NBA GM´s on Tanking

NBA GM´s on Tanking

                                                                  Source: NBA

 The economic principle I’m exploring is because of scarcity, people choose. All choices have an opportunity cost. My research question to help me study the economic principle is how do NBA teams use tanking to their advantage and what risks are involved. This principle is demonstrated In Danny Chao´s article from The Ringer, ¨Tanking Ain´t What It Used to Be¨ by demonstrating the new rules in tanking and the possible benefits and risks involved in it.

 What is tanking you may ask? Tanking is basically when teams intentionally don´t do the best they can during the season so that they can get the worst seed and a high draft pick. How the draft lottery used to work is that the worst team would have the greatest chance at having the #1 pick at 25%, then the next worst team at 19%, then 15% then 12% and so on. Now, the new rule for this draft is that the worst three teams have an equal chance at getting the #1 pick at 14%. Not only is this percentage less for the worst teams, but a teamś chance at getting a top 3 and top 5 player is also significantly less. So, this new rule is created to force teams to think twice about tanking, and if itś even worth it anymore.

 Before this new rule, tanking was huge; the better you tank the better draft pick you get. But the NBA administrators realized, why in the highest competitive level, should teams try to not compete at all? This is a big factor in the new tanking rule. Even though this new rule is in play, teams will still tank however. So when should a team decide to tank? When a General Manager knows their team isn´t going to make the playoffs and doesn´t see a bright future of success for the team then the GM may decide to start tanking, this is especially the case when they have a very poor record. So let´s say a General Manager does decide to tank, what do they have to do? A big one is resting your best players. When your best players aren´t in the game, chances are you are not going to win unless you have an amazing bench. Not only this, but veteran players might be traded away for fresh young players who have the potential to be good in the future.

 But a common misconception of tanking is that the players intentionally suck and miss shots and get turnovers. This is wrong. The players are definitely aware of what the GM´s are trying to do, but regardless they are still going to play hard, especially considering a lot of players put themselves before the team and only focus on their stats. The downside to tanking is that fans lose interest in coming to the games and watching the games. This adds up to big revenue losses. The number of tickets sold will decrease, less merchandise will be bought and no one cares about a bad team. So, GM´s have to consider if their tanking will be worth it for the future of the program and if the long term gains outweigh the short term losses. This relates back to my economic principle by proving that the GM´s have to make decisions. They have to evaluate the pros and cons and eventually come to a conclusion.
 
But again, with this new rule, you will see a lot less tanking in the years to come

In my next blog post, I will talk about the evaluation of GM´s