This is how the lottery balls would be distributed in levels with the odds in the first option:
| # of equipment |
lottery balls |
% chance at #1 |
|
|
Three worst records |
3 |
2 |
5.4% |
|
Rest of non-play-in teams |
7 |
3 |
8.1% |
|
9th and 10th play-in place |
4 |
2 |
5.4% |
|
Losers of 7v8 play-in matches |
2 |
1 |
2.7% |
Entry teams would participate in this proposal. The two losers of the confrontations between those classified 7 and 8 would receive a ball (2.7% probability). The four teams in 9th versus 10th would each receive two balls (5.4% probabilities).
Advertisement
Most interestingly, the three worst records in the league would have lower odds (5.4%) than the other seven teams missing the playoffs and play-in (8.1%).
Those bottom three teams would enter what the NBA calls the “relegation draft” and lose one of their lottery balls to avoid a race to the bottom. This draft relegation concept was raised during the general managers meeting in early April, as first reported on Yahoo Sports. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver welcomed it with great enthusiasm because of how the mechanism would work to discourage teams from hitting rock bottom.
The 16 teams would be selected in the lottery as part of this proposal. But the teams relegated to the draft would have the 12th pick as their floor.
|
draft selection |
bottom 3 |
The next 7 worst |
9 and 10 seeds |
7 against 8 losers |
|
1st |
5.4% |
8.1% |
5.4% |
2.7% |
|
2nd |
5% |
8% |
5% |
3% |
|
3rd |
6% |
8% |
6% |
3% |
|
4th |
6% |
8% |
6% |
3% |
|
5th |
6% |
8% |
6% |
3% |
|
6th |
6% |
7% |
6% |
4% |
|
7th |
6% |
7% |
6% |
4% |
|
eighth |
6% |
7% |
6% |
4% |
|
ninth |
6% |
7% |
6% |
4% |
|
10th |
8% |
6% |
6% |
4% |
|
11 |
14% |
4% |
5% |
4% |
|
12 |
25% |
2% |
2% |
2% |
|
13 |
7% |
9% |
8% |
|
|
14 |
6% |
9% |
10% |
|
|
15 |
5% |
9% |
15% |
|
|
16 |
3% |
7% |
27% |
I’m in the relegation zone of the draft. It’s time. The league has spent 20 years subsidizing the race to the bottom, and the arguments for cutting that subsidy are overwhelming.
Advertisement
The standard objection is that the drop in the draft makes it harder for the league’s worst teams to emerge from a rebuild. I don’t buy it. In recent years, many organizations with functional headquarters have fallen into the lottery and quickly exited. The teams that don’t come back out (the ones that continue to be bad year after year) usually have the same problem, and it’s not bad luck. They are the people who lead the teams. Allowing horrible front offices by giving them higher odds would return the league to even more extreme levels of tanking.
The relegation zone also turns around the sign of losing for the teams that are in it. Fans will no longer squint at the March and April schedule and instead face their own squad. If this rule were in effect this year, the Wizards, Pacers and Nets would have been fighting like hell to get out of the top three. The Jazz, Kings and Grizzlies would have tried hard to avoid it. Mavericks fans wouldn’t have been disappointed by some of the wins they had in April, which hurt their lottery odds. For the worst teams in the league, winning would mean the same thing it always meant to fans of every other team: It would be good.
Well, more or less. This proposal has a big problem. To understand it, this is how the probabilities would be distributed by rank:
|
#1 odds |
The first 3 |
top 5 |
top 10 |
Average selection |
|
|
3 worst records |
5.4% |
16% |
28% |
61% |
8.1 |
|
7 remaining teams that do not enter the play-in |
8.1% |
24% |
39% |
73% |
7.4 |
|
9th and 10th Entry Teams |
5.4% |
16% |
28% |
59% |
9.1 |
|
2 losers of the 7 vs 8 play-in |
2.7% |
8% |
15% |
35% |
11.7 |
The best place to be in the 3-2-1 Lottery is clearly outside of the play-in, avoiding the bottom three. Because this new proposal aims to eliminate tanking at the bottom of the league, and it certainly does so with the teams relegated from the draft.
Advertisement
But there is a cliff between each level. If you are in ninth or tenth place, you may want to be one of the seven teams not participating in the play-in for better odds. If you are seeded 7th or 8th, you may want to be 9th or 10th to double your odds. If you are the fifth or sixth seed, you may prefer to participate in the play-in.
I am concerned about this step in lottery odds. The winners of those play-in games get seventh place and a zero percent chance in the lottery. The loser has a chance to make the playoffs and a 2.7% chance of being in the first pick, an 8% chance of being in the top three, a 15% chance of being in the top five, a 35% chance of being in the top 10 and a 100% chance of being in the top 16. It seems like a significantly better result.
This concern is why I originally favored extending the lottery to 22 teams (the 10 teams missing the playoffs, the four play-in losers and the eight eliminated in the first round) to further flatten the odds and reduce the chasm between each tier. I think this would do much more to eliminate tanking at all levels of the league and I hope it comes back. But given that the league already went from 18 teams in the previous proposal to 16 teams in this one, a return seems unlikely.
Still, the difference between each level is close enough that the NBA hopes that no front office tells its coach to start losing games in March to achieve this. But it could happen. That’s why the proposal also includes a provision that gives the NBA expanded disciplinary authority with the ability to lower a team’s lottery odds or change its pick outright. A franchise visibly losing its way to the play-in, or visibly losing its way to the play-in, is the exact scenario the league has in mind when it writes a sentence like that. The threat is the deterrent.
Advertisement
There’s one more detail, and it’s the most quietly aggressive piece of the entire proposal: No team would be allowed to win the No. 1 pick in consecutive years. And no team would be allowed to earn three consecutive top-five picks.
Apply it retroactively, just to get an idea of how this would play out: The Spurs would have gotten Victor Wembanyama in 2023 and Stephon Castle in 2024, and would have been ineligible to draft Dylan Harper second in 2025. The Pistons could have drafted Cade Cunningham in 2021 and Jaden Ivey in 2022, but they would have been shut out of the top five by Ausar Thompson in 2023. I agree. agree with a rule that aims to break multi-year tanking cycles and eliminate the chances of a team getting very lucky for several years in a row.
Advertisement
The 3-2-1 proposal is not the finished product. League sources say the odds may change, the relegation zone may change, the lottery field may grow back to 18 or shrink to its current 14. The current language prevents teams from protecting picks in the 12-15 range, which seems like a placeholder for something more definitive. Owners don’t vote until May 28, and five weeks is a long time in league politics.
There’s a natural backslide in the league’s approach: teams are finding it much harder to improve. The CBA already makes it harder to improve through free agency because of all the apron rules. Veteran exchanges can be extremely expensive. Sometimes the draft is the only way for teams to get out of the bottom or out of the middle to the top of the league. There will be unintended consequences. But teams intentionally losing games is an abomination that should in no way be celebrated and should never serve as a solution.
The NBA is moving in the right direction. The bottom of the rankings is about to become an uncomfortable place to live on purpose. Good. It should be.