Sacramento remains in position to land either the top pick or inside the top five of the NBA Draft. But what does this proposal state that could, potentially, alter the draft?
The Sacramento Kings could be impacted by a new anti-tanking proposal presented on Friday morning.
ESPN NBA insider Shams Charania reported the new ideas, which involves a formal vote come May.
The franchise still holds a high chance to land the top overall pick in the June draft. Sacramento took a narrow 121-117 loss to the Orlando Magic on Thursday to help improve its draft positioning. The Kings remain linked to names like AJ Dybantsa (BYU), Darryn Peterson (Kansas) and Kingston Flemings (Houston).
However, the term "tanking" has hovered above the league involving teams reportedly trying to purposely improve their draft positioning.
Already commissioner Adam Silver has fined the Indiana Pacers and Utah jazz before the all-star break for player participation violations, which falls into tanking and purposely losing for the benefit of elevating higher in the draft.
Sacramento, meanwhile, has avoided facing disciplinary action. Even head coach Doug Christie became a vocal critic of tanking across the league.
Now this new proposal via Silver outlines the following modifications:
-- The 18 teams in the draft lottery (seeds 7-15 in both the Western and Eastern conference) now have flattened odds, with the bottom 10 teams receiving an 8% chance to land the top pick. Meanwhile, the remaining 20% odds distributed in decreasing order for 11 through 18 come with a lottery drawing for all 18 picks.
Note: This also means that teams exiting out of the play-in postseason round are eligible to land in the lottery category.
-- Lottery teams like the Kings would also reach a minimum win total floor in each season, such as 25 wins. If a team falls short of that floor, it gets slotted to meet the floor.
Charania and ESPN, though, adds how the above proposal is actually one of three Silver is helping present for a vote.
"In the second proposal, sources told Charania, 22 teams -- the bottom 10 teams that miss the play-in tournament, the eight that qualify for it and the four playoff teams that lose in the first round -- will all be included in the lottery, and will be ranked according to their record across two seasons," the ESPN report read.
There's also a third proposal involving the follow format:
-- The five worst teams in the league (like the Kings) still hold a chance to land the top pick. However, Sacramento would remain in competition with other teams that produce one of the league's five-worst records. In this case, the Pacers and Brooklyn Nets are considered the biggest threats to the Kings for draft positioning.
League owners are expected to put these proposals into a vote, which could be before the league conducts its lottery selections on May 10.
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