JJ Jansen on tanking

[ChibCU]

I probably would have become a casual Hornets fan if Cooper ended up there, but the NBA just solidified my apathy for its product. Hornets also got shafted when Lakers got cold feet on the Mark Williams trade. NBA is corrupt and that alien-headed Silver is the kingpin.

[UnluckyforSome]

The Bucs absolutely tanked the last game of the season in order to draft Winston. It happens.

 

In regards to the lottery, there has always been way too much smoke for there to be nothing burning there. Always has been way too much coincidence, and little visibility. Even if it was all on the up and up, the league has to know there is this negative perception, and they do nothing to change or remedy it.

Edited 7 hours ago by UnluckyforSome

[Mr. Scot]

I've never bought into the idea.

There's just too much at stake, even for front office people. Jobs are lost, trust is lessened, lives are altered, reputations are damaged and more. Throw in that the average front office person isn't as young as the average player. They may not have ten years ahead of them to salvage their careers. Any given year could be their last.

The only person not guaranteed to suffer some direct form of consequence from losing is the owner, and even there you still have problems (fan reaction, team reputation, revenue, etc). You've also got massive egos in play on that front so it can get personal.

Mind you, I do accept that there are "fire sales" in order to build for the future, but even those have consequences. They don't exactly guarantee success either. Poorly run teams often just wind up in the same circumstance a few years down the road.

Sorry gus, but my tinfoil hat just hasn't fit me for quite a while.

[WhoKnows]

1 hour ago, Icege said:

Sure, there's definitely a chance that a fire sale in 2022 could've paid off but I don't think that's a certainty. It's not just about stockpiling the picks and bettering odds; it's about hitting on those picks, having a stable coaching staff to develop them, and keeping the locker room engaged. We didn't exactly have a model front office nor stable coaching staff in 2022.

It's worth noting that part of the reason that DJ had to be included in the trade up for #1 was because the Bears needed an immediate, proven WR1 to help Fields. It was him or another immediate first-round pick, not a future one like what was being offered for Burns (whom teams knew that things were shaky with and that they could afford to wait).

As for the Eagles, they recovered because the foundation was already in place. Pederson got flak and was ultimately fired (and was just fired again this offseason from the Jags). Their recovery was quick because the foundation was already in place: Howie Roseman and a solid roster (that included a stacked OL, a second year QB, and a veteran defense). Philly had a margin of error that just wasn't available to Carolina.

I'm not against using the draft to rebuild, but a full-on teardown comes with real consequences: fan disengagement, a fractured locker room, poor development, a losing environment... and I don't believe that we had the necessary leadership at the time to cleanly navigate it. That's a gamble that I want no part of. 

Now that we do have a staff that seems to be in complete alignment and building for the future rather than fighting for their jobs, I'm more inclined to observe their process and see where it leads rather than backseat driving with "perfect" hindsight. 

Dude, I’m sorry but I don’t get your worries about this magical culture and fan involvement. We’ve sucked balls since 2018 because we actually did what you want to do. Limp along and try to win as many games as possible without actually being good. All that does is cause the same problems you didn’t want to gamble on happening. Well, they did what you wanted and what did we get for it? 7 drafts and Young, Horn and Brown, not exactly a SB winning core. We haven’t won more than 7 games since 2017 and you are worried about risking our culture, etc.? That’s silly. Cam and Luke have been gone for 5+ years now. We finally had a draft in 2025 where we actually had our full allotment of picks. We absolutely screwed up by not going full rebuild. Texans did in the same window and they’ve been to the playoffs multiple times and have a much better team. Any fan issues now in Houston even with the Watson massage debacle?

I will separate this statement because I get annoyed at back seat driving type comments. Many of us like minded draft followers and GM and wannabes said that we should have tanked in 2022 and traded every guy where teams offered quality picks. You might not like it, but we were 100% correct. Sure, Fitterer might have pissed them away but the Rams 2024/2025 1sts would have been Morgan’s picks.

You also have to rebuild through the draft, period, which is why bad teams try build up picks, not trade them all away or don’t take hauls when available. There’s not one team that rebuilt through FA and was successful. It doesn’t exist because the key guys (Eagles OL/DL, Hurts, Mahomes, Kelce, Chris Jones) on Super Bowl teams (Kuechly, TD, Cam) are drafted.

I grew up in CT and I went to Pats games when people handed you stacks of free tickets in the parking lot because no one wanted to go to their games. One QB and a bunch of solid OL/D picks and they were a different franchise. We can only hope that Canales is the right coach and that 2025 is the start of drafting well. If I’m being objective, we’ve still got a ways to go.

[Khyber53]

3 hours ago, WhoKnows said:

I don’t know why the tanking concept is not understood. Coaches and players are not involved at all. It’s always the front office. If we had actually traded players like we should have back in 2022, we would have effectively tanked and gotten a better pick than 9 so we lost all the draft picks to get Young. We traded CMC. We should have traded Burns for the haul and taken GB’s offer of a 1st for Moore. We could have easily traded anyone else.

We see it in every sport, every year. Trade deadlines where bad teams give up current assets for future assets. Unfortunately, we were stupid and decided we only wanted to trade CMC for peanuts even though we clearly had a plan to go after Young. We were dumb and there is no way you can tell me that we shouldn’t have tanked via trading away Burns, Moore and anyone else. We’d be a much better team right now had we had a fire sale and tanked the 2022 season.

Trading away your top players for future draft picks or prospects (baseball) is tanking. Shoeless Joe and the black Sox is not tanking. That’s point shaving/betting on your sport/team. Again, I just don’t get why this concept is so hard to get when MLB, NFL and NBA teams trade players for future assets every single year and usually end up with better draft slots (or at least odds since Hornets never win the lottery).

Acually, Shoeless Joe and Black Sox did tank, just for someone's betting purposes. 

Playing to lose, whatever the reason for it, is unethical. 

[PNW_PantherMan]

6 minutes ago, Khyber53 said:

Acually, Shoeless Joe and Black Sox did tank, just for someone's betting purposes. 

Playing to lose, whatever the reason for it, is unethical. 

I get your definition, but to me the definition of tanking is to achieve the worst possible outcome in the regular season to get the best outcome in the offseason (draft).  What the Black Sox did was throw the World Series for money.

I would classify tanking and throwing as two different forms of intentional losing.  But its all losing on purpose.

Edited 5 hours ago by PNW_PantherMan

[Mr. Scot]

9 minutes ago, Khyber53 said:

Playing to lose, whatever the reason for it, is unethical. 

The most common reason is, of course, the one referenced.

[WhoKnows]

8 minutes ago, Khyber53 said:

Acually, Shoeless Joe and Black Sox did tank, just for someone's betting purposes. 

Playing to lose, whatever the reason for it, is unethical. 

Again, the front office isn’t playing. Doug Pederson aside, tanking has nothing to do with players and coaches. The black Sox weren’t tanking, they were point shaving if you will. They got money to lose. Tanking is all about the FO getting better future assets in reward for making their team weaker. Tanking for a draft pick slot or tanking to get a young prospect or tanking to get future picks.

Again, no playing to lose but there absolutely aren’t hundreds of examples of trading away talent for future picks and prospects which invariably makes your current team worse thus bettering your draft pick slot (potentially, no guarantees). 

[kungfoodude]

5 hours ago, t96 said:

Still it’s unfair, the massive markets will be able to spend way more than teams like the Hornets. Lakers, Celtics, etc. have a huge advantage

Yeah, I don't see them ever allowing true parity. 

[amcoolio]

Hornets have had the worst luck of any professional sports franchise this century. Constantly drafting a slot below the generational talent, all because of the lottery done behind closed doors. It's been brutal and frankly unfair to be a diehard fan of this franchise, and I don't blame anyone for cutting out the stress.

[PNW_PantherMan]

It's probably impossible to institute a hard cap without a strike/lockout labor situation.  I'm pretty sure the players would all be against it because it would further limit salaries and player mobility.

Just because it's unfair doesn't mean it can't be good.  I think ideally every league would have parity like the NFL, but I think the NBA could be vastly improved without messing with the soft cap/luxury tax system.

[WUnderhill]

15 hours ago, Dave Gettleman's Shorts said:

Mavs had a 1.8% odds of winning the number 1 overall pick btw

In 2008, the Bulls had a 1.7% chance of winning the top pick which ended up being Chicago native, D-rose

2 teams with sub 2% odds winning it within a span of less than 20 years. Quite unbelievable. 

[WUnderhill]

Tanking in the NFL isn’t really a thing and anybody wanting to bring the rigged lottery to the NFL has an ulterior motive.

[kungfoodude]

1 hour ago, amcoolio said:

Hornets have had the worst luck of any professional sports franchise this century. Constantly drafting a slot below the generational talent, all because of the lottery done behind closed doors. It's been brutal and frankly unfair to be a diehard fan of this franchise, and I don't blame anyone for cutting out the stress.

To be fair, historically we have overperformed our lottery slot(in terms of probability) and had a pretty significant hand in making very poor draft picks for a long time.