bring in Pat Riley and already had Wade. SA tanked for Duncan and ended up with arguable the best big man ever. So, yeah, the chances that Utah ever wins a title are a little better than someone winning 1 billion dollars from Buffet.

BUT, the only way Utah has any sort of shot at that tiny little chance is to win the lottery in the year that one of the greatest players of all time is available in the draft. Sooooo, if you are Utah, what do you do? You probably do what Utah has done. Have a goal to make the playoffs every year for 20+ years, then once ever 30 years or so, try to blow it up and shoot for the Sun.

But, without that "guy" you are hopeless. And while Miami is a small market team, I don't think Utah has quite the same pull for a young African American basketball player that Miami has.

So, what I am basically saying, is that the only shot Utah has at winning a title might very well be Jabari Parker. And praying that he turns out to be one of the best SF's of all time.

Yeah, we really have no shot at winning a title.

 

[green]

We don't have to look at the championship teams: there were to few of them to see the trends and much of that stuff happened a while ago and may not be relevant in the current NBA. Lets look at this year contenders (Miami, Indiana, San Antonio, Oklahoma, Clippers, and Houston.


Only two teams out of six could be classified as the teams that are contenders now because they blew up a roster, sucked and got a star or two with a high pick (Oklahoma and Clippers). One (Miami) is partially in this group, owning much more of their current power to the Decision than to the lottery balls. SA was a good team that lucked out due to the injury to their star player, but they still contend due to their culture and ability to keep their stars. And Indiana and Houston assembled their team through spending time in the dreaded "not bad enough" land.


In short, these days you can build a contender in many different ways. Becoming awful on purpose could well be the riskiest and least productive path statistically.

Let's look at those teams. Teams who got where they are today with top 5 picks:

Miami, San Antonio, Oklahoma, LA Clippers.

Indiana built through the draft.

Houston took advantage of an incredibly stupid decision made by the Thunder. And they also lucked out that a superstar didn't want to play in LA.

So, I doubt Utah can do what Houston did. In fact, they might have tried, and were politely told, "no thanks."

Utah won't be able to do what Miami did, because I don't think we could get LeBron to come to Utah, even if we had a Wade level player.

That leaves San Antonio, Oklahoma, Clippers, and Indiana.

Out of this list, only San Antonio has won a title. They did it by drafting the best PF in the history of the NBA. Probably not happening for Utah.

That leaves LAC, Oklahoma and Indiana. They are all contenders. In fact, I've said a bunch of times that I think Indiana is the Jazz of the 90's...win a ton of games, but lose every time they face LeBron (Jordan) in the playoffs.

OKC tossed away their "true" contender status when they traded Harden away. And the Clippers haven't ever made it past so OKC and SA, sooooo....

Again, doesn't look good for Utah. Or any team for that matter. Basically, we have two teams that I'd put money on to win the title this year, SA and Miami. And out of those two teams, how many of us would put money on SA? Not many.

So, in reality, there is only one "contender" this year. As long as LeBron is playing, every other team is praying for an injury.

Like when Jordan was playing.

Like when Shaq was playing.

Like when Duncan was in his prime.

The NBA is a one man game. And you have to have that one man. Or pray for an injury.

 

[[size/HUGE] fixed [/size]]

The Clippers don't apply. They didn't reach Contender Status solely because they got Griffin. They also landed CP3 after CP3's deal with LAL fell through. And, they finally got Sterling to back the **** off.

IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT HAS HAPPENED BEFORE, OR WHAT THE MODELS SUGGEST. THE BEST WAY FOR THE JAZZ TO SUBSTANTIALLY IMPROVE THEIR POSITION -- GIVEN WHERE THEY WERE, AND THE FREE-AGENT MARKET AT THE TIME-- WAS TO LOSE A BUNCH OF GAMES WHILE PICKING UP SOME ADDITIONAL ASSETS. They did the latter (GSW trade), but have they been good enough at the former?

It's stupid to speculate about if it might not work out. Of course it might fail. But if they land a top3 pick, then they PROBABLY played the best hand given the context for their decisions.

 

[JimLes]

t's stupid to speculate about if it might not work out.

Why? It's called risk assessment. You have a plan. It may or may not work. You try and calculate the likelihood of success, which is what should determine whether it's worth it or not.

But if they land a top3 pick, then they PROBABLY played the best hand given the context for their decisions.

No **** Sherlock. If I win the Powerball moneys, it was PROBABLY a good idea to play. Seriously, can we raise the logical arguments just a smidge here?

 

[[size/HUGE] fixed [/size]]

Why? It's called risk assessment. You have a plan. It may or may not work. You try and calculate the likelihood of success, which is what should determine whether it's worth it or not.



No **** Sherlock. If I win the Powerball moneys, it was PROBABLY a good idea to play. Seriously, can we raise the logical arguments just a smidge here?

Are you looking for a disagreement? Cuz you're looking in the wrong place. Read my post in the context of the preceding posts.

 

[Doublea]

tbh winning a title would be great and all, but I'd rather just be a team in title contention talks, so like the clippers, thunder... Just to be exciting and going deep into the playoffs. I'll take that.

 

[Doublea]

Uhh....the point I've been trying to get across for the last five months:

IT'S NEXT TO IMPOSSIBLE FOR A SMALL MARKET TEAM TO WIN A TITLE.

I think the only exception is SA and Miami. Miami was able to bring in Pat Riley and already had Wade. SA tanked for Duncan and ended up with arguable the best big man ever. So, yeah, the chances that Utah ever wins a title are a little better than someone winning 1 billion dollars from Buffet.

BUT, the only way Utah has any sort of shot at that tiny little chance is to win the lottery in the year that one of the greatest players of all time is available in the draft. Sooooo, if you are Utah, what do you do? You probably do what Utah has done. Have a goal to make the playoffs every year for 20+ years, then once ever 30 years or so, try to blow it up and shoot for the Sun.

But, without that "guy" you are hopeless. And while Miami is a small market team, I don't think Utah has quite the same pull for a young African American basketball player that Miami has.

So, what I am basically saying, is that the only shot Utah has at winning a title might very well be Jabari Parker. And praying that he turns out to be one of the best SF's of all time.

Yeah, we really have no shot at winning a title.

I think we have a little bit better of a chance than 1 in 9.2 quintillion to win a title sometime.

 

[[size/HUGE] fixed [/size]]

LOL... can we raise the level of logical arguments?

How about you take seriously your own PowerBall metaphor?

 

[JimLes]

LOL... can we raise the level of logical arguments?

How about you take seriously your own PowerBall metaphor?

I was just pointing out the level of your logic. You are saying that if the Jazz land a top3 pick, then by default, the strategy used will become the best strategy in retrospect, are you not?