Every time I try to come up with ideas to eliminate tanking I always come back to the reverse draft, where the team closest to making the playoffs ends up with the number one pick and you go down from there to fill out 1-18. To me its the best way to reward maximum effort and good play. It seems so backwards to reward being the worst. Should make them earn it.
Along those lines, how about the bottom 18 teams that did not make the playoffs get seeded based on season finish and have their own lottery bowl playoffs where the winner gets the #1 pick. Runner up gets 2nd pick. Semifinal losers get 3rd and 4th pick (best seed gets best spot). Quarter finals losers get 5th - 8th picks, and so forth to decide the first 18 picks of the draft..
This consolation playoff could run parallel to the regular playoffs except they would happen on Thursday and Friday instead of Saturday and Sunday. You would need an extra week though as 18 teams would be an uneven bracket and you would have to have 2 play in games the first week to get to your clean 16 team bracket. Or you could just drop the 2 worst teams and default them to the 17th and 18th picks of the draft and then you can shorten the playoffs 1 week to a total of 4 weeks. In that case you could play the lottery bowl championship the weekend before the Superbowl instead of that mess of a pro bowl.
If a team had traded away their first round pick prior to this change then they would be playing for an extra 2nd round pick at whatever spot they finish.
You could make the argument that you could still have a possible tanking situation in maybe the last couple weeks of the season where a team is in the last 2 playoff spots and really would rather miss them and play for the #1 pick so they rest key guys. No players would ever go for that though and I think you would be hard pressed to find a coach that would.
I think most players, with the exception of stars on multi million deals or the guys whose contracts expire and will be free agents, would love to have a couple extra game checks with the chance to drastically improve the team with better draft picks. Those potential free agents would hate the idea of course. Maybe offer those guys double or triple pay for the playoff games. Would also incentivize teams to have guys on longer contracts instead of 1 or 2 years deals as they would be more invested in playing hard for long term success.
Also - not really related, but I would love to see a policy implemented that if you finish in the bottom 4 teams in the league for 3 years in a row, then you are required to sell the team. They remain in the same city but just different ownership and management. There is no private business in the world where you can finish in the bottom 10% of your industry 3 years in a row and still have a company. Same should hold true for sports franchises. Some lousy owners have been getting a free pass living off city and fan devotion.
Anyone have thoughts?
Along those lines, how about the bottom 18 teams that did not make the playoffs get seeded based on season finish and have their own lottery bowl playoffs where the winner gets the #1 pick. Runner up gets 2nd pick. Semifinal losers get 3rd and 4th pick (best seed gets best spot). Quarter finals losers get 5th - 8th picks, and so forth to decide the first 18 picks of the draft..
This consolation playoff could run parallel to the regular playoffs except they would happen on Thursday and Friday instead of Saturday and Sunday. You would need an extra week though as 18 teams would be an uneven bracket and you would have to have 2 play in games the first week to get to your clean 16 team bracket. Or you could just drop the 2 worst teams and default them to the 17th and 18th picks of the draft and then you can shorten the playoffs 1 week to a total of 4 weeks. In that case you could play the lottery bowl championship the weekend before the Superbowl instead of that mess of a pro bowl.
If a team had traded away their first round pick prior to this change then they would be playing for an extra 2nd round pick at whatever spot they finish.
You could make the argument that you could still have a possible tanking situation in maybe the last couple weeks of the season where a team is in the last 2 playoff spots and really would rather miss them and play for the #1 pick so they rest key guys. No players would ever go for that though and I think you would be hard pressed to find a coach that would.
I think most players, with the exception of stars on multi million deals or the guys whose contracts expire and will be free agents, would love to have a couple extra game checks with the chance to drastically improve the team with better draft picks. Those potential free agents would hate the idea of course. Maybe offer those guys double or triple pay for the playoff games. Would also incentivize teams to have guys on longer contracts instead of 1 or 2 years deals as they would be more invested in playing hard for long term success.
Also - not really related, but I would love to see a policy implemented that if you finish in the bottom 4 teams in the league for 3 years in a row, then you are required to sell the team. They remain in the same city but just different ownership and management. There is no private business in the world where you can finish in the bottom 10% of your industry 3 years in a row and still have a company. Same should hold true for sports franchises. Some lousy owners have been getting a free pass living off city and fan devotion.
Anyone have thoughts?
