If that means big market teams get an advantage then sorry, this is what we call sports. At least try to win games with what you have.

What a joke.

Big market teams are also under more pressure to keep (i.e. overpay for) bigger stars because their fan bases tend to demand a winning product more so than small markets, which also puts them at risk for making big money decisions that go bad vs. small market teams (we've seen that movie before...ahem amar'e).

OKC got Durant via tanking and ruining an entire city's fans hearts by taking that money and running from Seattle with their assets.

So wack...

Boooooo.

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/sources--nba-owners-nix-lottery-reform-plan-154009158.html

Sources: NBA owners nix lottery reform plan

The NBA’s draft lottery reform was voted down by the league’s owners Wednesday at the Board of Governors meetings in New York, league sources told Yahoo Sports.

The current lottery system – a weighted format in which the worst team has 25 percent of the pingpong balls for the No. 1 overall pick and a guarantee it'll drop no lower than fourth in the draft order – will remain as 13 teams voted against reform, league sources told Yahoo Sports.

"Several teams started to wonder about unintended consequences and voted ‘no’ to be able to do further study," one owner told Yahoo Sports.

Among the “no” votes were big-market teams Chicago and Washington, a source said, with small-market Sacramento, in a strange twist, voting for lottery reform.

The remaining teams that voted no were Phoenix, Philadelphia, Oklahoma City, New Orleans, Detroit, Miami, Milwaukee, San Antonio, Utah, Washington and Atlanta, sources said.

On Tuesday, it appeared likely that the reform would pass, with opponents Philadelphia and Oklahoma City seemingly struggling to get the support of six more teams to block the movement.

Under the proposal, the worst four teams would have had a 12 percent chance at the first pick, No. 5 would have had an 11.5 percent chance, No. 6, 10 percent, and on down. What's more, the worst team could have dropped as far as seventh in the draft order, the second worst could drop to No. 8, and so on.

With the current system, the bottom three teams have 64 percent, 56 percent and 47 percent chances of getting top-three picks. Under the proposal, that would have changed to 35 percent.

Thunder general manager Sam Presti had campaigned against the reform, thinking it would give big-market franchises another advantage over small markets. Big-market teams have an advantage signing superstar free agents and an advantage trading for them because those players are far more apt to agree to sign a contract extension. The lottery proposal created some concern that big-market teams would also get better access to top players higher in the draft.

Wednesday’s development obviously didn’t leave everyone thrilled. One glum general manager told Yahoo Sports: "Well, we still have the 'be-as-[expletive]-as-humanly-possible' strategy available in the future if we need it."

For the longest time, Sterling & his clippers were in the lottery, picked up top tier talent, were in a large market, and still never retained talent or improved.

Given that we have our own pick this year, I'm not sure I would want to change the lottery this year.

After 20 games, I might change my mind depending on how bad we are or aren't playing.

VCoug wrote:

franco12 wrote:I don't see how this is about small vs. large market teams.

For the longest time, Sterling & his clippers were in the lottery, picked up top tier talent, were in a large market, and still never retained talent or improved.

Given that we have our own pick this year, I'm not sure I would want to change the lottery this year.

After 20 games, I might change my mind depending on how bad we are or aren't playing.

That's not because the Clippers couldn't retain their talent, they didn't want to pay.

Sort of like Philly getting MCW and getting ready to trade him away before they have to pay him.

I've never understood the ping pong concept. You want reform, go back to the original format -- nobody gets sheehit for tanking. And stop the whiney conspiracy theory crap. It's the 21st century. You can fix bingo as easily as you can fix envelopes.

Suhucking big time isn't helping Milwaukee or Utah or Orlando. For every SanTone, you have three Boston, Miami and Cleveland.

The wheel like this......

The system is designed to eliminate the link between being very bad and getting a high draft pick. There is no benefit at all to being bad under a wheel system like this. If you believe tanking is morally wrong, or that it hurts business by alienating fans and cutting into attendance, this is a system you could get behind.

Then reopen the draft eleigibility back to 18.