Timberwolves

NBA Draft Lottery Reform: How it Impacts the Timberwolves

According to a report on Thursday from ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the NBA Board of Governors approved a couple of systemic changes that will significantly impact parts of the league both this year and in years to come. How much will they affect the Minnesota Timberwolves?

In an ideal world, not very much at all.

The most impactful changes that passed are the rumored changes to the NBA draft lottery odds. Woj reported as early as Sept. 7 that the NBA had a proposal ready to go, which would move to a final vote. The changes, which will take effect starting with the 2019 lottery, are largely as reported in that article from three weeks ago. The big details:

  • The teams with the three worst records in the league now have equal odds of landing the No. 1 overall pick, as opposed to the current system.
  • The team with the worst record in the league can now drop as low as fifth, where before they could drop no lower than fourth.
  • Teams can now move into the top four through the lottery. In past years, teams could only move into — or out of — the top three.

This graphic, also from Woj, shows the exact changes.

The expected pick column tells the biggest story: the top five lottery positions — the five worst records in the league — are now less guaranteed to be the highest possible pick, and lower picks have a slightly higher expected value.

How does this impact the Timberwolves? Hopefully not much at all. Nothing appears to have changed for the teams outside the lottery, which is where the Wolves hope to end up for many years to come. This season is the final year of the current rules, and Minnesota will likely lose its first-round pick to the Atlanta Hawks (shoutout to the terrible, awful Adreian Payne trade), assuming they make the playoffs. Assuming the revamped Oklahoma City Thunder make the playoffs this season, the Wolves will receive their first-round pick, as they received it in a trade with Utah for Ricky Rubio.

There are some concerns about the draft reform’s effect on small-market teams, as the easiest way to “guarantee” a star player for your franchise was tanking for that first slot in the lottery. The Timberwolves’ 2015 lottery win that got them Karl-Anthony Towns and set the table for the optimism heading into this season will be a lower-percentage play in 2018-19. Glen Taylor was reportedly in favor of the changes, as were nearly all the owners.

The second set of changes, related to resting players in marquee games, could impact the Wolves, but with Tom Thibodeau as the head coach, they are unlikely to. From Woj’s story:

In the new resting legislation, Silver will have the discretionary ability to fine teams for resting players in several instances, including sitting multiple players outside of unusual circumstances in a single game, and healthy players in nationally televised ESPN, ABC and TNT games.

When teams decide to rest players in games, they’ll be encouraged to do so for home instead of away games. Star players sitting out are expected to be on the bench during games and encouraged to be accessible to fans for interaction before the game.

The Wolves have both star players and many nationally televised games this year, so they would be subject to these rules should Thibodeau choose to sit any of Towns, Andrew Wiggins or Jimmy Butler for a national TV game. Funny joke, right?

Given that, according to Basketball Reference, the Wolves employ the No. 1 (Wiggins), No. 2 (Towns) and No. 6 (Butler) players in terms of total minutes played in 2016-17, and also employ four of the five NBA players to start all 82 games last season (Wiggins, Butler, Gorgui Dieng and Jeff Teague), this seems unlikely to become an issue. Though, it could benefit them if an opponent chooses to flaunt these new rules.

Both of these changes are somewhat controversial. Should tanking be a viable strategy for teams? Is this the right way to “fix” the lottery? Should Adam Silver have the power to fine teams for not playing their stars? The questions remain, but the changes are here to stay.


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