re: NBA Draft Lottery Reform Voted Down

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Just two days ago, higher-ups with both the Sixers and the league office expected lottery reform to pass by a vote of either 29-1 or 28-2. Over the weekend, Thunder GM Sam Presti initiated a stealth lobbying campaign against the league’s proposed changes, outlined here, which would have smoothed out the odds across the lottery. Presti raised concerns that such reform, piled atop other coming changes, would hurt small-market teams. A bunch of those non-glamour teams — including the Spurs and just about every branch of the Spurs management tree — eventually came around to the Sixers/Thunder “no” side. According to sources, the vote was 17-13 in favor of lottery reform, but 23 positive votes were needed for the proposal to pass

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1. Under the league’s proposal, teams at the top of the lottery, the very worst teams, would have had a reduced chance of snagging the no. 1 pick and staying within the top three and top six.

2. The anti-Philly animus is real

3. The league will probably try again.

4. The union might end up in the same place.

5. No one knows if any of this is really true yet.

6. Whether this really hurts small markets is unclear.

7. The Sixers, of course, are a large-market team using these alleged small-market tactics, and no one is sure if they’ll succeed

8. The league will fight to the death any perception that small-market teams face a disadvantage. It will point to the recent success of Indiana and Memphis, two teams that didn’t need a massive lottery win.

9. Some teams appear to have voted out of straight self-interest linked to protected picks, another indication that the league might have rushed into this change. (Why I initially said attempting to do this so quickly was such a bad idea)

10. That raises the big question: If you’re going to change the lottery system, what is the best move?

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