In his lengthy dispatch exchange with ESPN's Bill Simmons, New Yorker writer and bestselling author Malcolm Gladwell endorses wholesale changes to the NBA draft. Specifically, he wants to erase the incentive for bad teams -- he wants all teams, elite and awful, to have a shot at the best players in the draft.Gladwell has most recently been the talk of basketball blogs for another opinion, that NBA and college teams need to embrace the full-court press as a legitimate strategy. Frankly, these two opinions don't make sense coming from the same person.
The press, Gladwell argues, helps underdogs compete against more talented teams by adding a bucket of variability to the matter. If Sacramento can't beat Cleveland because of a (vast) talent disparity, Sacramento needs to get Cleveland off its game. The press is one way to do this. Though Gladwell's argument on this matter has (well-investigated) holes, it makes sense: 'tis better to die tryin' than go quietly.
But this is a risky strategy. If an average team (say, Chicago) tried to press all year, there's a chance opponents would figure it out and the Bulls would fail. Using the press full-time in the NBA is innovative, but risky. There is no real data base -- the effectiveness and unforeseen impacts of using it in the NBA is mostly a mystery. All but the worst teams would be risking disaster to implement Gladwell's strategy.
But here's Gladwell, in the next breath, arguing that risk should not be rewarded:
I think, for example, that the idea of ranking draft picks in reverse order of finish -- as much as it sounds "fair" -- does untold damage to the game. You simply cannot have a system that rewards anyone, ever, for losing. Economists worry about this all the time, when they talk about "moral hazard." Moral hazard is the idea that if you insure someone against risk, you will make risky behavior more likely. So if you always bail out the banks when they take absurd risks and do stupid things, they are going to keep on taking absurd risks and doing stupid things. [...]Beyond the dishonest implication that any team with a lottery has "an atrocious GM" (every team in the league has had a high lottery pick in the last 12 years), isn't this diametrically opposed to Gladwell's endorsement of the press?
No economist in his right mind would ever endorse the football and basketball drafts the way they are structured now. They are a moral hazard in spades. If you give me a lottery pick for being an atrocious GM, where's my incentive not to be an atrocious GM?
The draft structure rewards risk. This is bad, says Gladwell. A lack of innovative strategy -- seen as risky -- is a problem, says Gladwell. Do you want risk, or not?
In 2007, the Grizzlies fired Mike Fratello after a bad start. Tony Barone took over. Memphis was clearly going nowhere fast. Barone decided to employ a risky, somewhat innovative (if not mind-blowing) strategy -- push the ball at every opportunity. It did not work. Memphis got killed most nights, and finished with the worst record in the league. By Gladwell's draft logic, Memphis should not have been rewarded for trying to innovative route. By Gladwell's strategy logic, Memphis should be encouraged to do things like this. Which is it? I can't figure it out.
(I'll also use this opportunity to note Simmons' ridiculous line of logic regarding how awful it is that great college/international players have to get drafted by bad teams smacks of elitism. Or, he had no problem hoping for Kevin Durant to come to a truly embarrassing Celtics team two years ago. Guess what? Fans in Washington, D.C., Sacramento, Minneapolis, and the non-Laker side of L.A. matter too. Never mind the actual impact of high picks improving their teams. See: all teams currently remaining in the playoffs except for Boston and L.A.)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
5-16-2009 @ 9:18PM
steve said...
ziller this guy is wayyy smarter than you.
he wins.
I like the idea. Not necessarily because of the reasons he states but I don't like the idea of the worst teams being given some kind of a pity-advantage.
I mean its not even guaranteed that the pick is going to be worth it anyways so what's the big deal?
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5-16-2009 @ 9:42PM
Ankur said...
...Seriously?
Gladwell's comments on the press amount to saying that teams should want to do well, and if they know they're overmatched, the press might make them do well.
His comments on the draft amount to saying that we ought to encourage teams to want to do well, and the current setup creates an incentive to do WORSE (in econspeak, a "moral hazard").
How on earth are these contradictory?
Additionally, you conveniently gloss over the fact that the first article is about strategic decisions (micro-level structuring) while the second is about macro-level incentive structures. In other words, they're about COMPLETELY DIFFERENT THINGS. Would it be a contradiction for me to have the opinion "rich teams should seek to spend as much money on talent as possible" while also saying "the league ought to impose a cap on how much a team spends"? Of course not...it's okay that in one place I'm saying "spending money is good" and in another I'm saying "spending money is bad," because the context is completely different.
Look, you're correct in pointing out that there's a world of problems with Gladwell's thoughts here...the veracity of the claims he's making is dubious at best. That said, calling them contradictory because you're misinterpreting his words is just silly.
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5-16-2009 @ 10:17PM
Wade said...
Agreed with the first two comments.
Seeing the headline made me wonder how they'd be contradictory, reading the post certainly didn't connect the dots.
Basically, you are assuming the press would be a major failure. They tried something innovative and didn't work, so lets give them the best player in the draft.
Gladwell is saying that a press gives those teams a chance and nobody will try it because they are rewarded with the best odds for the top pick.
How is that contradictory?
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5-16-2009 @ 10:50PM
claytor said...
Arguing for this guys logic and against Tom is a greek tragedy. Lol, economics...and sports.
Apples...meet Oranges.
How in the hell do either of these have to do with the other, except in the terms of player attraction to the market? What this wannabe Coach K cant wrap his frizzy little head around is the fact that hey, in the NBA? If youre a "bad GM", your shelf life isnt very long. If sports dont appear to be a year by year surmising, then ponder why it is weve gone from seeing coaches they couldnt push out of the door, to heaping praise on a guy who held his job for longer than five seasons. I mean didnt the Lakers kinda sorta "nudge" Phil into retirement a few years ago? And hes a winning coach!
The lottery in itself is a crap shoot, and usually the two or so absolute worst teams have safe bet picks on a normal rate, and while were at it? the NBA isnt even like the NFL, who gives the bar none worst team the first pick overall. You literally HAVE to win a lottery! Obviously this goof doesnt endorse parity, and it might be because hes a Knickerbockers fan, they make money regardless. Perhaps D'antoni could apply the FCP? God knows defense isnt in his vernacular.
Honestly, Poofys argument smacks on deeper implications. Ones such as "Is the league fixed?"
I mean why not, who in their right mind tries to lose?!?!
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5-17-2009 @ 12:12AM
Martin said...
Tom-I agree with Gladwell on the draft. We have seen teams tank a season to pick up a "franchise player" in the draft. Such tactics destroy the integrity of the game. I prefer the system where the two worst teams get demoted into a lower league, like in British soccer.
As for the full court press, obviously such a strategy depends on the particular player personnel on the team. If you have a lot of good, quick defensive players and not a lot of good half-court offensive players, the press leads to an up tempo game that may be favorable to your team. But if you don't have the players to make it work, the press will be easily broken leading to a lot of easy baskets for the other team. Thus, if there are a lot of relatively inexpensive free agents who would make the press work, a small-revenue team may want to give that strategy a try out.
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5-17-2009 @ 8:57AM
Jay (Houston) said...
Would Derrick Rose had as much playing time if he played for the Lakers/Cavs/Celtics/Nuggets? Would he have won R.O.Y.? Would he still be the same player at the end of this season if he had far less playing time?
Rose got 37 minutes per game.
LeBron got 39 minutes per game his first year.
Kobe didn't get that many minutes until his 3rd year in the league.
Coaches that are expected to win championships or at least make it to the 2nd or 3rd rounds of the playoffs don't care about rookie's minutes. It's not like the team is paying them a lot of money... so why feel obligated to give them a lot of minutes just because they were drafted in the top 3?
Top picks should feel lucky to get picked by the crappy teams. They know that after their short rookie contracts, if they have done well, they will get a nice fat contract and have some stability in the city they are in. Instead of going to a different team to get what your worth because the better team you are on doesn't have enough money to pay you.
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5-17-2009 @ 11:06AM
seeblissthatjawn said...
I think you miss the points here:
On the press, he goes on to discuss that in the NBA a full-time press is going to court disaster. In lower levels, few teams have the guards with the wherewithal to effectively break the press. In the article, he and Simmons come to the conclusion that it would be best to have a "press" rotation for the starts of the 2nd and 4th when regular opposing starters are sitting out. This wouldn't be for a full game.
As far as the draft logic, I think that it definitely has holes, but it's an interesting take. Take away the incentive for losing, and you create a situation where a team that is not performing well midseason can't just mail it in and hope for a top-3 pick. It also creates a situation where a top college/international player can end up on a team where he does not have to be "the man" while learning the NBA game. Does Glen Davis play as well as he is if he was drafted by the Clippers or the Grizzlies?
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