How long does a SUCCESSFUL tank need to be?

[Schrödinger's Gerbil]

Thank you for your excellent analysis. I guess my question is what are the criteria to determine whether the tank was successful tank and whether the benefits exceed the costs.

For example, after suffering five years of intentional misery, what is the expected outcome? An NBA title or multiple titles, an NBA finals appearance or multiple finals appearances, a conference final or multiple conference finals, etc.? Will it be considered a successful tank if the team becomes a perennial high 40s or 50 win team that routinely makes the playoffs and occasionally makes a deeper run (i.e., second round or conference final) but never makes the finals? I don't think that we can talk about good vs. bad or successful vs. unsuccessful tanking without specifying what the criteria are for determining this.

Closely related to this is at what point do the benefits of the tank exceed the costs? How many years of playoff appearances and how deep in to the playoffs constitute sufficient benefits that they begin to outweigh the costs of enduring five years of what we endured the other day vs. the Lakers?

Of course, another factor that must be considered is the opportunity cost. In lieu of tanking, what were the other options and associated outcomes? Admittedly, this one is hard to assess, but we can assume a variety of scenarios and compare our projected tanking outcomes to these.

From my perspective, the discussion of tanking focuses disproportionately on the perceived benefits without considering these other factors. I'm not trying to be contrarian for contrarianism's sake here, I'm genuinely interested in how people would answer these questions. This analysis provide a good benchmark to facilitate the discussion.

 

[Thee Idiotic Minivan K]

Honestly, this question makes me miss the previous ownership regime. We were playoff competitive (or better) for 30+ seasons and were only in the cellar once that I can remember (04-05).

Honestly it’s the last regime that caused us to have to trade our stars. The Jazz were trapped, and we’re only going to get worse with no way to improve the team.

 

[idiot]

Love this thread. I would personally re-frame this question - "How long does it take to build a playoff or championship caliber nucleus?"

The answer boils down to 1) draft lottery luck and 2) ownership and front office personnel. How good are they at their jobs?

High-quality franchises (Thunder, Spurs - lucky bastards, Celtics) have historically rebuilt very quickly. Others (Kings, Wizards, Pelicans, the Knicks prior to recent history) have generally sucked forever. Market size and revenue considerations are a significant part of the equation, but still only part of the equation.

Honestly, this question makes me miss the previous ownership regime. We were playoff competitive (or better) for 30+ seasons and were only in the cellar once that I can remember (04-05).

We have the draft assets to get much better, and very quickly. DA clearly has the track record of rebuilding rosters but let's see what he can get done here.

IMO, if we really wanted to think big - go get Sam Presti and pay him whatever (and I mean - WHATEVER) it takes to get him to Salt Lake City.

I think we often forget that the Spurs had four losing seasons before getting Wemby (including two with wins in the 30s and mediocre draft position). They've got their guy now (yes, thanks to luck), but this year is likely to be their 6th losing season in a row.

 

[idiot]

Thank you for your excellent analysis. I guess my question is what are the criteria to determine whether the tank was successful tank and whether the benefits exceed the costs.

For example, after suffering five years of intentional misery, what is the expected outcome? An NBA title or multiple titles, an NBA finals appearance or multiple finals appearances, a conference final or multiple conference finals, etc.? Will it be considered a successful tank if the team becomes a perennial high 40s or 50 win team that routinely makes the playoffs and occasionally makes a deeper run (i.e., second round or conference final) but never makes the finals? I don't think that we can talk about good vs. bad or successful vs. unsuccessful tanking without specifying what the criteria are for determining this.

Closely related to this is at what point do the benefits of the tank exceed the costs? How many years of playoff appearances and how deep in to the playoffs constitute sufficient benefits that they begin to outweigh the costs of enduring five years of what we endured the other day vs. the Lakers?

Of course, another factor that must be considered is the opportunity cost. In lieu of tanking, what were the other options and associated outcomes? Admittedly, this one is hard to assess, but we can assume a variety of scenarios and compare our projected tanking outcomes to these.

From my perspective, the discussion of tanking focuses disproportionately on the perceived benefits without considering these other factors. I'm not trying to be contrarian for contrarianism's sake here, I'm genuinely interested in how people would answer these questions. This analysis provide a good benchmark to facilitate the discussion.

Yeah, I agree that these things are worth thinking about. Part of the problem is it's hard to figure out (especially for us not involved with the finances of the NBA). How much money does the team forego because of long term losing? Is it money mostly out of the owner's pocket or does the impact have a deeper effect on the team's long term fortunes? I don't know the answer and I don't know of any way we can really estimate it well.

As for the criteria of a successful tank, who knows? You have some Jazz fans that are yearning to tank because they think it's the only realistic way we can get past the second round of the playoffs. Some say that a successful tank requires a championship appearance, if not victory. Lots of people have lauded tank jobs in the past that haven't really taken teams further than we got with DM and RG (such as the Sixers's tank). Others say that the tank is successful if you get a top 5 (10, 15?) player.

And in reality, most "tanks" don't really net then whole set of key players for a team. Do we give Denver credit for a successful tank when they picked up Jamal Murray with the 7th pick? Or Houston for getting the good but probably not completely transformative trio of Amen, Jabari Smith, and Jalen Green? Or, what role do we think tanking plays in OKC's success, since they have the league's best record even with their only top-5 pick (Chet) missing most of the season?

So figuring out what tanking success is is kind of like trying to nail jello to the wall. It's probably best to try to at least hint at what we think it means for us when we talk about it (which I hope I've done in this thread), even if we know others will have different definitions. For me, I usually go by what I think many of the pro-tankers among Jazz fans were thinking when they insisted that we needed to tank: getting beyond the 2nd round and getting a player better than Donovan Mitchell.

 

[Tremendous Upside]

They've got their guy now (yes, thanks to luck), but this year is likely to be their 6th losing season in a row.

But but but... I thought drafting a great young talent will turn you into a contender and stop all the treadmilling!

 

[Schrödinger's Gerbil]

Yeah, I agree that these things are worth thinking about. Part of the problem is it's hard to figure out (especially for us not involved with the finances of the NBA). How much money does the team forego because of long term losing? Is it money mostly out of the owner's pocket or does the impact have a deeper effect on the team's long term fortunes? I don't know the answer and I don't know of any way we can really estimate it well.

As for the criteria of a successful tank, who knows? You have some Jazz fans that are yearning to tank because they think it's the only realistic way we can get past the second round of the playoffs. Some say that a successful tank requires a championship appearance, if not victory. Lots of people have lauded tank jobs in the past that haven't really taken teams further than we got with DM and RG (such as the Sixers's tank). Others say that the tank is successful if you get a top 5 (10, 15?) player.

And in reality, most "tanks" don't really net then whole set of key players for a team. Do we give Denver credit for a successful tank when they picked up Jamal Murray with the 7th pick? Or Houston for getting the good but probably not completely transformative trio of Amen, Jabari Smith, and Jalen Green? Or, what role do we think tanking plays in OKC's success, since they have the league's best record even with their only top-5 pick (Chet) missing most of the season?

So figuring out what tanking success is is kind of like trying to nail jello to the wall. It's probably best to try to at least hint at what we think it means for us when we talk about it (which I hope I've done in this thread), even if we know others will have different definitions. For me, I usually go by what I think many of the pro-tankers among Jazz fans were thinking when they insisted that we needed to tank: getting beyond the 2nd round and getting a player better than Donovan Mitchell.

Well said.

For me, and in the context of the Jazz, a successful tank HAS to include a perennial competitive team that makes regular semi-deep (i.e., second round), deep (conference finals), or finals runs. Otherwise, we blew up a perennially competitive team and endured 5+ years of shiite basketball only to wind up where we were when the entire thing started. Different contexts may have different answers, but this also strikes me as a reasonable criterion for most tank jobs.

As to the timeframe, the run of success HAS to AT LEAST equal the years of losing but the more successful tank will exceed it by several years. I don't propose this as a hard and fast metric but a minimum benchmark for determining whether a tank job was "successful." I'm sure others have as good or better metrics.

So, take San Antonio, for instance. It's suffering through it's sixth straight losing season, including two with Wemby. This would mean a minimum of 6 consecutive years of semi-deep, deep, or finals playoff runs to compensate for the six years of pain. Given that Wemby can be an unrestricted free agent in another few years (not sure how many years it is), the Spurs better hurry and build a competitive team around him before the inevitable drumbeat of speculation starts about Wemby wanting to play for a large market team along with the ratcheting-up pressure to trade him.

 

[Thee Idiotic Minivan K]

Don’t know how many times I have to say it but this **** is predicated on luck. The draft has almost nothing to do with skill, and mostly making a lucky or unlucky pick. For example the Jazz drafted Stockton because they needed a good backup for Ricky Green. No one knew how good he’d be. Look at the blazers, they drafted two bigs that had all the potential in the world but were derailed by horrific injuries and both times passed on generational talents. So it’s all about that and getting lucky with those ping pong balls. Cavs with LBJ the spurs twice with Duncan and Wemby. If I recall, I don’t think they were supposed to even get close to the first pic in both situations. Tell me if I’m wrong though. We need to 1. Get lucky with the ping pong balls or get lucky and pick the right guy. I do believe we are lucky to be bad in a draft year as good as this. Even outside the top 3 or 4 I think there are 2-3 all stars to be had.

My point is there is no right or wrong time frame for a rebuild other than being patient. In doing so you ensure building a complete team. Just don’t cut corners weather that takes 5 years or 10.

 

[Strutter]

Locke did a similar type of breakdown earlier this year:

 

[jazznik]

The Jazz need to acquire 2 bonafide stars to add to the players they have currently. They'll also need to add some depth pieces and make changes around the fringes, but this should be feasible.

2025: Flagg and Harper look to be the main franchise-caliber players. Bailey, Johnson and maybe Edgecombe have some All Star potential as 2nd fiddle types, imo.
2026: Dyantsa and Peterson are franchise-level prospects, while Cam Boozer might be. Avent and Lopez have some star potential as 2nd fiddle types, imo. There's more really intriguing talent, like Quaintance, Arenas, etc., but the Jazz don't have a 2nd pick in 2026 to capitalize.

Over these next two drafts, the Jazz really need to draft one of: Flagg, Harper, Dybantsa, Peterson or maybe Boozer, while also grabbing one of Bailey, Johnson, Edgecombe, Avent, Lopez, etc.

You pretend that you know who is a franchise-level prospect and who is not - but you don't. Nobody knows. Otherwise James Wiseman and Deandre Ayton would not be have been drafted in the top-2, while Jalen Brunson and Jokic were passed by every single team in the first round.

 

[KqWIN]

kudos @idiot, I think this type of high level/not super scientific view of things is great. I actually think this does a better job of answering the question of "How much is a tanking year worth". I'd be interesting to see a histogram or anything else that would indicate how often you get a 20, 30, 50, 80, 95 etc.

One of the reasons why I think tanking is overrated is that the draft as a whole is very overrated. Anytime I've ever seen analysis on the value of a draft pick it always shows that the value is less than people think.

Having said that, success from any kind of method is likely lower than people think. Every path is unlikely, my gripe with the tanking crowd is that it is the path we don't acknowledge as extremely unlikely/luck dependent.

 

[Thee Idiotic Minivan K]

You pretend that you know who is a franchise-level prospect and who is not - but you don't. Nobody knows. Otherwise James Wiseman and Deandre Ayton would not be have been drafted in the top-2, while Jalen Brunson and Jokic were passed by every single team in the first round.

Also guys like Durant and Jordan wouldn’t have been passed on for Oden and Bowie which were hilariously drafted by the same team, the Portland Trailblazers, lol.

Luckily for us, this could be a draft with multiple stars

 

[jazznik]

Th

Also guys like Durant and Jordan wouldn’t have been passed on for Oden and Bowie which were hilariously drafted by the same team, the Portland Trailblazers, lol.

Luckily for us, this could be a draft with multiple stars

The current top-3 players in the NBA are Jokic (drafted 41st), Giannis (15th), and SGA (11th). That is all you need to know about the reliability of conventional wisdom on draft prospects.

Out of 10 last MVP winners there was not a single player drafted first or second: two winners were drafted 3rd, the rest of them - below.

 

[Thee Idiotic Minivan K]

Th

The current top-3 players in the NBA are Jokic (drafted 41st), Giannis (15th), and SGA (11th). That is all you need to know about the reliability of conventional wisdom on draft prospects.

Out of 10 last MVP winners there was not a single player drafted first or second: two winners were drafted 3rd, the rest of them - below.

Our two best players in the history of the Utah Jazz were drafted 13th and 16th

Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell were drafted 27th and 13th in their drafts. Carlos boozer Millsap. We’re both second round picks. Al Jefferson was drafted in the middle of the first round. AK47 was a late first round pick most of our best players were drafted outside the top 10

 

[Ferguson_Mellochill]

You pretend that you know who is a franchise-level prospect and who is not - but you don't. Nobody knows. Otherwise James Wiseman and Deandre Ayton would not be have been drafted in the top-2, while Jalen Brunson and Jokic were passed by every single team in the first round.

There's a difference between drafting a prospect with franchise-player potential and then seeing that player develop and come to fruition. Sure, there are a few prospects who really blossom and become franchise-level prospects when they weren't expected to--e.g., Jokic, Kawhi, James Harden, etc. But you're asking yourself, "If this guy hits and fulfills his potential, does he have the potential to be a top-10 player in the league?" For the guys I mentioned, the answer is, yes.

 

[Ferguson_Mellochill]

• Th

The current top-3 players in the NBA are Jokic (drafted 41st), Giannis (15th), and SGA (11th). That is all you need to know about the reliability of conventional wisdom on draft prospects.

Out of 10 last MVP winners there was not a single player drafted first or second: two winners were drafted 3rd, the rest of them - below.

You're choosing a selective sample and saying, "What about so-and-so?" Drafting at #1 gives a team the greatest potential of drafting an All NBA-caliber player. Yes, there are other players with high upside who become dominant players, and yes, teams screw up and draft the wrong guys all the time. However, it's a logical fallacy to say, "See, Giannis and Kawhi were drafted at #15. So therefore, you should be willing to draft at #15."

A team that drafts with the #1 pick has the best opportunity to get the best player in their draft. Then it's simply a question of whether the team can identify that player.

 

[Rubashov]

The most important part is getting it right on draft day. You could argue that the Sixers dogged it every draft day with hindsight.

Philadelphia 76'ers "Process" --
2013: Tank, draft Nerlens Noel with the 6th pick, who red-shirted with a torn ACL.
2014: Tank, draft Joel Embiid with the 3rd pick, who red-shirted with foot and back issues.
2015: Tank, draft Jahlil Okafor with the 3rd pick.
2016: Tank, draft Ben Simmons with the 1st pick, who red-shirted with some issue I don't remember.
2017: Tank, draft Markelle Fultz with the 1st pick after trading up with Boston.
2018: Win a few games, draft Mikal Bridges with the 10th pick, then trade him to Phoenix for Ziaire Smith.
2019: Win 51 games.

2013 missed on CJ McCollum and Giannis
2014 missed on Smart, LaVine, Jokic got Jerami Grant right
2015 missed on Porzingis and Booker
2016 missed on Brown, Siakam and Dejounte Murray. Sabonis and Jamal Murray too
2017 missed on Tatum and Fox
2018 SGA went 11th pick...

The Sixers have won despite their mistakes on draft day.

 

[Ferguson_Mellochill]

Our two best players in the history of the Utah Jazz were drafted 13th and 16th

Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell were drafted 27th and 13th in their drafts. Carlos boozer Millsap. We’re both second round picks. Al Jefferson was drafted in the middle of the first round. AK47 was a late first round pick most of our best players were drafted outside the top 10

Just imagine who the Jazz could have drafted if they had more top-3 picks.

 

[jazznik]

There's a difference between drafting a prospect with franchise-player potential and then seeing that player develop and come to fruition. Sure, there are a few prospects who really blossom and become franchise-level prospects when they weren't expected to--e.g., Jokic, Kawhi, James Harden, etc. But you're asking yourself, "If this guy hits and fulfills his potential, does he have the potential to be a top-10 player in the league?" For the guys I mentioned, the answer is, yes.

A few prospects?! Literally ALL MVPs in the last 10 years came outside of top-10 in the draft. And here is the number one picks in 2011-2020 (those that are still in the league and had enough time to pan out): Irving, AD, Bennett, Wiggins, KAT, Simmons, Fultz, Ayton, Zion, Edwards. Do you see many successful franchise players here? During the same period the following players were drafted outside of top-5: Kawhi, Lillard, Butler, Giannis, Jokic, Booker, Sabonis, Siakam, Mitcell, SGA...

Take the 2012 draft, for example: the GMs in their eternal wisdom identified prospects with the most franchise-player potential in Anthony Bennett (1), Victor Oladipo (2), Otto Porter Junior (3), Cody Zeller (4), and Alex Len (5), while deeming Giannis (15) and Gobert (27) as clearly lacking that coveted potential despite both of them clearly being incredibly tall and athletic players.

The GMs and fans are incredibly bad at identifying players with the franchise-player potential unless they are dealing with tall athletic freaks like Shaq, LeBron or Wemby.

 

[idiot]

kudos @idiot, I'd be interesting to see a histogram or anything else that would indicate how often you get a 20, 30, 50, 80, 95 etc.

A brief summary of how I valued players:

• 7 were over 50, so about once every 2nd year: Wemby 100, Doncic 95, ANT 65, Embiid 65, AD 60, Tatum 60, Trae Young 55 (I'm having second thoughts on this one)
• 5 at 50 (once every 3 years)
• 14 over 30 and less than 50 (once nearly every year)
• 14 at 30 (I tried to do nice round numbers when I thought it possible)
• 15 at 20-29
• 12 under 20 but more than 0
• 28 at 0

As I mentioned initially, I graded probably too generously, meaning that the average time I calculated initially could be a little shorter than reality. I tried to give the benefit of the doubt (within reason) to young players whose careers haven't played out yet, and I usually gave more weight to potential than too injuries when a career has been wildly up and down because of both.

 

[SoberasHotRod]

A few prospects?! Literally ALL MVPs in the last 10 years came outside of top-10 in the draft. And here is the number one picks in 2011-2020 (those that are still in the league and had enough time to pan out): Irving, AD, Bennett, Wiggins, KAT, Simmons, Fultz, Ayton, Zion, Edwards. Do you see many successful franchise players here? During the same period the following players were drafted outside of top-5: Kawhi, Lillard, Butler, Giannis, Jokic, Booker, Sabonis, Siakam, Mitcell, SGA...

Take the 2012 draft, for example: the GMs in their eternal wisdom identified prospects with the most franchise-player potential in Anthony Bennett (1), Victor Oladipo (2), Otto Porter Junior (3), Cody Zeller (4), and Alex Len (5), while deeming Giannis (15) and Gobert (27) as clearly lacking that coveted potential despite both of them clearly being incredibly tall and athletic players.

The GMs and fans are incredibly bad at identifying players with the franchise-player potential unless they are dealing with tall athletic freaks like Shaq, LeBron or Wemby.

As it relates to the current discussion there are two thoughts:

- A team that is good at drafting, could have picked any of the current MVPs with the number one pick.
- Player development is almost impossible to predict and so the draft is almost completely random. You just have to luck in to the guy draft wherever developing in to an MVP.

The truth is in the middle. It's difficult to talk about probabilities because of this.