Wouldn’t work because Nike could tell AJ to sign the minimum with the Lakers and get a 20 million nike contract, or if he’d sign for 15 million with Utah, they’d only offer him 1 million a year.

Got shot down quickly cause this idea sucks and will not be fair to all markets. Cuban always thinks he’s the smartest person in the room.

Zack Lowe made the important distinction on the BS pod. It’s pretty easy to eliminate tanking if you don’t really care about helping the worst teams getting the best players in the draft. Cuban’s idea here is not fundamentally different from, say, further flattening the lottery odds, in terms of how it addresses tanking specifically. In both cases you’re simply turning down the level of correlation between bad record and draft advantage.

Just fix the fucking Pittsburgh Pirates Mark you goober

Bc that’s dumb

That dude needs to STFU at this point. Wasn’t he defending Nico? Then Balmer?

Seems like a great way to further degrade fan trust in the integrity of the league. It would be a mess of endorsment drama and even in a completely fair version of this small market just get shitted on even more if the 1st pick team cant even get their guy because hed just rather play in miami

Am i the only one whos cool with tanking? Like let the teams get their top 10 pick, they suck already 

Am I dumb or is this suggestion the worst of both worlds?

Still gives teams an incentive to lose (more FA bucks) AND you create the risk of a 1st overall just deciding to sign with the Knicks or Lakers on a minimum

Why do we treat the guy who got ROLLED by Sheldon Adelson’s widow like some sort of business genius.

Legit thats the stupidest idea.

Say the worst team in the NBA gets 10 Million. (Say the pistons)

The best team gets 2.5 million. (Say the Lakers)

Chances are you could make more than the 10 million a year just by endorsments, movies, commercials by living in LA.

That being said with the multi million dollar shoe deals (thanks Michael jordan) they wont need max salaries. Winning more gets brand recognition, a way to circumvent cap spending (without trying to plant trees) and more salary.

I’m glad to see Cuban Aspired to something better.

The league was entirely correct in predicting the Aspirations some teams might have to circumvent such a system though.

None of this stops the problem though.

Go back to last years seasons draft; how would it stop Cooper Flagg from going to the Lakers… and the Lakers “promising” him money to makeup cash in endorsements or whatever else. It’s basically an NIL/Aspiration situation all over.

Can we ban posts about mark Cuban.  He’s very annoying 

A billionaire failing to grasp the basics of the economic incentive structures he wants to meddle with? Color me shocked

I’ve thought about this and I think this is really the worst of both worlds. It doesn’t really discourage tanking because it’s still valuable to have higher slot money, but when there are really generational drafts, the big market teams can still take all the best players because the difference between rookie scale contracts isn’t that big. The difference between first overall and 30th overall this year is around \(50 million over the course of 4 years. You're telling me New Balance wouldn't have tossed Flagg an extra \)12 million/year to go to Boston?

I have some trees to sell you.

I havent liked any of these ideas floated to fix tanking except the PWHL draft system. Its the perfect combination of not too convoluted to explain to casual fans and decoupling the incentive to suck from draft order.

Cuban is full of bad fucking ideas

How can someone so rich come up with such an obviously bad/irrelevant idea and think it’s any good?

For a smart man this idea is a complete wreck.

A good example of how this backfires is how Major League Soccer has operated. Any team can sign good players from anywhere in the world, but only the major market teams can leverage flashy destinations with a huge branding deal alongside their offer. Big money ownership groups want players to go to the biggest markets.

-Messi in Miami with Nike deal

-Zlatan in LA with Samsung “the galaxy” deal

-Lampard and Pirlo in NY as an ownership group deal of the owners who also own Man City.

-David Beckham in LA for external deals and visibility

-Thierry Henry in NY as a league brand deal

And so on and so on. No deals for recognizable superstars in small markets.

This is what becomes of this kind of “free agency.” You’ll have unspoken brand deals/potential for future brand deals sending the best to LA/NY/recent championship teams, leaving small market teams to find a diamond in the rough, develop their own stars, or pray for a hometown talent who wants to be at home. Superstars only come to them for lots of money and well after their prime. The reality of winning a championship becomes less and less likely and you turn a league with a few tanking teams into a league where most teams are functionally tanking due to disparity.

They should do this, but the contract difference has to be huge. Too many dudes would give up millions to play in a big market / good franchise. 

There’s no way in hell there’s gonna be any kind of majority owner vote for a system that fucks small markets and/or bad teams out of talent. It’s just not gonna happen. We can propose a thousand different variations of ‘fixes’ but if it leaves 20 markets with no REAL, set in stone path to get better once they bottom out, it’s just not happening.

Well Yeah… Most owners know they will just invest in the players llc for whatever Leonard already got busted for

So teams would just tank to get the highest rookie cap space.

I like it, picasso

I think rookies would definitely aspire to go to the clippers.

Well, apparently some teams are working with more than their official cap space, so this would mostly benefit the cheaters. Would probably also hurt small market teams, high tax state teams, and who knows who else, especially where the salary difference isn’t that big. A draft is fine. It creates some parity in the league and lets teams grab talent they otherwise wouldn’t in free agency. Lots of ways to fight tanking. You could take the 3 year average record of teams to discourage single year tanks (but that benefits consistently bad organizations). You could count wins after elimination from playoffs or after a certain date as benefitting draft position or chances at good draft position. You could throw the bottom teams into a post-season tourney and the winner gets the number one pick. Who doesn’t like some chaos? Would keep the eliminated markets somewhat engaged at the end of the year. Or you just make the odds the same whether you’re the bottom team or just missed the playoffs.

Someone posted the PWHL draft order system and I found it perfect for the NBA.

It makes perfect sense to me.

Dumb idea. Draft is to give weakest teams fist shot at best players. Plus its all about the second contract.

That’s where my brain went the other day.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/s/MP70fYYwA8

Cuban is dumb as hell.

Marc Cuban for prez

But Cuban just came out in support of tanking?

What about just allowing rookies to sign like unrestricted free agents, but then making it so they will remain restricted free agents for the rest of their career? Meaning the team they first sign a contract with can always match the contract and retain them.

Then they’ll have to choose a team that promises to develop them as well, and bad teams are more likely to give them better opportunity.

Would then suck to join the Lakers full of stars and forcing you to the end of the bench and unable to show your stuff, but at least they can do away with tampering rules.

Yo this guy sounds smart make him a GM? Or lol even an owner.. dude would thrive

Or.. he sold is stake and signed of on traded Luka..

Okay boomer run a hell of a failed attempt at office and buy into a minority stake

i would do a single elimination tournament between the lottery teams to determine who gets #1, equal odds for 2-14 so there’s no incentive to punt seasons completely, and a monetary prize for the winner of the tournament that way teams playing who don’t own their pick are at least playing for a financial incentive.

Cause it was a horrible idea duh

Why does this low iq clown think he’s relevant?

Might aswell move all teams to different neighborhoods in LA

I’ll preface this with I’m a big Cuban fan. He brought me a title which was pretty cool. But I got a weird feeling about him lately. What is his angle with discussing him tanking and now this?

No one has come up with a solution that does not have some flaw. For example, relegation would be a major change and would get shot down by the owners immediately.

A fair solution would probably be an overly complicated one. Perhaps a mathematical formula to determine the draft order. One that takes into account not only team record but also teams’ projected wins if every player including those with season-ending injuries played full minutes.

The flaw would be that it hurts teams that genuinely underperformed and had real injuries but again, every proposed solution so far has had flaws lol.

Another solution could be to prevent drastic increases in draft placement from one year to the next. For example, not allowing teams to jump more than 10 draft spots from the previous year. So a team that completely tears it down would have to wait at least an extra year to see results but good teams like Boston or Indiana can’t decide to take a gap year. It benefits teams that have been bad for a long time. The flaw is that it only prevents good teams from tanking but maybe that’s enough?

Surprise surprise the guy who almost certainly circumvented the salary cap with Dirk and claims Ballmer did nothing wrong with Aspiration wants a situation where teams willing to break the rules have a huge advantage.

No one’s solution is perfect.

My opinion would be that either its NFL style and you just accept the spots where teams finish OR that every team has lottery odds.

Flat odds for the teams that miss playoffs then reduced odds based on seeding. That would inherently make all draft picks more valuable as trade chips and stop ‘somehow the worst tanking.

Some teams would get a top pick as a top seed if they own their own pick one day but its better than teams racing to be as bad as they can be. Would rather see 7th and 8th seed teams try to drop to 9th seed than the worst teams be a joke every season.

I had a similar idea here that tries to incentivize players to pick small markets too

https://www.reddit.com/r/nbadiscussion/comments/1j96xoq/changing_the_lottery_system_to_a_hybrid_free/

Is this a plan to ensure that the championship never leaves LA? Because that’s a pretty good way to destroy parity.

Bad idea, especially for bad small market teams. Salary can be managed by under the table deals

It still wouldn’t work like that dumbass

Do the opposite of Mark, should be the rule of law. Dude is floundering in the air trying to straddle fences. The internet remembers all.

Just give the same odds to every team that misses the playoffs.

Mark Cuban thinks he is a lot smarter than he is. A lot of people think that about themselves. But Mark Cuban does too.

didn’t a play-in team get the #1 pick in the draft recently?

San Antonio and Dallas jumped over the worst teams who were tanking to get their #1 picks.

It’s not a bad suggestion. All this handwringing about how ALL the good rookies will end up on the Lakers doesn’t sound realistic to me.

Is there actually that much history of players taking less money to live where they want? Especially rookies who don’t have any money yet, could be busts and that rookie contract might be their one big payday?

You’d see some players go to the Lakers, but players need to PLAY to be marketable. There’s still only 5 players on the floor at once.

And if some of these markets suck so badly that players have to be horsewhipped to be there, maybe that team should move. Maybe the Jazz and Bucks should be in better markets like San Diego or Austin or Tampa.

Yeah this isn’t a fantasy football league this idea sucks

The same guy openly tanked the final 2 games of 2023 to keep his pick. Stop it with the fan buddy crap.

As long as teams see a benefit in not winning, whether it’s real or only perceived (or both) you’re gonna have tanking. Unless they make the whole draft a lottery with equal odds. And even then it’ll be seen as rigged the second a playoff team gets the 1st pick

One of the coolest things about growing up in DFW was watching that guy turn the mavericks around. The league absolutely copies his moves from twenty years ago. Not ego just facts. Well maybe a lil ego…

Cubans like ‘how many awful takes can I tweet out in one day’. Proposes an idea that obviously benefits larger markets more than smaller ones bc the difference in contracts would be made in endorsements for a bigger market.

This is not thinking about the fans. The plan got shot down because it wouldn’t work. The point of the draft is to encourage parity. This would undermine it. Players (or their agents) are smart enough to know that a haircut on their rookie contract won’t really dent their career earnings if it meant they can control the team they go to. In short, this plan would undermine competitive balance. Cuban knew that when he proposed it. He’s a smart guy. And the owners were smarter to reject his proposition.

Wouldn’t work. I can envision several top prospects taking less money to play on good franchises.

What if there was more financial incentive to win games? We keep the draft but we also reward money or cap space or something of the sort for each win? I know it would strengthen the top teams a lot but also would make bottom teams more strategic on their losing?

I wish there were enough teams and leagues to have relegation. You suck? Welp you go down to the second league and lose a bunch of money. Not you suck? Congrats, here’s some rewards.

Relegation is the only solution to tanking.

Split the league into two division. 1st division plays for the title, playoff format to be determined. Bottom two teams in the first division are relegated to the 2nd division for the next season. Top 2 teams in the 2nd division are promoted into the 1st division for the next season.

No matter how you slice it, there will be less interest and thus less money in the 2nd division so everyone from owners, staff, and players will be highly motivated to stay out of the 2nd division.

I still don’t think the worst record should get the best reward

They should get help getting to mediocre

The best of the mediocre should get the best reward

This is a competition, after all.

Cuban was apparently the greatest human being alive according to him. Zero of all his brilliant ideas were ever known or leaked to the media until after he sold them. Somehow the guy couldn’t shut up then either but all these ideas were never spoken about.

that like baseball?

I’ve noticed that a lot of ppl will complain constantly about the league but then also shoot down every suggestion to improve it. I’m convinced some of you just enjoy complaining more than basketball

Still a bad idea

I have liked this idea for a while but I think you’d have to make the “lottery” salaries a lot higher because why wouldn’t rookies look to go to either a glamor market or a contender for not too much less money? There’s something to be said that the idea should be that teams have to be able to win over rookies as well.

Then make it illegal to use that cap space for nba free agents other than rookies.

Mark Cuban sounds like an average r/nba redditor 

The problem really is that people are trying to address 2 different problems at once.

1. Bad teams need better players
   
2. Small markets have a tough time competing with bigger markets

I agree with this idea, if you treat the NBA rookie free agency more like MLB international free agency, allow teams to trade draft capital instead of draft picks themselves. Even some additional luxury protection for going over the allotted amount? I think the big market teams being able to dominate this is a little overblown, in my lifetime I dont think the Nets or Knicks have had the upper hand in free agency even though New York (and previously New Jersey) are pretty big markets. Rookies would be more apt to want to play where they get a good contract, and have a chance to win. I dont think Indiana is less attractive than LAC in that capacity.

This is a terrible idea and would help a team like the lakers while crushing small market teams. Might as well have a 8 team league team like Utah and Memphis would suffer

I can tell ya why it got shot down quickly: It’s stupid. Lol.

Now this is the first actually good idea I’ve heard

Should have offered the rookie a movie deal that doesn’t have a cap

dumbest idea I ever heard and is only feasible in like a 15 team league, not a league half full of small market bottom dwellers that have 0 path to relevancy under this system

Because certain owners could just circumvent the salary cap and pay them a bunch of money. The slot amount doesn’t mean much if we are okay with funneling money through shell companies.

Coincidentally he’s also the one person defending Ballmer.

The fans should vote who will get the draft picks

I like what the PWHL does. Once you are mathematically eliminated from contention every win you earns you points towards the draft. The modifier I would ass is that wins by larger margins earn you bonus points. Like winning by 10 gives you an extra x points. The team with the most “draft” points gets the #1 pick.