The NBA has approved sweeping changes to the draft lottery that will strip the teams with the worst win-loss records in a given season from receiving the best odds of winning the No. 1 pick that year, something the league hopes will prevent tanking.
Thursday’s vote by the NBA Board of Governors made the plan official for the next three seasons. The “3-2-1 Lottery” proposal expands the drawing to 16 teams, flattens odds of receiving the No. 1 pick, and will try to deter teams from tanking — intentionally losing, or at least not giving a full effort toward winning — by lowering lottery chances for teams that have the worst records.
They can still win the lottery, but they’ll have to buck the odds to do so. The three worst teams will have 5.4% odds of winning, while teams that finish with the fourth- through 10th-worst records will all have 8.1% chances of winning.
“Since October, the league office has met with key stakeholders to discuss current competitive incentives and solicit ideas aimed at discouraging tanking,” the NBA said in a release announcing the move. “That process led to the creation of the 3-2-1 Lottery.”
ESPN reported the vote was 29-1, with the Memphis Grizzlies casting the lone dissenting ballot.
The outcome fulfilled a promise from 12th-year commissioner Adam Silver, who vowed the league — which has changed the lottery system about a half-dozen times in the past 40 or so years — would strongly address the tanking issue before the 2026-27 season.
Starting with next year’s lottery, the 16 participating teams will all get somewhere between one and three lottery balls — that’s the 3-2-1 part — awarded in this manner: The losers of the No. 7 versus No. 8 play-in games in both conferences will get one lottery ball each; the No. 9 and No. 10 seeds going into the play-in tournament will get two lottery balls each; the remaining 10 teams that miss the playoffs and the play-in will all get three lottery balls — with the exception of the three worst teams in the standings, which will enter “draft relegation” and have one of their lottery balls taken away, the antitanking part of the plan.
Tanking was a huge — and from the league standpoint, regrettable — talking point this season. The Utah Jazz were fined $500,000 “for conduct detrimental to the league” over the way that two of their top players were held out of the fourth quarter of a pair of games, one of which their team actually won. The Jazz had reason to limit their wins this season; too many victories would have meant risking a chance to have a top-eight pick in next month’s draft in New York, a pick they wound up securing.
Utah was among five teams — the others were the Washington Wizards (who received the No. 1 pick), Brooklyn Nets, Indiana Pacers and Grizzlies — that had winning percentages below .180 after the mid-February break for the NBA All-Star Game. There had never been a season when so many teams lost so regularly after the break until now.
Under the new plan, the teams that finish with the three worst records cannot fall below the No. 12 pick, but the best odds of winning No. 1 would go to the other seven teams that miss the play-in and the playoffs. The No. 9 and No. 10 play-in seeds would also have a 5.4% chance of winning the lottery, and the losers of the No. 7 versus No. 8 play-in games would both have a 2.7% chance.
There are other caveats within the new plan, including that no team can win back-to-back No. 1 picks and that the NBA will now have “expanded disciplinary authority” to address tanking, with potential moves including lowering teams’ lottery odds or even changing draft positions.
The new rules will be in effect through 2029. The NBA Board of Governors will have to vote again at some point to either extend the new plan or come up with a different one before the 2030 lottery.