INGLEWOOD, Calif. – NBA commissioner Adam Silver wondered aloud on Saturday whether the rules of sportsmanship have been completely overruled as more teams lose games in apparent fashion – the hated practice of “shooting tanks.”
Silver acknowledged that the league is still struggling to find solutions to punish teams that lose on purpose for long-term gains.
“I think there was an old-fashioned perception of that in the old days, when it was just an understanding between teammates about behavior,” Silver told reporters at the Intuit Dome, home of the Los Angeles Clippers and site of Sunday’s NBA All-Star game.
The NBA’s annual draft allows the worst teams to have the first chance to select the best young, up-and-coming talent in hopes of boosting those clubs’ woeful fortunes. By losing out to a better draft position, teams have learned that if they aren’t in contention for the playoffs, moving down can be the best way to get talent back.
The 2026 NBA draft class is seen as the best in recent years, with many names at the top of the board that could change the future of the team.
The practice of “pulling tanks” is getting worse, Silver said.
“I think what we are seeing is a modern analysis, where it is clear that the incentives are not aligned,” he said.
The league this week fined the Utah Jazz $500,000 for “conduct prejudicial to the league,” in regards to the team sitting its top players for the fourth consecutive season.
“The league is 80 years old. It’s time to take another look at this and see if that’s the old way,” said Silver. “We have to look at new thinking here. What we’re doing, what we’re seeing right now, it’s not working. There’s no question about it.”
“Are we seeing worse behavior this year than we’ve seen in recent memory?” Silver added. “Yes, it’s my opinion.”
Jazz owner Ryan Smith responded by mocking the NBA in a statement: “I agree to disagree.”
Smith also pointed out that one of the games in which the Jazz were accused of trying to lose, was won by Utah.
“We won a game in Miami and got fined?” Smith said. “That makes sense.”
The NBA has tried to eliminate losing on purpose by deciding the draft order with a weighted draft, so losing multiple games does not automatically result in a first pick.
Silver said, however, that he is not sure that the teams with the worst records are the ones that need it the most.
“It’s not clear to me, for example, that the 30th (best) team is worse than the 22nd (best) team, especially if you have an incentive to do poorly to get the best pick,” he said. “So it’s a bit of a puzzle.”
The practice is so ingrained in NBA culture that even suggestions to combat it seem hard to come by. Popular talk show host Colin Cowherd, who is paid to be opinionated, recently threw up his hands on the topic and said his only suggestion is that Silver channel his controversial predecessor David Stern and yell at the losers.
“I don’t know what you’re doing with tanking, they’ve been doing it forever. But they did it very little with David Stern,” Cowherd said last week. “People were afraid of David Stern.”
