FanPost

Tanks but No Tanks


There's been a lot of talk lately about the Spurs 'tanking', usually after a loss, and often followed by impassioned comments (like mine!) either rejecting the idea or (some) endorsing it. So I thought it might be good to try to discuss what tanking even means, how it's been done before, and how it might or might not apply to the Spurs current situation.

But first, I think it's really important to point out, rationally, what the Spurs state of affairs is, and how we got here. Since 1989-90, the Spurs have had twenty five 50-win seasons (including the projected wins of the shortened season) and only four seasons with less than 50. Of those four, three were 47, 49, and 47 wins. This means in the last twenty nine years, the Spurs have had ONE losing season, with FIVE championships. Let that sink in the next time you're feeling panicked that the team is not doing so well this season. Spurs fans, myself included, are utterly, totally spoiled by the team's consistent success.

We may now be heading to our second losing season in about three decades. Want to feel better about that? Go look up NBA teams records, pick any team (pick 'em all) and compare records for the modern NBA era. Then, quit your damn whining!!! Things aren't that bad.

Now on to the tank-talk! (feel free to suggest witty puns; I only thought of one and it's not even that funny) What does tanking really mean? It's a serious question and I hope folks will offer specific thoughts in the comments. Here are some of my criteria:

1. The team management decides to make personnel moves with the specific goal of losing more games in a current season, in hopes of landing a higher spot in the draft.

2. The coach makes in-game decisions, typically playing younger developing players, knowing that games will be lost by those decisions, but wants to favor player development.

3. Players almost certainly don't deliberately lose games, but maybe don't play as hard, especially on team defense, because they know that the management's goal is to lose, or that winning is hopeless, so why try.

Maybe the most famous example of deliberate, long term tanking is with Philly for the last several seasons. Want to get a glimpse of what that's like? Go look at their record for the last 29 years. Guess how many 50 win seasons? Three. Prior to last season, they won 28, 10, 18, 19, 34, and 35 games. Given the outrage over the Spurs 47 win season last year and sub-500 record this season, how do think that would go over in San Antonio?

Meanwhile, the Celtics and Raptors had basically good seasons for most of those years, (with a few exceptions) and are still likely to beat the sixers in the playoffs. Philly's plan has resulted in an insane amount of suckage, and they're still not goign to win a championship any time soon.

It sure looks to me like tanking doesn't work so well.

So, what is the way forward for the Spurs? Rebuilding has already started, whether we wanted to or not. Is the worst over? I bet it is, because the team looks like they'll be getting younger and better throughout the season. Should PATFO try to move a veteran or two, even if it costs games this season? Is that a mild form of tanking or not? I'd like to hear comments on that.

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