Again, I sit here and write this blog post while yet another New York Knicks’ loss is about to unfold. With seven minutes left in the game (I’ll update you at the end of this blog post as to how the game concluded) the game is tied at 101 and things are not look good for the Knicks going down the stretch. After scoring 72 points in the first half of today’s game, the most they have scored in a half in over five years, they took a 21 point lead into the half. All things looked good, no way we can blow a 20 point lead after coming off the best half we have played this year, well that’s a lie. As you can tell by my score update earlier (no longer tied, we are losing now, as usual) we are on the verge of completely blowing this game in the most New York Knicks way possible. Now with that being said, I really hope we lose, I hope we lose every game for the rest of the year. Now that doesn’t sound like something you’d hear from a die-hard fan now is it. But you have to look at the facts. We have only a small chance at making the playoffs right now. If we were to make it to the playoffs, we would likely be seeded very low and would have to play a series against the Celtics or the Cavaliers right off the bat, teams we would not stand a chance against. Winning games can really only hurt us at this point. The more games we lose, the better the draft pick we will get in this years draft which is proving to be full of talent. The Knicks have entered tank mode, meaning that they will likely lose games on purpose in order to improve their draft pick at the end of the year. This is frowned upon by the NBA and by the fans but there is really no way to stop teams from doing it.
How the draft works in most professional sports is that the team that finishes with the worst record is awarded the first pick in the draft. Then, the next worse team gets the second pick and so on all the way down to whoever won the championship will have the last pick in the first round of the draft. For example, the Browns who did not win a single game this year in the NFL will have the first overall pick in this years NFL draft in April (please don’t pick Saquon…) and the Eagles who won the Super Bowl, will have the last pick in the first round of the draft. This is basically the same way that it works in the NBA but with a little (very annoying) twist. There are 30 teams in the NBA and when the regular season concludes, the top 8 teams from each conference (Eastern and Western Conference) are delegated to go to the playoffs and play a tournament bracket style playoff where each matchup is decided in a best of seven game series. So the winner of the Eastern and the winner of the Western Conference will ultimately play each other in the NBA championship. But what happens to the other 14 teams who do not make the playoffs? These teams are teams that will be included in the NBA lottery. The lottery system started in 1985 and the process is somewhat complicated as to how the whole thing works but in essence the worst team in the league has the best chances at the top pick and the 14th worst team has less than a 1% chance at getting the top pick in the draft. Now that has always been the way it has been done, with the worst team having the best odds at the first pick in the draft by a significant amount but this year they have changed how the odds are distributed and it is even more annoying. Now the worst three teams in the league actually have the same odds (14% each) at receiving the number one pick in the draft then that number decreases by a small margin as they get to the better teams. Now how teams are assigned their draft spots for picks 2-14, even I am confused by that but all I know is that no team can fall by more than three spots from where you are ranked in the lottery. So if you are the worst team and the team with the best odds at the first pick, the worst pick you can end up with is the 4th pick
In my opinion, I do not like the way the lottery works but it does encourage teams to not totally start tanking, starting a war to see rather which team can do the worst rather than going out on the court and trying to see who the best team is. Now I still want the Knicks to continue losing and get us the best chance possible at a good pick. In my next post we will likely look at some draft prospects that I would like to see drafted by the New York Knicks.
BTW they lost but I’m sure you could have guessed that. I wonder if at halftime they were told to stop trying and give up so they can lose and keep tanking….