NBA Reportedly Will Undergo Review of 'Tanking' Policies, Could Result in Rule Changes
The NBA informed all 30 teams that it had begun a renewed review of league policy changes regarding "tanking" on Friday, according to ESPN's Shams Charania.
The league plans to examine rules concerning "draft pick protections, revised draft lottery rules, and other approaches" as part of the review, per Charania.
The league previously approved a change to the lottery format in 2017, with the new rules implemented ahead of the 2019 draft.
Each of the three teams with the worst records during the prior season own identical 14 percent odds of winning the No. 1 overall pick. Before the update, the worst team held 25 percent odds of winning the lottery while the second-worst squad owned a 19.9 percent chance. The third-worst organization had 15.6 percent odds as well.
The NBA also introduced the play-in tournament in 2020, giving teams sitting in the bottom half of their respective conference standings more opportunities to remain competitive and attempt to clinch a playoff berth.
ESPN's Tim Bontemps and Kevin Pelton discussed tanking solutions with "sources around the league" in March, with one proposal involving the removal of certain pick protections. Under the potential change, picks would only be top-four protected, lottery protected, or unprotected.
Another idea was to flatten the lottery odds even more, per Bontemps and Pelton.
The NBA has incentivized teams with losing records to chase wins instead of improving their draft positioning in the past, and another change could be on the horizon.
