We already know that Jeff Van Gundy doesn’t like it. His team isn’t likely good enough yet for a chance at winning it all. I don’t think beating Utah, Dallas, and either Phoenix or San Antonio is in the cards. And even if they did, they still have to get past whoever comes out of the East. That’s a tall order, especially since they’re likely to be playing every single one of those teams on the road.
They’re too good, however, to get a chance at one of the premier players coming into the league (although a chance at a sleeper obviously exists).
Having a weighted system for the first three picks and a system of drafting in reverse order of the record obviously brings some parity to the league. That’s good, but some of the teams manage to stay bad for a decade, in spite of having top 10 picks year after year.
Do we really want to see Oden go to the Grizzlies or the Celtics? I’m sure Grizzlies and Celtics fans do, but do the rest of us want to see him get his team barely into the playoffs after a couple of years. Wouldn’t it be nice if one of the 40 win teams got him and made it more of a playoffs next year because they moved from good to great.
Imagine if the Nets picked Oden. They’d be a team to be reckoned with.
Or what if the Utah Jazz or the Houston Rockets could get Kevin Durant to shore up weaknesses at shooting guard or small forward.
And for some of these raw centers picked in the top 14 picks of the draft, wouldn’t it be better for them and for the NBA if they could go to a team with winners — a team who could teach them the ropes — rather than to a team of perennial losers or with a bunch of guys who ALSO have never played in a playoff game?
Would teams be so eager to throw away draft picks if they knew that any of them could potentially be a top 10 pick?
If I was able to propose a few things to improve the NBA draft and lottery, here is what I would propose…
1) Keep a lottery. It makes it interesting.
2) Keep weighting in place. It’s better if the bad teams can get better.
3) Penalize perpetually bad teams in the weighting. If they haven’t made it to the playoffs for 3 years or 5 years or a decade, don’t allow them to keep monopolizing the best rookies and doing nothing with them. How many top 5 players have the Chicago Bulls had on their team over the past few years?
4) Involve all of the teams somehow.
- For some teams, it is better not to make the playoffs (because they really don’t have a legitimate shot at winning more than a couple of games in the playoffs anyway). That’s just wrong!
- The good teams should have a chance at some of the better players coming into the league. Maybe this involves having the first 10 picks in a lottery with the playoff teams having some ping-pong balls thrown in after the 5th pick. I’m sure San Antonio, Dallas, and Phoenix would love a chance at getting and training a legitimate center.
- Give some of the raw players a chance to develop with winners rather than just a bunch of losers or other young players. How much better would the league be if new players could be taught to play the right way!
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