"If you're not a play-in team or a playoff team and you're set to face one of the bottom ten teams in the NBA, you basically have a bye on your calendar. That's because the bottom ten teams in the league are currently on a combined 44-game losing streak. Not one of those ten teams won their last game."
"This also means we already have a pretty clear picture of which teams will be in the playoffs, the play-in, and the lottery - making the last month and a half of games feel almost completely irrelevant. It's a fun stat that also highlights the biggest problem in the NBA: the race to the bottom is just as competitive as the race to the top."
The NBA has abandoned efforts to combat tanking this season, allowing struggling teams to openly pursue losses. The bottom ten teams have accumulated a combined 44-game losing streak, with the Brooklyn Nets leading individually at nine consecutive losses. This extended losing streak means the playoff, play-in, and lottery positions are already determined with over a month remaining in the season, rendering most remaining games meaningless. The competitive race to the bottom mirrors the intensity of the race to the top, highlighting a fundamental problem in the league where teams have incentives to lose rather than win.
Read at Bleacher Nation
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]