AggieEP said:

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I agree here. I also think that long term the CBA with the punitive aprons renders most of the conversations on tanking etc. moot outside of what will become a few exceptions with franchises stuck with injured stars on guaranteed contracts.

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Aprons encourage tanking. They remove a team's abilities to sign free agents (reducing exception contracts) and make trades (salary matching, restricting player bundling), narrowing improvement opportunities more heavily on drafting their missing piece, making moving up the draft more important. That was Cuban's point.

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That alone will (or should in theory) cause us to see at some point a notable free agent sign with Sacramento or Memphis because that will be their only option if they want a max deal.

The downside of course if we think about this as musical chairs is that the stars available for these teams are probably the Trae Young, JJJ, AD variety that come with serious warts.

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Correct. Those teams are going to continue to be limited to fairly free agents that may be marketable (if they play), but aren't going to get them to conference finals/championships. They need the draft for that.

It just makes no sense that these teams who draft good players have to pay more than other teams would to retain their player and it counts more towards the cap than it would for another team to sign the player away.

Sure, the player should be incentivized to want to stay with the team which drafts him, but the team should retain their ability to build a contender around said player.

It makes no sense to make the tax penalties punitive but also make it punitive to re-sign the good players you drafted.

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Aprons encourage tanking. They remove a team's abilities to sign free agents (reducing exception contracts) and make trades (salary matching, restricting player bundling), narrowing improvement opportunities more heavily on drafting their missing piece, making moving up the draft more important. That was Cuban's point.

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This is ridiculous. If you are threatened with the 2nd apron and you are in a position where your team sucks so much where you are encouraged to tank, it means you ****ed up completely in team building. The only way you are getting there is by vastly overpaying for multiple players.

There is one team over the 2nd apron and one team next to that line and both teams are among the top in their conference.

The only three teams that have been significantly hampered by apron rules this year are Minn, Cleveland, and the Knicks, who are all contending.

The only really expensive team that isn't a contender is Golden State, and they aren't a contender primarily because their second best player blew out his knee. And even they aren't tanking and are above .500.

The teams that have apron problems are teams that are well built teams.

Last year 6 teams were within $4M of the 2nd apron and all but one (PHX b/c of Beal) were playoff teams. PHX was obviously mismanaged with the Beal/Durant trades.


What the 2nd Apron does is encourage smart team building rather than just throwing insane amounts of money at everything and allows a team to make a run and pay it if their team is built.

The league wants parity and they have achieved it with 7 different champions in 7 years. The apron rules discourages teams like Golden State or LAC or PHX to just pay anything to build a champion to create a more level playing field for the league.

Vessel said:

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It just makes no sense that these teams who draft good players have to pay more than other teams would to retain their player and it counts more towards the cap than it would for another team to sign the player away.

Sure, the player should be incentivized to want to stay with the team which drafts him, but the team should retain their ability to build a contender around said player.

It makes no sense to make the tax penalties punitive but also make it punitive to re-sign the good players you drafted.

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That's a weird take. The league is giving the home team an advantage in keeping their own player, something wanted by teams. The home team isn't forced to pay over the league market rate.

Teams retain their ability to build a contender by making smart moves. If you **** up by giving Bradley Beal the supermax, that's your own damn fault.

Guitarsoup said:

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Vessel said:

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It just makes no sense that these teams who draft good players have to pay more than other teams would to retain their player and it counts more towards the cap than it would for another team to sign the player away.

Sure, the player should be incentivized to want to stay with the team which drafts him, but the team should retain their ability to build a contender around said player.

It makes no sense to make the tax penalties punitive but also make it punitive to re-sign the good players you drafted.

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That's a weird take. The league is giving the home team an advantage in keeping their own player, something wanted by teams. The home team isn't forced to pay over the league market rate.

Teams retain their ability to build a contender by making smart moves. If you **** up by giving Bradley Beal the supermax, that's your own damn fault.

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It's a weird take to say it hurts a team more to re-sign the player they drafted than it does for another team to sign them away? That's just factual.

I appreciate that the league has encouraged players to stay with small market teams by allowing them to be paid more for staying put. At the same time it costs the team the ability to build around the player. They have about 5% less of the cap to work with than another team would for signing that player in FA.

It makes no sense.

I agree that they should change the rules to where the hometown Supermax allows the hometown team to pay more but the increase in pay isn't a hit against the cap. Then it would be a true advantage and allow the teams to sign their guys, but wouldn't make it so they are paying more than a normal max in cap hits.

Allowing them to pay more to keep the player, but then keeping the player severely hampers them with the cap, is a very weird mix.

mavsfan4ever said:

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I agree that they should change the rules to where the hometown Supermax allows the hometown team to pay more but the increase in pay isn't a hit against the cap. Then it would be a true advantage and allow the teams to sign their guys, but wouldn't make it so they are paying more than a normal max in cap hits.

Allowing them to pay more to keep the player, but then keeping the player severely hampers them with the cap, is a very weird mix.

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Vessel said:

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Guitarsoup said:

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Vessel said:

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It just makes no sense that these teams who draft good players have to pay more than other teams would to retain their player and it counts more towards the cap than it would for another team to sign the player away.

Sure, the player should be incentivized to want to stay with the team which drafts him, but the team should retain their ability to build a contender around said player.

It makes no sense to make the tax penalties punitive but also make it punitive to re-sign the good players you drafted.

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That's a weird take. The league is giving the home team an advantage in keeping their own player, something wanted by teams. The home team isn't forced to pay over the league market rate.

Teams retain their ability to build a contender by making smart moves. If you **** up by giving Bradley Beal the supermax, that's your own damn fault.

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It's a weird take to say it hurts a team more to re-sign the player they drafted than it does for another team to sign them away? That's just factual.

I appreciate that the league has encouraged players to stay with small market teams by allowing them to be paid more for staying put. At the same time it costs the team the ability to build around the player. They have about 5% less of the cap to work with than another team would for signing that player in FA.

It makes no sense.

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Again, a team and player doesn't have to agree to it. When Chet and JDub signed their contract extensions, they agreed to the 25% max, but didn't put in language for it to bump up to the 30% max if they won awards (like what happened last year with Mobley.)

Getting the extra 5% only happens with players that get two All-NBA teams or MVP or DPOY, so it is rare. And there are players that agree not to take it if they qualify.

If a player is winning MVP or consistently a top 15 player, teams are probably beyond thrilled for the opportunity to lock them down a year before they hit open market.

The alternative is that you don't get to offer them more to stay and they just leave for the Lakers next summer for the same amount of money you can offer with no compensation for them leaving.

mavsfan4ever said:

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I agree that they should change the rules to where the hometown Supermax allows the hometown team to pay more but the increase in pay isn't a hit against the cap. Then it would be a true advantage and allow the teams to sign their guys, but wouldn't make it so they are paying more than a normal max in cap hits.

Allowing them to pay more to keep the player, but then keeping the player severely hampers them with the cap, is a very weird mix.

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I wouldn't have a problem with the difference not counting against the apron. But make the team pay the tax.

Things like incentives already count against the apron, so counter that with the home town raise amount above open league market rate not counting against the apron, but still counting against the tax.

Teams should be able to keep the players they drafted. I'm fine with allowing them to pay more than the Lakers could offer in free agency.

But it shouldn't count against the hometown team that they get to keep their player for more than the Lakers can offer. Make it count the same against the cap that the player would get in free agency.

Vessel said:

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Teams should be able to keep the players they drafted. I'm fine with allowing them to pay more than the Lakers could offer in free agency.

But it shouldn't count against the hometown team that they get to keep their player for more than the Lakers can offer. Make it count the same against the cap that the player would get in free agency.

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I think it is a disingenuous argument for the most part. Teams get expensive generally for reasons OTHER than the players they drafted.

OKC is going to be insanely expensive and will probably have to sell off their team because Chet and JDub's contracts kick in. But Chet&JDub aren't the only reason they are expensive:

Hartenstein: drafted by Rockets
SGA: Drafted by Hornets (Clippers)
Caruso: undrafted
Dort: undrafted
Joe: Drafted by 76ers
Mitchell: Drafted by Knicks (technically)
McCain: drafted by 76ers
Kenrich: undrafted


Five of the top seven highest paid players for OKC next year weren't drafted by OKC.

They acquired all of their good players outside of Hartenstein by draft/UDFA, or trade.

They are now punished for being an extremely well run team. They are going to have a yard sale this summer. That is stupid.

Same for Boston. Boston acquired good players through smart trades and the draft. They should get to be dominant for half a decade instead of having to sell Jrue and KP for pennies.

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They acquired all of their good players outside of Hartenstein by draft/UDFA, or trade.

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Yes, they made great draft picks, free agent pickups and trades. Those are the three ways you can acquire players.

But the fact remains that of their current roster under contract for next year, they only drafted two of the 7 most expensive players.

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They are now punished for being an extremely well run team. They are going to have a yard sale this summer. That is stupid.

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I don't think all the contracts they have signed were good value and that is hurting them.

They will be fine in the long term and will still be contenders next year.

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Same for Boston. Boston acquired good players through smart trades and the draft. They should get to be dominant for half a decade instead of having to sell Jrue and KP for pennies.

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Boston, like OKC, made a lot of great moves, but I think they also overpaid on some contracts. Boston gave Jrue Holiday 4y134M at age 34 and I think that was insanely overpriced. And they did it when the apron era was already coming into effect. I think they overpaid White some. He's obviously a hugely valuable role player, but I don't think he is a 19% of the cap guy. Giving that much to a guy at age 31 is very risky. And KP was only worth pennies. Jrue didn't have a high value because he was 35 with 3 very expensive years left.

And despite all that, Boston is 2nd in the East and 4th in the league. Pretty amazing considering their best player has been injured all year. Had Boston signed KP, White, and Jrue to contracts closer to market value, they may not have had to sell off as much.

But in the end, they were able to do all that and still be competitive. And that's the lesson. You can't make a few good moves and sit back. You have to continue to seek talent and value.

They are claiming that they rid the league of tanking. I do not see how they impact a bad team's desire to tank. You can explain that, because I don't understand.

Teams don't tank, generally, because they think they're going to suck to start the season and do it all season long. I think most teams start the season with the intention of winning and then they find themselves in circumstances where the value of losing exceeds the value of winning, either because they genuinely suck or because their injury circumstances lead them to it. Mavericks are an example of that.


They do however incrementally create an incentive for good teams in bad circumstances to tank. If Jokic goes down early season and the Nuggets have struggled to an 18-35 record like the Mavericks, and he's ready to come back for a final playoff push you don't think they're more strongly considering a tank job to get to a top 10 pick rather than struggling to a 41-41 record and the play in? They started the season 22-7, not out of the question that they could do it.


Should have been "If anything they encourage tanking" not "Aprons encourage tanking"

Hopefully no one here is really feeling sorry for OKC. Even in the event they sell off any assets, they should be able to recoup some serious value to reinvest back into the team and keep their window wide open.

Barring injuries, they will compete for championships for the next 5 to 7 years built around SGA plus either Chet or JDub and whatever cast of guys they can assemble with their one million draft picks. If they keep hitting on their draft picks they will gladly flip them for value later on down the line. This is a really good problem to have as a franchise. I don't really see the downside in the "we have too many good players to pay them all narrative."

At the end of the day there is only one ball so no one needs 5 super max guys anyway, you get extremely diminishing returns on the value a star brings when you make them stand in the corner (Kevin Love and Chris Bosh on the Lebron super friends teams)

I don't think we have enough evidence to know for sure yet, but I think the aprons discourage tanking because of the impact they have on dispersing talent around the league. Sure some teams who are determined to tank will intentionally not sign or trade for good players that are available, but I think in general there will be semi-star level players available to sign or trade for on a fairly regular basis as the championship level teams navigate the roster management process.

Lots of people thought that Jaylen Brown might be available over the past off-season as the Celtics sought to reset their apron status. That would have been a huge get (and ironic) for a team like the Nets to super charge their return to contention.

ATL giving Trae away for free and Memphis giving JJJ away for free are early examples that good players (not perfect though) are out there and can be had for cheap.

hph6203 said:

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They are claiming that they rid the league of tanking. I do not see how they impact a bad team's desire to tank. You can explain that, because I don't understand.

Teams don't tank, generally, because they think they're going to suck to start the season and do it all season long. I think most teams start the season with the intention of winning and then they find themselves in circumstances where the value of losing exceeds the value of winning, either because they genuinely suck or because their injury circumstances lead them to it. Mavericks are an example of that.

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I disagree with this. The Pacers, Jazz, Wizards, and Nets all came into this season knowing they would suck and were playing for a top draft pick.

The Mavs in 2023 are a less common example where they tank a couple game to save a protected pick.

The Mavs this year are a team that are slightly different in that if they were healthy, they could have been a 45+ win team, but we knew from the start Kyrie wasn't healthy and the smart money is on AD not being healthy. I think that form of tanking is significantly less common. The more common form is what Utah has done the last couple years.

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They do however incrementally create an incentive for good teams in bad circumstances to tank. If Jokic goes down early season and the Nuggets have struggled to an 18-35 record like the Mavericks, and he's ready to come back for a final playoff push you don't think they're more strongly considering a tank job to get to a top 10 pick rather than struggling to a 41-41 record and the play in? They started the season 22-7, not out of the question that they could do it.

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Most teams that have an MVP candidate that can come back for the last 3 months of the season and make the playoffs don't tank. Look at Boston. It would have been absolutely understandable for them to tank this season with Tatum out. But instead of doing that, they made some really savvy moves and kept themselves in the title hunt with hopes that Tatum will come back. I really thought they would sell off a lot and tank for a pick, but what they are doing is how the NBA would hope things would be handled. And if Tatum does come back, I think they could win the East.

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Should have been "If anything they encourage tanking" not "Aprons encourage tanking"

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I don't think the aprons encourage tanking at all, but aprons do make contributing players on rookie deals more valuable, so on that point I would agree if that is what you meant.

What Aprons REALLY do is make sure teams focus on value for their #3-8 players. Being able to get players on cheap contracts that can be in your playoff rotation is insanely valuable.

-The Mavericks plan to enter the season was run with Flagg/AD and try to tread water long enough for Kyrie to come back and make a playoff push. It wasn't a tank first operation, it became a draft focused team once they started 1-3, AD got hurt and they rattled off a 4-11 record without him, hitting 10 games under .500 the game he came back. At that point they weren't good enough to dig out of that hole without Kyrie and were going to be well out of a playoff opportunity even with Kyrie coming back. Punt on the season, trade AD, tell Kyrie next year, and lose.

-Boston has never been under .500. I don't think Denver would just throw in the towel the moment Jokic got hurt, but you glossed over the 18-35 comment. If Boston hadn't maintained winning basketball absent Tatum do you think they're still pursuing a playoff spot? You are on the one hand saying Boston continued to try to win absent Tatum, and Indiana is intentionally losing without Haliburton. Boston pursues wins without Tatum, because they can win without Tatum. Indiana begins tanking, because without Haliburton they lose. Eventually it goes from a natural order losing to an intentionally losing effort. I don't think it's that Indiana tried to lose, they just did, and then the focus pivots when the season's success is out of reach.

-Indiana and the Jazz are exceptions to the "generally" of not tanking to start the season due to their pick protections. Absent those I think they'd both be putting in better effort, but I don't think Indiana is radically shifting their position in the standings. Worst thing they can do is end up in the 5-9 slot and convey the pick. Jazz could be quite a bit better, and I think what they're doing is bad both as a trading partner and for the league.

-I think the rest of the teams in the top half of the draft are just bad. I don't think they started out with the intention of being bad. I think they just are bad. That accidental bad shifts into intentional bad once it becomes clear that good isn't in the offering.


Cuban is nuts for thinking a free agency style draft is a good idea. End up with top guys taking less money to go to NY/LA/MIA definitely maybe POR for some Phil Knight goofiness to get better endorsement deals to offset any lost wage scale.

Since tanking is getting everyone’s attention , back in the day, when we were winning 50 gms every year and never got a good pick here is what I floated

“Make the draft more like free agency. Except the worst record gets the salary slotted to the first draft pick. The next…

— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) February 17, 2026

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-The Mavericks plan to enter the season was run with Flagg/AD and try to tread water long enough for Kyrie to come back and make a playoff push. It wasn't a tank first operation, it became a draft focused team once they started 1-3, AD got hurt and they rattled off a 4-11 record without him, hitting 10 games under .500 the game he came back. At that point they weren't good enough to dig out of that hole without Kyrie and were going to be well out of a playoff opportunity even with Kyrie coming back. Punt on the season, trade AD, tell Kyrie next year, and lose.

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Right, exactly what I said. If the Mavs were healthy, it could have been a solid team. But everyone except Nico and little Patty Dumont knew AD wouldn't be healthy. I had said I would have cut my losses and traded AD when healthy in the off-season before he could get hurt again.

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-Boston has never been under .500. I don't think Denver would just throw in the towel the moment Jokic got hurt, but you glossed over the 18-35 comment. If Boston hadn't maintained winning basketball absent Tatum do you think they're still pursuing a playoff spot? You are on the one hand saying Boston continued to try to win absent Tatum, and Indiana is intentionally losing without Haliburton. Boston pursues wins without Tatum, because they can win without Tatum. Indiana begins tanking, because without Haliburton they lose. Eventually it goes from a natural order losing to an intentionally losing effort. I don't think it's that Indiana tried to lose, they just did, and then the focus pivots when the season's success is out of reach.

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Boston has more talent and better coaching. I think Indiana getting their 2026 1st round pick back from probably the only front office worse than Nico made it where they would punt on the season before it started. I think Indiana could have done things to put themselves in better position to win but they planned on this being a tanking season throughout.

You just don't create massive changes based on hypotheticals with slim chances of happening.

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-Indiana and the Jazz are exceptions to the "generally" of not tanking to start the season due to their pick protections. Absent those I think they'd both be putting in better effort, but I don't think Indiana is radically shifting their position in the standings. Worst thing they can do is end up in the 5-9 slot and convey the pick. Jazz could be quite a bit better, and I think what they're doing is bad both as a trading partner and for the league.

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I don't agree with that. Lots of teams sell off their roster for value knowing they will suck. Spurs did it when they traded DeRozan, White, DeJounte, and Poeltl because even with all those guys, they were maxed at like 34 wins. Teams knowing they are going to suck or trading away mid talent to bottom out is the most common way to tank. Utah did it by trading out Gobert/Dono. Houston did it by trading out Harden. Brooklyn did it by trading Durant/Harden. OKC did it by trading Brodie, Chris Paul, and PodcastP.

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-I think the rest of the teams in the top half of the draft are just bad. I don't think they started out with the intention of being bad. I think they just are bad. That accidental bad shifts into intentional bad once it becomes clear that good isn't in the offering.

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I think Washignton, Utah, Indiana, and Brooklyn are all intentionally tanking. Sacramento and New Orleans are unintentionally awful. Dallas and Memphis punted. Memphis probably should have started as soon as they got 4 picks and a swap for Bane and sold off JJJ, too. Trading two firsts to get Coward is pretty idiotic when his best case scenario is a really good role player. They should have seen the writing on the wall earlier and not made that move. Same with Dallas as I said earlier. I don't think Chicago or Milwaukee knows what they are doing and Atlanta has essentially punted on this season and hopes the NOLA pick hits, but they can't tank because they dont have their pick this year or next.

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Cuban is nuts for thinking a free agency style draft is a good idea. End up with top guys taking less money to go to NY/LA/MIA definitely maybe POR for some Phil Knight goofiness to get better endorsement deals to offset any lost wage scale.

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I think Cuban wanted a free agency style with caps available to each team because he probably had no problems paying players under the table. I get Dirk never wanted to leave, but I also have no doubt that Cuban took care of Dirk when Dirk turned down max deals from LA and HOU to come back to Dallas for 3y25M. Just like the Knicks are paying Brunson under the table (took 113M less than his max!!) and the Clippers started paying Uncle Dennis back in 2017 when Kawhi was with the Spurs.

Realistically, if this happens, the Clippers' lineup next year is going to be

PG Kingston Flemming - Houston
SG Darryn Peterson - Kansas
SF AJ Dybansta - BYU
PF Caleb Martin - UNC
C Cam Boozer - Duke

Amazing how they all wanted to take the rookie minimum to play together and plant trees together in LA.

Probably a requirement to spend all of the slotted value to a singular player and a requirement to accept an offer if it is your only offer left after 30 teams select 30 players.

So you'd have

Cade Cunningham
Daryn Peterson
Cooper Flagg
Paolo Banchero
Victor Wembanyama

On the plus side the Lakers, Knicks, Heat, Nets and Clippers would really, really value draft slots regardless of team. Just send every perceived good player to them to figure out if they're good and if not you can trade for your role player of choice so they still have roster space for the next draft.