The scourge of tanking has been eating away at the NBA system for years. But perhaps it has never been as present as this season. Tanking is that damn word that translates to “wanting to lose”. It is the strategy adopted by some teams to increase their chances in the Draft. The worse they finish in the regular season, the more options they have. If a team runs out of chances for the Playoffs, it lets itself lose and gains options in the Draft. But this year it is even believed that some teams even started the season with that strategy in mind.
The issue of Draft options is controversial. The worse you do in the regular season, the more likely you are to get the number one Draft pick or at least one of the higher picks. The teams with the most losses get more ping-pong balls that are placed in a pot for the Draft lottery, which is only open to teams that are not in the Playoffs or Play-In.
And in this sense, here comes the solution proposed, in his own style, by Charles Barkley. And it’s simple: “one ping-pong ball for the teams that don’t make the Playoffs“. He did it on an ESPN show with Shaquille O’Neal and Kenny Smith
“I’ve been saying this for years. Teams have been tanking for three months,” Barkley said. “Every team that doesn’t make the playoffs should get one ball for the draft lottery. Losing does not improve your odds. Every team should get one ball. That would be the fair way to do it.”
At one point in the conversation, Kenny Smith asked him: “Where else in the world do you get rewarded for being deficient?“
Sir Charles’ response: “Nowhere else… only in our stupid NBA. Come on, man. Stop doing that. Give a ball to each team, that would stop the tanking.”
Barkley not only referred to the Draft as a possible deterrent to tanking, but also suggested a punishment: not allowing teams that finish with a losing record to raise ticket prices the following year: “It’s not just now, I’ve been saying this for years. And not just in basketball, but in football, baseball, in all sports. I strongly believe that if you finish with a losing record, you shouldn’t be able to raise ticket prices. If you’re bad, you shouldn’t be able to raise ticket prices.”
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