LABron James Discussion: The Final Year?

They would get pick #1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 & 8 a nearly equal % of the time as #9, they just wouldn't get an outsized chance at the top 4 and be guaranteed #5. The deck isn't stacked against them, it just wouldn't be in their favor. It would be equalish for the bottom 7-8 or so. They would still get a healthy share of top picks with a normal distribution, but there's no incentive to tank.

Besides, the Utah stuff this season and the stuff pika references is worse than Washington Generals stuff anyway imo*.

This happens due to luck anyway, like with Dallas and San Antonio last year. Or due to injury status like when GSW got the #2 pick in 2020. The current tanking issue is worse than those things happening imo*.


*And to much of the NBA, which is why we are where we are now, with current draft proposals.

Love it. Would never get through ownership, obv.

Agree. That's what the league office does though, try to keep the product afloat despite bad ownerships working against themselves and us. Given that, we seem to be not that far off, except that many of the proposals you suggest and that I agree with are extremely unlikely to get voted through by ownership.

So although I favor many of your suggestions, I'm curious - what would you pick, if the only options on the table were (1) the current system or (2) the new proposal about to be voted on by owners tomorrow?

As a side note, I'm also curious if you would pick one of those, or (3) my proposal above with teams #24-30 getting 9.5% then scaling down to team #17 getting 1.2%. Although that's academic, as it's not on the table.

 

the third one over current or the new proposal. i probably prefer current over the new proposal, though, as much like you're foreseeing things balancing out (i.e., rich not getting richer), i actually think the current system is already randomly punishing enough teams (see: indy's lost bet this year).

i'm also quite wary of whatever this power they're giving to silver is as part of the new proposal. we don't need any more david stern stuff.


it's frustrating to me what we discuss this when financial changes could probably solve it all, but the owners are too greedy and nervous about their own stupidity to agree to them.

 

Cool! Let's push it through!

Well, not the rich (teams 1-16) getting richer, but more like mid-tier teams 17-23 occasionally getting richer. I'm not sure why this is a problem, and if it is, it's been happening anyway, as evidenced by Dallas and San Antonio last year.

Do you think that this potential issue of the #17-23 teams occasionally getting a top pick, is worse than the tanking issues this past year?

Well, teams obviously don't think so, as they are tanked more than ever this year. I'm also not sure how Indy got punished, as they knowingly made a 52/48 trade bet and lost.

Agree

Again, agree, but I guess I just accept this because I know this part will not change.

 

yeah, ultimately, i think it's really bad for the league to have teams be perennially bad (like really bad), and i think further flattening or even regressing (as is planned)--by design--actually enhances that likelihood. smaller tweaks like extending the lotto to where you're not guaranteed top 5 in any circumstance and you can't say, get consecutive top 5 picks would probably help as much as this will and leave a little less room for some of the worse unintended consequences.

so our only point of disagreement is that i think the maximal harm that being a truly bad team and having an even smaller shot at the top pick can cause is probably worse than the worst stuff now.

but we'll see. maybe it will work exactly as people are saying, and the very worst teams will have to try to win games, which will cut down on tanking. i just think it will shift tanking to different spots with potentially more problematic outcomes.

 

lol less than the maximum requires explanation is hilarious.

i'd throw out several proposals, some with him making as low as minimum, just to demonstrate what's possible. if he's insulted, he can take the tpmle in cleveland. if he wants to get over the fact that he no longer controls our free agency, he's welcome to wait around while we build a team and decide whether he wants to take what's left (which we could simply guarantee will be more than mle, which is more than than any team he'd like to play on can offer.

 

i mean, take any number of fan posts here and show it to them. if he thinks him at the max with us using bird rights to bring folks back and trying to trade junk for impact is better, he's wrong.

 

No explanation. Get out

 

I'd be offering no more than 20M. No "contender" can offer him more. He can go take the MLE somewhere else if he wants.

 

If this is PR, it's great. LeBron gets to tell the public he's still worth a max, but he will take a [potentially big] discount if the Lakers can show him a plan why it makes sense, and then LeBron looks like a great guy taking a huge discount to help the team contend. When in reality, this is probably what the Lakers want to do anyway, and they are not willing to make him a large offer, but LeBron gets to save face.

If this is not PR, it's terrible, LeBron has his head up his a**, fire him into the sun.

 

I can see a scenario where how it sounds is exactly what it is. However, wouldn't surprise me if the original message was him indicating that he'd take less but wants to hear how the Lakers plan to use that money. Gets a lot more clicks to phrase it as him demanding an explanation if they offer anything less than max.

 

we've definitely let his side get ahead of the narrative on several occasions in the past, so that's probably what's happening. also, like in the past, he's probably genuinely pissed as well.

 

The TRUTH About A LeBron James Sign & Trade

 

I mean obviously you have to tell him how you're planning to spend money. If you're signing poor players, I'm sure he isn't very keen on that, it's his way of applying some control.

People don't like to admit it, but he still has more control than we like. He is the best FA available and the one that gets us closest to winning a ring still.

 

But that's the thing, the teams can't afford to be bad. They have to make good decisions. Good draft, good contracts, good staff. They can't afford to be bad or they lose the team. NBA is a gold mine, owners will enforce being good enough.
Because now being the worst can be good, and that's the problem. You can't afford to be the worst in this new model

 

Fkn’ hater you are.

 

For next year, yes. For the future, no, and it would be better to invest the money, even $20 mil, into a younger player(s) who will grow alongside Luka. So it depends on what tack the FO takes. If they are focused solely on the future, then LeBron has very little control or leverage. The answer is probably somewhere in the middle.

Agree with this. I would rather take this route, and try to eliminate as much tanking as possible. If the result is a drastic decrease in tanking, but there is a perennially bad, mismanaged team who gets unlucky in the lottery and never to rarely gets top picks*, then boo hoo to them, and there will be public and league pressure to sell, get new FO management, etc. I don't believe the league would let a team do that long term. The league forced Hinkie out after just 3 years, and that was a decade ago. If there was a singular team tanking now, they would probably do the same thing. But because the problem has become so large, by so many teams, they have to implement systemic change, which is what they are likely doing tomorrow.


*which is unlikely over the long term anyway. If a team is the worst in the league every year for, say 5 years, even with a reduced chance at a top pick under the 3-2-1 model, they would still have a 75% chance at a top 5 pick over that period.