If you have not heard yet, the NBA will introduce for the first time an in-season tournament, which essentially tries to “copy” the national cups that European soccer leagues have (without however, adding new games for the teams – until the final). While you can find all the details here, the main point is that teams are placed in 6 groups (3 in each conference) and after the group play, where each team will play once each of the other team in the same group, 8 teams will compete for the award at a final-8 format (single elimination).
While I do not have strong feelings about the tournament itself, I still think that the league should most probably try to strengthen the interest in the G-league by incorporating these teams in the tournament. But since we are here now the question is whether the “bragging” rights and the monetary award for the players are enough to make teams take it seriously? After all we are talking about 4 group stage games and then potentially another 3 games (only 2 of which count for the regular season). So are these enough to make teams care and give their 100% in these few games? Or, from the league perspective, if the objective is to increase the interest in regular season, isn’t this just a drop (or two) in the ocean since we are talking for about 10% of the total games?
I personally think that the motivation is not enough and the impact on the interest will again be small (of course small is better than nothing). Remember that teams that win the soccer cups are being awarded with a spot to next seasons international tournaments, which comes with financial gains (which consequently can help the team improve their roster etc.). So it is not only about bragging rights. But what if there was a “prize” that would be worth for the teams playing? Something that could help them with improving their team. I guess you know where I am heading towards to. What if the team that won the tournament was awarded 2 (tradeable) second round picks in the next draft? The order of these picks would be chosen via a random draw. This sounds easy to implement and an award that is of enough value for teams to be interested in winning the tournament. While I like this as a bait for teams, one of the problem is that some teams that have decided to tank before the season started – or that they are in constant tank mode – most probably are not going to be worried about 2 second round picks, since they are going after the big prize of the top overall pick. Now of course, the amount of tournament games is still fairly low that they might still try and win those games as they are not expected to have a huge impact on their tanking efforts. What would be something else that could make these “tanking” teams really try and win the tournament? A first round pick swap; that’s what. Teams will provide before the tournament (or the season) begins a sealed bid for a team that they wish to swap first round picks with if they win the tournament. The bid will be made public only after the regular season ends. What is the impact of this ? Playoffs teams would like to get a chance at making the playoffs and getting a higher draft pick, which means they are trying to win these games. Tanking teams want to avoid getting their precious pick snatched by another team and hence, they want to win the tournament to avoid this. Now these teams might also be “forced” to try and win the rest of the games too if they do not win the in-season tournament, since they will be candidates for a pick swap! So everyone wants to win — and most probably the whole season.
Obviously there are many details that need to be considered. For example, what if a team that wins has chosen another team with their bid that has a worse draft pick? Then we could fall back to the 2 second round draft picks. Also, maybe instead of 1 game with every other team in the group, we go to 2 or even better 3 games between each pair of teams in the group phase (as they are in the same conference). One of the problems that this might bring up is that the pairings at the final-8 might be such that the teams have already played their regular season series. Well scheduling in this case can be more tricky (but still doable) or if the teams have played already in the regular season the results of these games automatically fill the bracket. This has the added benefit of “forcing” teams to worry about other games in the regular season that might indirectly impact the tournament. Now I do not think that anyone will agree upon this (i.e., using earlier results), but I still think the scheduling can be tweaked to accommodate these intricacies.
The main problem I see teams having an issue with is that it is possible for the pick swap to hurt competitive balance. E.g., teams that are truly bad and need these high draft picks might be swapped out of their chance to improvement. This is certainly a possibility but on the other hand it might discourage teams from getting really bad and relying on prolonged tanking to improve. A possibility would be instead of a pick swap, the winner of the in-season tournament is provided with a lottery probability (if they are already in the lottery, their odds are adjusted upwards). This way the truly bad teams still have a chance (even though lowered) to get a high draft pick. However, this does not necessarily make teams avoid tanking, as they still have a pretty good shot to a high draft pick, while the pick swap might send them towards the end of the first round.
Bottom line, in my opinion, the league needs to up the ante (well I had to use the title) in order to make sure that teams are really interested in winning the in season tournament. Based on the structure of the reward it might have trickling effects in other areas that the league has been trying to improve for a long time (e.g., tanking). I am sure someone will come with a better reward structure than the one I mentioned here but I just do not think “bragging” rights of a new cup is enough to make teams try more during these games.
The Athlytics Blog 