You guys are forgetting when the Union Army was tanking at the beginning of the Civil War. Losing at Bull Run and Chancellorsville was painful, but they were able to draft Ulysses S Grant first overall in the 1863 draft.
To be fair to Hinkie, he admitted that draft picks are misses more often than not. That’s why his was a multi-year tank and he traded for picks. He wanted as many chances as possible to eventually draft a star or two, which they did.
and also, while his return for MCW was kinda lackluster, he wound up being completely right about that jumper being basically unfixable. He traded MCW at the peak
And in all those years, despite all those pin pong balls, he only got one 1st overall. The other aspect Hinkie was ahead of everyone was doing this in a salary cap league.
Watching the Jets lose to the Raiders in 2020 was one of the most satisfying endings to a game I’ve ever seen... because I’m a Jets fan. They ruined that good feeling when they beat the Rams, but it seems to have turned out ok for the time being
@@Mike-ge7pe I'm a jets fan too, and I was one of the people that actually wanted them to win. Lawrence could be really good but going 0-16 is an utter disgrace that i want no part of
I think you missed two of the greatest examples of tanking I've ever heard of... Barbados v Grenada in 1994 in which Barbados INTENTIONALLY scored an own goal due to a silly rule in which extra time goals were worth 2...the precise amount they needed to advance out of their group in their tournament. They were up 1 near the end of the game, and just...beaned themselves to get a better chance at the differential. Germany v Austria in 1982, dubbed "The Disgrace of Gijon" in which BOTH teams tanked in order to screw over Algeria in their group. Basically Germany and Austria needed a specific result for both of them to move on in the World Cup, and they both kind of lazily walked up and down the pitch once the scoreline was reached.
the Edmonton Oiler from 2007-2015 are pretty much THE definition of tanking and the first example that comes to my mind. This was a franchise that from 2010-2015 had the first Overall Draft Pick in FOUR of the six years during that span. Since they began their tanking in the 2009-10 season, they've finished dead last 2 times, 29th/30 2 times, 28th /30 2 times, and bottom third in the NHL 3 more times. as of the end of the 2020-21 season, they've finished top 10 in the NHL 2 times and 11th/30 once. not to mention having a generational talent in Connor McDavid and another elite player in Leon Draisatl. this so far is a lesson that in a sport like hockey that is very much a TEAM sport, tanking for one or two generational players without building a competent team around them will be very unlikely to result in championships because a team is only as good as its weakest link... and if 85% of the team is the weakest link, then, the team won't be good.
This was my thought as well, but to be fair the owner was a super douche and deserved it. On the other hand, it really sucks for the players and fans that just wanted to win.!
Colts tanked to get franchise type qb's as well. See: peyton '98 and luck '12. Also tanked to get Elway in '83 draft. Only problem with that is that Elway said he would never play for colts. And he didn't forcing trade to Broncos.
Same with Noel he’s been a key piece with the knicks this year people see his scoring numbers and assume he’s bad he has never been known for his offense and has always been a big defensive player
How much you wanna bet this video was just from Mike watching that shot of the cuphandle and thinking "what the heck was that I need to make a video about it somehow"
I think it’s important to mention that tanking for draft picks is more prevalent in other sports than others. Drafting #1 overall in NFL to get college football’s best quarterback, who will then make an impact on the NFL team in a few months, is a lot more consequential than an MLB players drafting a great player who will still have to go through the minor leagues for 2-3 years, and still have a less than guaranteed chance of being a franchise player.
I was going to say that the Houston Rockets in 1983-84 were the first team especially since after that the NBA installed the lottery system. Didn't know about the Penguins the same year, I like to see Urinating Tree talk about them.
2 hockey teams invented tanking., The 1979-1981 Winnipeg Jets, who would send goaltenders to the minors if they got a shut out. The end goal: Draft Dale Hawerchuk And the 1983-84 Pittsburgh Penguins, who perfected the idea by selling off ALL of their assets for pennies on the dollar. The end goal: Draft Mario, the team's eventual savior.
Possibly the biggest example would be the Detroit Lions. They made it a long and storied tradition. I don't know if the qualify though because in the end it didn't seem like they had a viable reason to lose every season (maybe monetary reasons). It was so brutal that one of the greatest running backs in history retire one season away from becoming the number one man for rushing yards. And management didn't trade him away...ever. He just had to suck it up year after year. Barry had a strong desire to win and couldn't fathom sucking so bad year in and year out.
Which makes it funnier that they then traded that draft pick to Miami and went back further on the board then they would've been if they had won the game
Didn’t even do it for that. Doug wanted Sudfeld to have a chance to play before Philly undoubtedly cut him once the new regime came in. Hurts wasn’t gonna win that game anyway. Dude’s cheeks.
Invented in like '98 or something by the San Antonio Spurs for Tim Duncan - that's the first time a team with talent intentionally sat out guys with the sole purpose of getting great draft picks for a small market team in a lost season.
I remember tanking a game in juco so we could gain a bracket advantage. The initial goal was achieved and we nearly won our conference. It's high risk high reward. Not a fun strat but a strat.
Foolish baseball had a video about one owner owning the Cleveland spiders and st Louis I believe might count as a tank in the 1800 s...all of the good players got traded to one team and the other got the leftovers...
Can you make a video talking about the Career of Jose Reyes? He was underrated imo and was one of my favorite players growing up. Keep up the great content 👍🏻
One thing that I think people forget about with Hinkie is his strategy of just throwing darts at the board got the Sixers a lot of value. He pulled TJ McConnell and Robert Covington out of thin air. Just a shame the NBA basically couped the front office and then Jerry Colangelo's fail son just fucked things up for multiple years because he spent more time tweeting on burners than scouting or meeting with with his cap advisors.
The New York Rangers pretty much openly admitted to tanking. They were in a heated playoff race by mid season, but didn’t think they could truly contend for a championship. So they wrote a letter to their fans saying how they were gonna trade a bunch of their good veteran players. That kind of transparency was cool but it probably didn’t sit well in the locker room
@@mpaulm Then losing Hall wasn't as bad as everyone said it was. I don't follow much hockey outside what my favorite team (the Blackhawks) does. I just heard that Hall was traded and he turned into MVP, but I knew about McDavid, Draisitle, Nugent-Hopkins (you guys are stacked).
You should mention that it was the 1st that the lottery odds flattened that season which is why not only the Knicks dropped in the lottery but also a few other teams also.
The fix for tanking is relegation, but the owners will never go for it unless somehow forced. Would make the teams less of a sure thing value long term.
As a Quebec Nordiques fan, I am not sure if they tanked or were just awful, but in 3 consecutive years, they got Sundin, Owen Nolan and Eric Lindros , all as #1 overall picks.
Not through the whole video but damn this a brilliant concept to explore just wanted to say that. There’s a form of tanking in Motorsports called sandbagging if on the off chance you see that on RUclips you’ll know the moment it was inspired from haha
Some series, specifically GT racing, have performace balancing rules which allow for slower cars to gain horsepower or lose weight if they are deemed to be uncompetitively. I believe there was a situation at the 24 hours of Daytona where some Lamborghinis were busted for sandbagging to receive a performace increase. However, I do not remember the specifics.
I've said it before, the team who just missed out on the playoffs, who were doing their thing and giving it all on the court and in the front office. That's the team that should get the first round pick. That way the following year they will have that extra piece to possibly help them take that next step and make the playoffs and make a run. If they took that approach then we as fans would be able to see stellar basketball, NFL, MLB, and NHL and every year we might see different teams making runs. The other significant point to doing this will be that we get rid of tanking and it will force front offices to do everything they can to better their program, which is what the fans deserve and it will point out certain owners who don't give a shit about winning and are content with just raking in money and not willing to spend money to improve cause they're petty and stingy when it comes to cash. And if that's the case the league can then fine them and force them to put together a quality product. Let's change things up sports
They need to follow that method but weight it so that the team that just misses gets MORE ping pong balls, NOT less. or Do like they do in Euro Soccer- split the league into halves not bt conference and geography, but top and bottom teams so that the bottom feeders go to the B League and people know they suck and it hurts financially.
There was a famous example of tanking in Australian football - following the game called the Kreuzer Cup at the end of 2007. Carlton and Melbourne both went into the game with 4 wins for the season, and a team could qualify for a priority pick in the draft if they finished a season with 4.5 wins for the season (provided their previous season had been similarly terrible, which Carlton's had). Even if they didn't finish in last place on the ladder. Carlton lost that last game, consequently were awarded the priority pick, and used the priority pick to grab young star Matthew Kreuzer in the draft. As a result Melbourne missed out on the priority pick by winning that game, and missed out on a potential superstar in Kreuzer, who everyone knew would be the first pick in the 2008 draft. Melbourne would spend the next couple years losing so badly that they were frequently accused of tanking, and they would be fined $500 000 and both their coach and their general manager of football operations were found to have "acted in a manner which was prejudicial to the interests of the AFL", for their actions in the latter weeks of 2009.
getting Pegula'd... because since drafting eichel, all the ownership has done is piss off players, fans, and more with their gross incompetence and lack of respect towards the team.. i mean for heaven's sake, they gave their alumni and past legends cheap chinese knock-off jerseys to wear on alumni appreciation night a couple years ago as well as mis spelling Dave Andreychuk's name on a different alumni night... the hockey operations team, as well as coaches and management have TRIED to put competent teams together in recent years that on paper look decently competitive, but end up finishing mediocre AT BEST... i feel for you, sabres fans....
This is way more common than the video implies. Near the trade deadline, for example, there are teams out of playoff contention who trade their expensive and good players away for prospects/young players. They effectively tank the rest of the season. Once a team gives up on making the playoffs they *always* tank, at least up to a point, trying to avoid offending their fan base. Noone wants an ugly Charles Oakley incident due to bad management and tanking with respect to the Knicks.
2015 Toronto Maple Leafs traded their first pairing defenseman / captain, starting goalie, a slew of depth players AND leading scorer (who helped lead the Penguins to back to back cups). All this to get Austin Matthews in the draft, Yet this was seen as "rebuilding"....
Leafs were actually better that year than the prior (by a point)... played better too. They weren't in sole possession of last place until the last day of the season, largely because they had like 5 games on hand on most teams for the majority of the year. Edmonton was the one in last place for the majority by pts%. Though Toronto did hold out JVR because of his injury, I think? There was a moment at the end where they decided to dress their rookies Brown, Nylander, Leivo, Hyman and Kapanen and eventually sent them down because they were playing too good XD... in reality Leafs did the least offensive tanking ever considering that they did improve, they did play better, they dressed their young up and coming players at one point and they still placed much higher than Edmonton and Buffalo did the year prior (that was a tremendous tanking hellstorm). On top of that it was just the one time as they've been a good team since. I'd prefer if teams were to tank, they'd do it like the Leafs. They signed numerous decent players to single year or short term deals (like Grabner, Winnik, PA Parenteau) entirely for the purpose of showcasing them throughout the season to trade them for picks then once traded they were replaced with their available top prospects and the team on the ice never looked like they were ever trying to lose.
As a sports fan, pain is at its peak when the team you love is perennially "Okay" either barely making the playoffs and bouncing in round 1, or barely missing the playoffs. No high intensity finals or semifinals competition. Just a meh draft pick and a sad exit. Fans have the same vested interest as the GM, they want to see championships, and if your team already sucks in a given year, sucking just a bit harder to get a chance at getting back to glory in 3-5 years can seem worthwhile.
The Spurs in a way tanked also for Tim Duncan. David Robinson was injured at that time, and I believe they held him out to the end of the season so they will have a good chance at the no. 1 pick
The Cubs didn't tank. At least not in the window that you're suggesting. -Zambrano was declining and a clubhouse cancer. They traded him for Chris Volstad, who was 23 at the time and was a strong bounce-back candidate. -Samardzija wanted more money than he was worth, so they shipped him to Oakland for a package featuring Addison Russell while he was cheap and under team control. -Garza was in the same boat as Samardzija, except he was in a visible decline, so they shipped him while they could actually get something for him. They received a few years of solid relief in Carl Edwards Jr. and Justin Grimm while taking a chance on Mike Olt. -Feldman had one solid season in his entire career. When it looked like he might be having his second, they shipped him for two nobodies in Jake Arrieta and Pedro Strop. -Andrew Cashner was just another "next best thing" prospect for the Cubs. They always had one in the early 2000s and they never panned out, so instead of letting him flounder, they traded him for Anthony Rizzo. He's been pretty okay. -Bryan LaHair was an all-star based on less than a month of solid play for a team with (probably) the largest fan base. He ended 2012 with an OPS of .784 and played even worse in Japan the following year. tl;dr The Cubs traded five pitchers that weren't helping them win and released a minor league journeyman. Six of the eleven players they received in return were on their 2016 championship roster.
I think the Oakland As deserve a top spot here in 2022. "Moneyball" only means trade away all your up and coming players and replace them with a minor league team every year. People forget...when the As actually wanted to win they paid good money for a solid pitching staff for like a decade. Now it looks like they are clearly tanking to move cities, yet the minor leaguers are actually winning some games.
Some teams in nba/nhl can't do the obvious tank job right thanks to lottery. See: Boston celtics for Duncan 1997. Or Buffalo sabres for mcdavid 2015. Cavs tanked badly and got lotto luck in '03 to get lebum.
I'm not sure your info is correct on the 82-83 Rockets. They had a bad team that year after Malone left. Ralph Sampson was the possible pick in 83 if they won the coin flip and they did. Hakeem wasn't available until the 84 draft. I am a lifelong Houston Rockets fan and have followed them since the 70s.
There should be some rules to make tanking less desirable. For example: a) (Talking about NBA draft which has 2 rounds) If a team had nr 1 pick then for the next 3 season they can't have another top 3 picks; if a team had nr 2 pick, then 2 years; if a team had nr 3 pick, then they can't have top 3 picks next year. (NHL, NFL, and MLB have more rounds so the number of top picks and the number of seasons they can't have another would differ) b) If a team had deep playoff runs and even won championships (in their last 3-5 years) then they should not get high picks. Like GS went to 5 NBA finals in a row, won 3 of them, and when Klay and Steph got hurt, they tanked and got the second pick. Like what stops a good team to give their top players a year or two off, get a few top prospects and then go back to winning. If I were an executive I absolutely would do that. GS played around a season worth more games between 2015-2019 than half of the league teams, and their players would feel fatigued. Then GS would play them less (maybe 40-50 games instead 70+ games). Basically, this idea would have stopped Penguins from getting Mario and he would have ended in Devil's jersey.
While that last one is a crazy story, I personally feel as if it's not the earliest example of tanking in sports. What if I told you there was an arguable example of tanking from the 1910s in baseball that led to a team having 7 straight last place finishes? Let me introduce you to Connie Mack and his Philadelphia Athletics. From 1910-1914, they had been a dynasty, winning 4 pennants and 3 World Series in 5 years, and were the undisputed best team in baseball. However, that all started to unravel in 1914. First, the competing Major League known as the "Federal League" was formed, driving up salary. Then, the A's were swept in the World Series by the 1914 "Miracle" Boston Braves who had gone from last place on the 4th of July to first in the NL by the of the season. Mack, seeing that he wouldn't be able to keep up with the salaries of the FL, and bitter over this loss, proceeded to sell off all of his best players, and went from 99 wins in '14 to 43 in '15. In '16, He had the worst team in modern major league history by winning percentage -worse than even the '62 Mets, at .235- and had just 36 wins. They had hit the bottom of the barrel. It would take until 1922 for them to climb out of the basement, and 1925 for them to have a winning record, when they finished second behind the Washington Senators. However, they finally fully recovered by 1929 when they won 104 games, more than they had in any season in the first dynasty, and the World Series in dominating fashion. I think this shows all the hallmarks of a tank, albeit in different ways at times. For one, pettiness and not working to a T (Losing the World Series and selling off all of your best players and then finishing in last 7 straight years). For another, it DID eventually work, with the same management too! Though, Connie Mack, was an owner-manager, so he had 100% job security, but hey, it worked! And the teams from 1929-31 (Mack's last Dynasty) were his best, so there's that. I didn't mention this, but it goes without saying, but he hit on a LOT of players. Lefty Grove, one of the best pitchers ever, Jimmie Foxx, one of the best first basemen and most fearsome hitters ever, Al Simmons, a hitter who had an unconventional stance but made it work, and a host of others, they were great. And he did have a reason other than pettiness: to cut costs with the competition from the Federal League threatening to raid the existing AL and NL. So overall, I think that Connie Mack, created tanking, at least in a rudimentary form.
the buffalo sabres tanked in 2015 for connor mc david, didn't get him but got jack eichel who is still an amazing player. and now they're gonna trade him when his value has been at its all time low
We're at the 15min mark, and I havent seen the 2013-2017 Edmonton Oilers on the list....I think they've just been bad since then. But they were so dedicated to the tank that they traded away one of their tanking prizes, Taylor Hall to the NJ Devils, just to tank even further....at least that's how it kinda felt...
The #1 pick in the draft should go to the team with the best record to not make the playoffs, 2nd pick goes to the 2nd best, etc. etc. Once all the non-playoff teams have picked, then playoff teams going from worst record to best, with the champion picking last
I don't know if it's considered tanking, but I remember in 86 the Mets going to Philly at the end of the year and losing 3 games on purpose just so they can clinch in Flushing. Great times
Tanking is one of those strategies that works well if you're the only one doing it, or one of a small few that does. But when tanking becomes a league-wide strategy where every team that thinks it has no chance to win the championship intentionally blows games, you have an unwatchable product AND your tanking might not pay off at all. That, sadly, describes the recent state of the NBA. Say you have eight teams tanking. Only a couple of them will get the primo draft picks, meaning there are five or six teams that did their best to lose but won't be rewarded that well for their tanking. And because they were tanking, that means most of their games were non-competitive not enjoyable for fans to watch unless you wanted to see crazy stats accumulated. So those teams just lost a season of development and sacrificed good will with the fans and aren't going to be significantly better any time soon. And that's why tanking is bad for sports, because it becomes contagious, and the more prevalent it becomes the less effectively it'll work.
My first thought is, there are far more egregious examples of dismantling teams for monetary reasons but since there isn't video, we won't include them. The Philadelphia A's during the 1913-1914 are easily the top tankers -- ever. Mack did the same thing to them in the 1930s.
in 1993, the ottawa senators did a major tanking job. they did this so they could draft alexandre daigle. they did end up with the first overall pick. the beautiful thing was that daigle ended up being one of the nhl's draft bust ever. than in 1995 the nhl started the draft lottery.
Tanking is also a complicated process to manage for PR reasons. Watch HBO's interview with Derek Jeter; Bryan Gumble tries to get him to admit that he's tanking, but Jeter immediately counters Gumble by saying it's against every fiber of someone's competitive nature to tell their team that they expect them to lose.
I would argue though people may hate tanking, its better than what more and more teams seem to be doing outside of the NFL, staying competitive. Staying competitive makes it so management can keep their jobs years after they should have been fired, they can't rebuild for the future, and grows fan apathy at an exponetial rate. For a case of this look at the 2022 Twins, a mediocre team that led their terrible division for 75% of the season then finished around .500 (this was a season after a terrible collapse in which the team was last in the division and after the previous season ended, the owner said that the front office was doing an A+ job, they finished well below .500). The problem was not that the Twins, just sucked, it was that the fans just started to not care about the team, causing attendance to plumett like a rock.
The NBA should (get rid of the play-in) put all the teams with a losing record in the bottom of the draft In other words, if you go 41-41 you get the top pick, if you're 40-42, you get the last pick. If you have the best record, you're somewhere in the middle one spot ahead of the team with the worst record Houston Rockets 41 41 Sacramento Kings 46 36 Golden State Warriors 46 36 Miami Heat* 46 36 Orlando Magic* 47 35 Indiana Pacers* 47 35 Philadelphia 76ers* 47 35 Los Angeles Lakers* 47 35 Cleveland Cavaliers* 48 34 Phoenix Suns* 49 33 New Orleans Pelicans* 49 33 Milwaukee Bucks* 49 33 Dallas Mavericks* 50 32 New York Knicks* 50 32 Los Angeles Clippers* 51 31 Minnesota Timberwolves* 56 26 Denver Nuggets* 57 25 Oklahoma City Thunder* 57 25 Boston Celtics* 64 18 Detroit Pistons 14 68 Washington Wizards 15 67 Charlotte Hornets 21 61 Portland Trail Blazers 21 61 San Antonio Spurs 22 60 Toronto Raptors 25 57 Memphis Grizzlies 27 55 Utah Jazz 31 51 Brooklyn Nets 32 50 Atlanta Hawks 36 46 Chicago Bulls 39 43 There should also be an expansion draft type draft every year where losing teams can draft players off winning teams, top8 protected (Winning teams can opt out but they have to move to the back of the draft order) And maybe there is some extra cap flexibility if you are a losing team to make it easier to acquire a high contract player who is underperforming. The idea is that a really bad team only has to get up to.500 to get a high draft pick, so maybe that would make more teams attractive in free agency? And for the league, you have the most hyped up players come into the league on a fringe play-off team that you can put on national television day one instead of Wembanyama and who
There are Three Levels of "Tanking". 1. Developing Young Talent with Playing Time. 2. Purposeful losing for draft picks. 3. Being the 2000s Detroit Lions.
Talking about Fútbol, there are cases about rivalry tanking but, in more dramatic fashion, for promotion/relegation. Some, having their historic rivals clinging from bottom of the standings, knowing they have to win to keep playing on their flight, and playing against their competitors for permanence, may have been seen a little loose on their game, a little slow, you know. Some being more obvious than others, but collusion nonetheless. Oh, the beauty of human spirit.
I am sure it is as old as sporting events. There must have been lots of,politics in Greek and Roman sports where it might have advantages someone to lose.
It's crazy how some teams like the Pirates and Royals in the 90s and the recent Edmonton Oilers were bad,tanking at some point and they were all bad for so long!
Pirates didn’t tank in the 90’s. They got beaten by one legged Sid Bream and the Braves in 1992 and then lost players to bigger market teams who could pay more.
To be honest I wouldn’t be surprised if we tanked every playoff game but the big question would what’s the motivation? And my answer is the other team paid us to lose.
In the 1968-69 NBA season, the Milwaukee Bucks or Phoenix Suns would get to draft Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, depending on a coin toss. They raced to the bottom during the latter part of the season to get there.
While I can't disagree with the Cubs tanking "worked".... you can't deny that, trashcan banging aside, it worked for the Astros too... they built a core around multiple high draft picks.... Bregman, Correa, Altuve... then started spending and trading for the final pieces when they thought they were close.
I feel like the Cubs popularized tanking in MLB even though they weren’t the first. Now half of MLB is doing it. But yeah tanking never guarantees success, you need to have the right front office getting new players
Tanking does not exist in promotion-relegation in non-American soccer, because teams at the bottom of the league go down to a second tier league. It’s the ultimate anti-ranking mechanism. This isn’t possible for most sports, especially in American franchise style sports leagues, but it’s worth noting.
You guys are forgetting when the Union Army was tanking at the beginning of the Civil War. Losing at Bull Run and Chancellorsville was painful, but they were able to draft Ulysses S Grant first overall in the 1863 draft.
Ah i see so tanking actually works
Nerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrddds!
Also, I agree.
ahhhh the dynamic duo of US History and American Sports
@@manny5186 the two are interchangeable. USA wins always
Confederacy blew their lead when they lost Atlanta with Sherman's march to the sea.
Falcons blew a 28-3 lead.
Coincidence?
To be fair to Hinkie, he admitted that draft picks are misses more often than not. That’s why his was a multi-year tank and he traded for picks. He wanted as many chances as possible to eventually draft a star or two, which they did.
and also, while his return for MCW was kinda lackluster, he wound up being completely right about that jumper being basically unfixable. He traded MCW at the peak
Hinkie wanted Tatum over fultz, but was forced to leave
@@nou4083 exactly right, traded MCW at his peak for a top 3 pick!!!
And Fultz COULD have been good if he didn't get the yips. That's unforseeable.
And in all those years, despite all those pin pong balls, he only got one 1st overall. The other aspect Hinkie was ahead of everyone was doing this in a salary cap league.
The British I think, in WW1.
Well no the french but the british got it on the battle field first
Union in the Civil War
🤦♂️
Tanking has literally turned into fans cheering for the tank 😂
literally been me all year being a rockets fan. the most fun season since 2018 wcf
Cue Glorious Tank Bowl
True this past year Rich Eisen lost his mind when the Jets started winning.
Watching the Jets lose to the Raiders in 2020 was one of the most satisfying endings to a game I’ve ever seen... because I’m a Jets fan. They ruined that good feeling when they beat the Rams, but it seems to have turned out ok for the time being
@@Mike-ge7pe I'm a jets fan too, and I was one of the people that actually wanted them to win. Lawrence could be really good but going 0-16 is an utter disgrace that i want no part of
I think you missed two of the greatest examples of tanking I've ever heard of...
Barbados v Grenada in 1994 in which Barbados INTENTIONALLY scored an own goal due to a silly rule in which extra time goals were worth 2...the precise amount they needed to advance out of their group in their tournament. They were up 1 near the end of the game, and just...beaned themselves to get a better chance at the differential.
Germany v Austria in 1982, dubbed "The Disgrace of Gijon" in which BOTH teams tanked in order to screw over Algeria in their group. Basically Germany and Austria needed a specific result for both of them to move on in the World Cup, and they both kind of lazily walked up and down the pitch once the scoreline was reached.
Tanking only works in American sports/sports that have a draft
the Edmonton Oiler from 2007-2015 are pretty much THE definition of tanking and the first example that comes to my mind. This was a franchise that from 2010-2015 had the first Overall Draft Pick in FOUR of the six years during that span. Since they began their tanking in the 2009-10 season, they've finished dead last 2 times, 29th/30 2 times, 28th /30 2 times, and bottom third in the NHL 3 more times. as of the end of the 2020-21 season, they've finished top 10 in the NHL 2 times and 11th/30 once. not to mention having a generational talent in Connor McDavid and another elite player in Leon Draisatl. this so far is a lesson that in a sport like hockey that is very much a TEAM sport, tanking for one or two generational players without building a competent team around them will be very unlikely to result in championships because a team is only as good as its weakest link... and if 85% of the team is the weakest link, then, the team won't be good.
Before watching this: The 1919 White Sox (They tanked the series, but still go chisox!)
Ouch
This was my thought as well, but to be fair the owner was a super douche and deserved it. On the other hand, it really sucks for the players and fans that just wanted to win.!
@@EpsilonUnitGaming as a White Sox fan, this applies to every owner but ONE in franchise history
1899 spiders blows the Sox out of the water
free shoeless joe he was innocent
Last time I was this early the Suns, 76ers and Nets were poverty franchises.
so like, last year
@@gkdunch no more like 2015-2016
So every day?
@@icannotbelievethisnigga lol, you're right but i saw a chance to rag on these teams and took it
@@philthornton1382 I feel the salt radiating from this comment
I remember watching Jacksonville have that defensive set against us live and I was laughing so hard 😭 obviously we knew why but still so weird
Colts tanked to get franchise type qb's as well. See: peyton '98 and luck '12. Also tanked to get Elway in '83 draft. Only problem with that is that Elway said he would never play for colts. And he didn't forcing trade to Broncos.
Cue the "TANK BOWL" music from urinating tree
which is fox sports college basketball theme
I knew I was about to say that Urinatingtree first invented Tanking because of his history of Tank Bowl-ism.
8:00
the cubs: “i’ll fucken do it again”
Hey now, Dario Saric is a very good player and if given the opportunity to succeed in Philly, he’d be 6th man of the year
Same with Noel he’s been a key piece with the knicks this year people see his scoring numbers and assume he’s bad he has never been known for his offense and has always been a big defensive player
He probably hits free throws better than Ben.
Ah the early 2010s Cubs, many nostalgic players, trades that made a young me a bit sad in the short term but eventually very happy in the long term
How much you wanna bet this video was just from Mike watching that shot of the cuphandle and thinking "what the heck was that I need to make a video about it somehow"
I think it’s important to mention that tanking for draft picks is more prevalent in other sports than others. Drafting #1 overall in NFL to get college football’s best quarterback, who will then make an impact on the NFL team in a few months, is a lot more consequential than an MLB players drafting a great player who will still have to go through the minor leagues for 2-3 years, and still have a less than guaranteed chance of being a franchise player.
I'm early in the video but I still love how the Marlins basically tanked for money but accidentally tanked in to another ring.
I thought it was Urinatingtree who first invented Tanking because of his Tank Bowls.
I was going to say that the Houston Rockets in 1983-84 were the first team especially since after that the NBA installed the lottery system. Didn't know about the Penguins the same year, I like to see Urinating Tree talk about them.
2 hockey teams invented tanking.,
The 1979-1981 Winnipeg Jets, who would send goaltenders to the minors if they got a shut out. The end goal: Draft Dale Hawerchuk
And the 1983-84 Pittsburgh Penguins, who perfected the idea by selling off ALL of their assets for pennies on the dollar. The end goal: Draft Mario, the team's eventual savior.
Not every Sport btw. You do that in Football (Soccer) ,Basketball, Icehockey anywhere else in the World and you are relegated.
honestly tanking is better as a fan than being stuck as mediocre team (spurs fan here (not the basketball one))
@@racg174 That makes no sense. Tanking is literally committing to being mediocre at best instead of actively trying to improve ASAP
@@racg174 That's like saying, "I'd much rather be bad and hope something good falls in my lap than try to get better on my own merit."
Possibly the biggest example would be the Detroit Lions. They made it a long and storied tradition. I don't know if the qualify though because in the end it didn't seem like they had a viable reason to lose every season (maybe monetary reasons). It was so brutal that one of the greatest running backs in history retire one season away from becoming the number one man for rushing yards. And management didn't trade him away...ever. He just had to suck it up year after year. Barry had a strong desire to win and couldn't fathom sucking so bad year in and year out.
The Eagles lost intentionally for the draft position, not to spite the Giants that was just a happy coincidence
Watching that live was frustrating but I understood the concept and reasoning.
Which makes it funnier that they then traded that draft pick to Miami and went back further on the board then they would've been if they had won the game
Didn’t even do it for that. Doug wanted Sudfeld to have a chance to play before Philly undoubtedly cut him once the new regime came in. Hurts wasn’t gonna win that game anyway. Dude’s cheeks.
Man this channel is awesome! All of the guys that make videos on here seem so cool. This Mike guy sounds like a handsome lad
Greatest Sports Hub on RUclips.
Collection of sport loving-dudes!
*takes of mask*
Mwahaha it’s me. I’m one of those cool guys 😎
@@srsmatt7272Oh I know.
You're disguise wasn't as deceptive as an Angel Hernandez strike-zone 👺
@@jaybagido775 Nothing could ever be!
Yeah I like all of them except this srs Matt guy oh wait...
Invented in like '98 or something by the San Antonio Spurs for Tim Duncan - that's the first time a team with talent intentionally sat out guys with the sole purpose of getting great draft picks for a small market team in a lost season.
I remember tanking a game in juco so we could gain a bracket advantage. The initial goal was achieved and we nearly won our conference. It's high risk high reward. Not a fun strat but a strat.
Foolish baseball had a video about one owner owning the Cleveland spiders and st Louis I believe might count as a tank in the 1800 s...all of the good players got traded to one team and the other got the leftovers...
That's not tanking, that's one person owning two teams and stacking one and forgetting about the other
Can you make a video talking about the Career of Jose Reyes? He was underrated imo and was one of my favorite players growing up. Keep up the great content 👍🏻
Who invented Tanking?
Well, I would say it was the Washington Generals; but what's their Endgame?
Krusty: oh come on! Steal the ball! He's just spinning it on his finger!
@@paulk6399 That Game was Fixed! They were using a Freaking Ladder for God's Sake!
One thing that I think people forget about with Hinkie is his strategy of just throwing darts at the board got the Sixers a lot of value. He pulled TJ McConnell and Robert Covington out of thin air. Just a shame the NBA basically couped the front office and then Jerry Colangelo's fail son just fucked things up for multiple years because he spent more time tweeting on burners than scouting or meeting with with his cap advisors.
jerami grant and richaun holmes from those teams are doing really well for themselves now too
The New York Rangers pretty much openly admitted to tanking. They were in a heated playoff race by mid season, but didn’t think they could truly contend for a championship. So they wrote a letter to their fans saying how they were gonna trade a bunch of their good veteran players. That kind of transparency was cool but it probably didn’t sit well in the locker room
Raging Bull. One of the greatest films in history. BY Martin Scorsese btw STARRING Robert DeNiro
Can you explain the mug handle though?
As an Oilers fan I will always remember the fall for Hall.😂
@Harry Engel Taylor Hall.
@Harry Engel ......
And then you trade him to NJ and he wins MVP. This must have hurt.
@@siimtokke3461 Salary dump, we had to sign mcdavid and draisitle. Plus he was a major cancer in the locker room.
@@mpaulm Then losing Hall wasn't as bad as everyone said it was. I don't follow much hockey outside what my favorite team (the Blackhawks) does. I just heard that Hall was traded and he turned into MVP, but I knew about McDavid, Draisitle, Nugent-Hopkins (you guys are stacked).
I thought the 1982 and 1983 Rockets tanked so spectacularly the NBA started the draft lottery. They gotta be my favorite example.
No discussion of tanking can omit the name Ralph Sampson.
You should mention that it was the 1st that the lottery odds flattened that season which is why not only the Knicks dropped in the lottery but also a few other teams also.
Thank you for using the word "literally" correctly.
The fix for tanking is relegation, but the owners will never go for it unless somehow forced. Would make the teams less of a sure thing value long term.
As a Quebec Nordiques fan, I am not sure if they tanked or were just awful, but in 3 consecutive years, they got Sundin, Owen Nolan and Eric Lindros , all as #1 overall picks.
Not through the whole video but damn this a brilliant concept to explore just wanted to say that. There’s a form of tanking in Motorsports called sandbagging if on the off chance you see that on RUclips you’ll know the moment it was inspired from haha
haha funny seeing you here. sandbagging vid would be interesting
Some series, specifically GT racing, have performace balancing rules which allow for slower cars to gain horsepower or lose weight if they are deemed to be uncompetitively. I believe there was a situation at the 24 hours of Daytona where some Lamborghinis were busted for sandbagging to receive a performace increase. However, I do not remember the specifics.
Would love to see this video someday!
Hard salary cap in all sports, abolish the draft, and let players choose where they want to play, just like they would if they were free agents.
I've said it before, the team who just missed out on the playoffs, who were doing their thing and giving it all on the court and in the front office. That's the team that should get the first round pick. That way the following year they will have that extra piece to possibly help them take that next step and make the playoffs and make a run. If they took that approach then we as fans would be able to see stellar basketball, NFL, MLB, and NHL and every year we might see different teams making runs. The other significant point to doing this will be that we get rid of tanking and it will force front offices to do everything they can to better their program, which is what the fans deserve and it will point out certain owners who don't give a shit about winning and are content with just raking in money and not willing to spend money to improve cause they're petty and stingy when it comes to cash. And if that's the case the league can then fine them and force them to put together a quality product. Let's change things up sports
They need to follow that method but weight it so that the team that just misses gets MORE ping pong balls, NOT less.
or
Do like they do in Euro Soccer- split the league into halves not bt conference and geography, but top and bottom teams so that the bottom feeders go to the B League and people know they suck and it hurts financially.
There was a famous example of tanking in Australian football - following the game called the Kreuzer Cup at the end of 2007. Carlton and Melbourne both went into the game with 4 wins for the season, and a team could qualify for a priority pick in the draft if they finished a season with 4.5 wins for the season (provided their previous season had been similarly terrible, which Carlton's had). Even if they didn't finish in last place on the ladder.
Carlton lost that last game, consequently were awarded the priority pick, and used the priority pick to grab young star Matthew Kreuzer in the draft.
As a result Melbourne missed out on the priority pick by winning that game, and missed out on a potential superstar in Kreuzer, who everyone knew would be the first pick in the 2008 draft. Melbourne would spend the next couple years losing so badly that they were frequently accused of tanking, and they would be fined $500 000 and both their coach and their general manager of football operations were found to have "acted in a manner which was prejudicial to the interests of the AFL", for their actions in the latter weeks of 2009.
What do you call what the Sabres have been doing this decade
Gross incompetence
not too hood
getting Pegula'd... because since drafting eichel, all the ownership has done is piss off players, fans, and more with their gross incompetence and lack of respect towards the team.. i mean for heaven's sake, they gave their alumni and past legends cheap chinese knock-off jerseys to wear on alumni appreciation night a couple years ago as well as mis spelling Dave Andreychuk's name on a different alumni night... the hockey operations team, as well as coaches and management have TRIED to put competent teams together in recent years that on paper look decently competitive, but end up finishing mediocre AT BEST... i feel for you, sabres fans....
This is way more common than the video implies. Near the trade deadline, for example, there are teams out of playoff contention who trade their expensive and good players away for prospects/young players. They effectively tank the rest of the season. Once a team gives up on making the playoffs they *always* tank, at least up to a point, trying to avoid offending their fan base. Noone wants an ugly Charles Oakley incident due to bad management and tanking with respect to the Knicks.
"Some player named Elvin Hayes" c'mon man that's a hall of famer.
2015 Toronto Maple Leafs traded their first pairing defenseman / captain, starting goalie, a slew of depth players AND leading scorer (who helped lead the Penguins to back to back cups).
All this to get Austin Matthews in the draft, Yet this was seen as "rebuilding"....
Leafs were actually better that year than the prior (by a point)... played better too. They weren't in sole possession of last place until the last day of the season, largely because they had like 5 games on hand on most teams for the majority of the year. Edmonton was the one in last place for the majority by pts%. Though Toronto did hold out JVR because of his injury, I think? There was a moment at the end where they decided to dress their rookies Brown, Nylander, Leivo, Hyman and Kapanen and eventually sent them down because they were playing too good XD... in reality Leafs did the least offensive tanking ever considering that they did improve, they did play better, they dressed their young up and coming players at one point and they still placed much higher than Edmonton and Buffalo did the year prior (that was a tremendous tanking hellstorm). On top of that it was just the one time as they've been a good team since. I'd prefer if teams were to tank, they'd do it like the Leafs. They signed numerous decent players to single year or short term deals (like Grabner, Winnik, PA Parenteau) entirely for the purpose of showcasing them throughout the season to trade them for picks then once traded they were replaced with their available top prospects and the team on the ice never looked like they were ever trying to lose.
I guess hockey isnt your focus but the tank for the Nhl's current best player, Connor Mcdavid, was absolutely bananas!
What about the Cleveland spiders
As long as it isn't to illegally manipulate betting, tanking is fine
As a sports fan, pain is at its peak when the team you love is perennially "Okay" either barely making the playoffs and bouncing in round 1, or barely missing the playoffs. No high intensity finals or semifinals competition. Just a meh draft pick and a sad exit.
Fans have the same vested interest as the GM, they want to see championships, and if your team already sucks in a given year, sucking just a bit harder to get a chance at getting back to glory in 3-5 years can seem worthwhile.
Michael Kay suggested that the number one draft pick should be awarded to a team that just missed the playoffs and tried.
The Spurs in a way tanked also for Tim Duncan. David Robinson was injured at that time, and I believe they held him out to the end of the season so they will have a good chance at the no. 1 pick
I’m a Pistons and Jags fan....
Help Me
The Cubs didn't tank. At least not in the window that you're suggesting.
-Zambrano was declining and a clubhouse cancer. They traded him for Chris Volstad, who was 23 at the time and was a strong bounce-back candidate.
-Samardzija wanted more money than he was worth, so they shipped him to Oakland for a package featuring Addison Russell while he was cheap and under team control.
-Garza was in the same boat as Samardzija, except he was in a visible decline, so they shipped him while they could actually get something for him. They received a few years of solid relief in Carl Edwards Jr. and Justin Grimm while taking a chance on Mike Olt.
-Feldman had one solid season in his entire career. When it looked like he might be having his second, they shipped him for two nobodies in Jake Arrieta and Pedro Strop.
-Andrew Cashner was just another "next best thing" prospect for the Cubs. They always had one in the early 2000s and they never panned out, so instead of letting him flounder, they traded him for Anthony Rizzo. He's been pretty okay.
-Bryan LaHair was an all-star based on less than a month of solid play for a team with (probably) the largest fan base. He ended 2012 with an OPS of .784 and played even worse in Japan the following year.
tl;dr
The Cubs traded five pitchers that weren't helping them win and released a minor league journeyman. Six of the eleven players they received in return were on their 2016 championship roster.
This is why I love the promotion/relegation of European soccer. You can't subject your fans to misery and be better off.
I think the Oakland As deserve a top spot here in 2022. "Moneyball" only means trade away all your up and coming players and replace them with a minor league team every year.
People forget...when the As actually wanted to win they paid good money for a solid pitching staff for like a decade. Now it looks like they are clearly tanking to move cities, yet the minor leaguers are actually winning some games.
Why are you making me relive 2016, thats ruthless
Good video, you should do a part 2 of individual players on a team who tank, usually for a trade like Ben simmons, James harden and kyrie
Wait what about the 1989 Cowboys? That was like one of the earliest instances of Tanking.
1899 Cleveland Spiders
Some teams in nba/nhl can't do the obvious tank job right thanks to lottery. See: Boston celtics for Duncan 1997. Or Buffalo sabres for mcdavid 2015. Cavs tanked badly and got lotto luck in '03 to get lebum.
I'm not sure your info is correct on the 82-83 Rockets. They had a bad team that year after Malone left. Ralph Sampson was the possible pick in 83 if they won the coin flip and they did. Hakeem wasn't available until the 84 draft. I am a lifelong Houston Rockets fan and have followed them since the 70s.
There should be some rules to make tanking less desirable. For example:
a) (Talking about NBA draft which has 2 rounds) If a team had nr 1 pick then for the next 3 season they can't have another top 3 picks; if a team had nr 2 pick, then 2 years; if a team had nr 3 pick, then they can't have top 3 picks next year. (NHL, NFL, and MLB have more rounds so the number of top picks and the number of seasons they can't have another would differ)
b) If a team had deep playoff runs and even won championships (in their last 3-5 years) then they should not get high picks. Like GS went to 5 NBA finals in a row, won 3 of them, and when Klay and Steph got hurt, they tanked and got the second pick. Like what stops a good team to give their top players a year or two off, get a few top prospects and then go back to winning. If I were an executive I absolutely would do that. GS played around a season worth more games between 2015-2019 than half of the league teams, and their players would feel fatigued. Then GS would play them less (maybe 40-50 games instead 70+ games). Basically, this idea would have stopped Penguins from getting Mario and he would have ended in Devil's jersey.
"if you win we'll beat you up" is probably the nicest thing ever said by a Lazio fan
Not sure what you'd do about the spite tank, but trapdoor leagues would help a lot get rid of tanking to improve your team.
While that last one is a crazy story, I personally feel as if it's not the earliest example of tanking in sports. What if I told you there was an arguable example of tanking from the 1910s in baseball that led to a team having 7 straight last place finishes?
Let me introduce you to Connie Mack and his Philadelphia Athletics. From 1910-1914, they had been a dynasty, winning 4 pennants and 3 World Series in 5 years, and were the undisputed best team in baseball. However, that all started to unravel in 1914. First, the competing Major League known as the "Federal League" was formed, driving up salary. Then, the A's were swept in the World Series by the 1914 "Miracle" Boston Braves who had gone from last place on the 4th of July to first in the NL by the of the season. Mack, seeing that he wouldn't be able to keep up with the salaries of the FL, and bitter over this loss, proceeded to sell off all of his best players, and went from 99 wins in '14 to 43 in '15. In '16, He had the worst team in modern major league history by winning percentage -worse than even the '62 Mets, at .235- and had just 36 wins. They had hit the bottom of the barrel. It would take until 1922 for them to climb out of the basement, and 1925 for them to have a winning record, when they finished second behind the Washington Senators. However, they finally fully recovered by 1929 when they won 104 games, more than they had in any season in the first dynasty, and the World Series in dominating fashion.
I think this shows all the hallmarks of a tank, albeit in different ways at times. For one, pettiness and not working to a T (Losing the World Series and selling off all of your best players and then finishing in last 7 straight years). For another, it DID eventually work, with the same management too! Though, Connie Mack, was an owner-manager, so he had 100% job security, but hey, it worked! And the teams from 1929-31 (Mack's last Dynasty) were his best, so there's that. I didn't mention this, but it goes without saying, but he hit on a LOT of players. Lefty Grove, one of the best pitchers ever, Jimmie Foxx, one of the best first basemen and most fearsome hitters ever, Al Simmons, a hitter who had an unconventional stance but made it work, and a host of others, they were great. And he did have a reason other than pettiness: to cut costs with the competition from the Federal League threatening to raid the existing AL and NL. So overall, I think that Connie Mack, created tanking, at least in a rudimentary form.
Jesus, that first clip of Harden looks like he's lost 40 pounds this season (after going to Brooklyn of course)
The Eagles tanking and letting the Football Team win the division is the perfect embodiment of the NFC East last year
@@footerotica882 like it or not, they’re the Football Team now.
And in the draft, they screwed the giants over again.
@@choiyatlam2552 That’s not their fault though lol. They wanted a player and so they drafted up to get him so other teams couldn’t
the buffalo sabres tanked in 2015 for connor mc david, didn't get him but got jack eichel who is still an amazing player. and now they're gonna trade him when his value has been at its all time low
We're at the 15min mark, and I havent seen the 2013-2017 Edmonton Oilers on the list....I think they've just been bad since then. But they were so dedicated to the tank that they traded away one of their tanking prizes, Taylor Hall to the NJ Devils, just to tank even further....at least that's how it kinda felt...
The #1 pick in the draft should go to the team with the best record to not make the playoffs, 2nd pick goes to the 2nd best, etc. etc. Once all the non-playoff teams have picked, then playoff teams going from worst record to best, with the champion picking last
I don't know if it's considered tanking, but I remember in 86 the Mets going to Philly at the end of the year and losing 3 games on purpose just so they can clinch in Flushing. Great times
Tanking is one of those strategies that works well if you're the only one doing it, or one of a small few that does. But when tanking becomes a league-wide strategy where every team that thinks it has no chance to win the championship intentionally blows games, you have an unwatchable product AND your tanking might not pay off at all. That, sadly, describes the recent state of the NBA. Say you have eight teams tanking. Only a couple of them will get the primo draft picks, meaning there are five or six teams that did their best to lose but won't be rewarded that well for their tanking. And because they were tanking, that means most of their games were non-competitive not enjoyable for fans to watch unless you wanted to see crazy stats accumulated. So those teams just lost a season of development and sacrificed good will with the fans and aren't going to be significantly better any time soon.
And that's why tanking is bad for sports, because it becomes contagious, and the more prevalent it becomes the less effectively it'll work.
It's okay that Houston landed Hakeem, because Portland got to pick second and Michael Jordan was available
I'm surprised you didn't mention the Colts & "Suck for Luck"
83-84 Penguins were painful for me as a Devils fan. Worse of all, the Devils "won" on the last night of the season to miss out on the first pick.
My first thought is, there are far more egregious examples of dismantling teams for monetary reasons but since there isn't video, we won't include them. The Philadelphia A's during the 1913-1914 are easily the top tankers -- ever. Mack did the same thing to them in the 1930s.
Astros legit had one of the best tanks in mlb history
They also legit had one of the best cheating systems in mlb history
@@metsfan7376 still made the alcs 4 times in a row
@@aaaaa8282 they still cheated. It’s all one big asterisk next to their name and will never get the respect they don’t deserve
@@owenanderson3425 OH NO WHAT WILL THE ASTROS ORGANIZATION DO WHEN USER JOE C DOESN'T RESPECT THEM 😭😭😖😣😞😞
@@metsfan7376 Yeah they did, but still tanked very well and still are an elite team.
in 1993, the ottawa senators did a major tanking job. they did this so they could draft alexandre daigle. they did end up with the first overall pick. the beautiful thing was that daigle ended up being one of the nhl's draft bust ever. than in 1995 the nhl started the draft lottery.
great channel homie
glad I finally came across it
keep up the great content please
Tanking is also a complicated process to manage for PR reasons. Watch HBO's interview with Derek Jeter; Bryan Gumble tries to get him to admit that he's tanking, but Jeter immediately counters Gumble by saying it's against every fiber of someone's competitive nature to tell their team that they expect them to lose.
If the title was called “Who invented Choking?” That would be Atlanta Sports Teams as a whole
I would argue though people may hate tanking, its better than what more and more teams seem to be doing outside of the NFL, staying competitive. Staying competitive makes it so management can keep their jobs years after they should have been fired, they can't rebuild for the future, and grows fan apathy at an exponetial rate.
For a case of this look at the 2022 Twins, a mediocre team that led their terrible division for 75% of the season then finished around .500 (this was a season after a terrible collapse in which the team was last in the division and after the previous season ended, the owner said that the front office was doing an A+ job, they finished well below .500). The problem was not that the Twins, just sucked, it was that the fans just started to not care about the team, causing attendance to plumett like a rock.
The NBA should (get rid of the play-in) put all the teams with a losing record in the bottom of the draft
In other words, if you go 41-41 you get the top pick, if you're 40-42, you get the last pick.
If you have the best record, you're somewhere in the middle one spot ahead of the team with the worst record
Houston Rockets 41 41
Sacramento Kings 46 36
Golden State Warriors 46 36
Miami Heat* 46 36
Orlando Magic* 47 35
Indiana Pacers* 47 35
Philadelphia 76ers* 47 35
Los Angeles Lakers* 47 35
Cleveland Cavaliers* 48 34
Phoenix Suns* 49 33
New Orleans Pelicans* 49 33
Milwaukee Bucks* 49 33
Dallas Mavericks* 50 32
New York Knicks* 50 32
Los Angeles Clippers* 51 31
Minnesota Timberwolves* 56 26
Denver Nuggets* 57 25
Oklahoma City Thunder* 57 25
Boston Celtics* 64 18
Detroit Pistons 14 68
Washington Wizards 15 67
Charlotte Hornets 21 61
Portland Trail Blazers 21 61
San Antonio Spurs 22 60
Toronto Raptors 25 57
Memphis Grizzlies 27 55
Utah Jazz 31 51
Brooklyn Nets 32 50
Atlanta Hawks 36 46
Chicago Bulls 39 43
There should also be an expansion draft type draft every year where losing teams can draft players off winning teams, top8 protected
(Winning teams can opt out but they have to move to the back of the draft order)
And maybe there is some extra cap flexibility if you are a losing team to make it easier to acquire a high contract player who is underperforming.
The idea is that a really bad team only has to get up to.500 to get a high draft pick, so maybe that would make more teams attractive in free agency?
And for the league, you have the most hyped up players come into the league on a fringe play-off team that you can put on national television day one instead of Wembanyama and who
Uh Dario panned out, he’s pretty solid
@Harry Engel it's because he copied peak Tim Duncan offense but wasn't any good on defense.
There are Three Levels of "Tanking".
1. Developing Young Talent with Playing Time.
2. Purposeful losing for draft picks.
3. Being the 2000s Detroit Lions.
Ah yes the Triple A Astros the other 2 A's coming from Absolutely and Atrocious
Talking about Fútbol, there are cases about rivalry tanking but, in more dramatic fashion, for promotion/relegation.
Some, having their historic rivals clinging from bottom of the standings, knowing they have to win to keep playing on their flight, and playing against their competitors for permanence, may have been seen a little loose on their game, a little slow, you know. Some being more obvious than others, but collusion nonetheless. Oh, the beauty of human spirit.
The fact that the Astros whole payroll was Tim Lincecums yearly salary is just hilarious.
I am sure it is as old as sporting events. There must have been lots of,politics in Greek and Roman sports where it might have advantages someone to lose.
It's crazy how some teams like the Pirates and Royals in the 90s and the recent Edmonton Oilers were bad,tanking at some point and they were all bad for so long!
Pirates didn’t tank in the 90’s. They got beaten by one legged Sid Bream and the Braves in 1992 and then lost players to bigger market teams who could pay more.
To be honest I wouldn’t be surprised if we tanked every playoff game but the big question would what’s the motivation?
And my answer is the other team paid us to lose.
In the 1968-69 NBA season, the Milwaukee Bucks or Phoenix Suns would get to draft Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, depending on a coin toss. They raced to the bottom during the latter part of the season to get there.
While I can't disagree with the Cubs tanking "worked".... you can't deny that, trashcan banging aside, it worked for the Astros too... they built a core around multiple high draft picks.... Bregman, Correa, Altuve... then started spending and trading for the final pieces when they thought they were close.
I’m pretty sure there is a example of tanking from the 1920s with the gold dust trio in wrestling
tanking spans every sport... i guess the rest of the world doesn’t exist
petition for americans to add the word “american” after the word “every”
I feel like the Cubs popularized tanking in MLB even though they weren’t the first. Now half of MLB is doing it.
But yeah tanking never guarantees success, you need to have the right front office getting new players
Could you consider the black sox scandal tanking?
The 1899 Cleveland Spiders were also pretty terrible but I don't know if that qualifies as tanking
I like how the jets failed tanking 😂
Tanking does not exist in promotion-relegation in non-American soccer, because teams at the bottom of the league go down to a second tier league. It’s the ultimate anti-ranking mechanism.
This isn’t possible for most sports, especially in American franchise style sports leagues, but it’s worth noting.