Drakenomics 101

By: Scott Barkett

It’s late March, which means only one thing for the post-LeBron Cleveland Cavaliers. Despite a season of impressive efforts against top-tier NBA teams, the real test is just beginning for Coach Scott’s young squad.

The time has come again to focus up and study extra game film. Months of hard work come down to these last few weeks and there’s no way owner Dan Gilbert will accept anything less than the Cavs' best effort.

If a starter has a hangnail? Two weeks rest, minimum. Can't be too careful! And the Cavs must figure out more ways to get Boobie Gibson and Omri Casspi some well earned playing time. That's right...it’s tanking season!

Wait, what?

Okay, so that was a contrived introduction. You knew damn well as soon as you clicked this link that you were going to read about some good old fashioned tanking.

But I didn’t lie—recent history shows that both Boobie Gibson and Omri Casspi are elite level players for any taking team. They’re so woefully overmatched on an NBA court that other tanking teams struggle to pull players off the bench of similar...ability.

For rebuilding teams in the NBA, there are two main schools of thought currently en vogue. One school is packed—think Introduction to Complete Sentences at University of Michigan in the Fall—and the other is a one-room school house with only a couple of pupils.

The former of course is Tankington University, home of Drakenomics 101—In order to reach the top, you must start from the bottom. Like it or not, Dan Gilbert’s Cleveland Cavaliers are unabashedly in this category.

The latter group we’ll call the Prideland School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Prominent enrollees include the Indiana Pacers and the Houston Rockets. After years of scorn, they just installed a couple of brand new Smart Boards and gave everyone an iPad. Now they've made the rank and file at Tankington University quite jealous.

Suddenly, it’s a little less straightforward of a proposition to unconditionally support the Cavs’ rebuilding strategy.

A Different Path

In the summer of 2010 as LeBron James was innocently answering questions about biting his fingernails, the choice was obvious for rebuilding NBA teams. Pride was a vice that only got in the way of acquiring the top talent necessary to build a true contender. Picking late in the lottery was a recipe for mediocrity.

You might make the playoffs occasionally, but you could never get good enough to be a legit contender nor bad enough to acquire an elite rookie.

You were stuck. Time to quit that dead-end job and enroll at Tankington U!

But, the Houston Rockets and Indiana Pacers turned down Tankington University’s full scholarship offer. Instead of bottoming out, both teams committed to a tank free rebuilding path. Rebels! Hippies! But it’s finally paid off for a few reasons.

First, both the Rockets and the Pacers have hit on enough mid to late draft picks to possess great young assets. The Pacers struck late lottery draft gold with Danny Granger, Roy Hibbert, and Paul George. For the Rockets, they’ve drafted (and traded) Jeremy Lamb, Marcus Morris, and Patrick Patterson. Also, they’ve hung on to late picks Chandler Parsons and Donatas Motiejūnas.

Young assets provide flexibility and cap space for GM’s, and both teams have seen huge return on investment despite their seemingly weak position. The Pacers signed David West and traded for George Hill; both guys are key players on the 2013 squad. The Rockets went out and stole Jeremy Lin from the Knicks and Omer Asik from the Bulls as restricted free agents, traded for superstar James Harden, then flipped Patrick Patterson for 2012 top-5 pick Thomas Robinson.

Now, the pitfalls of their path are plenty. Pride can get you fired if mediocrity becomes the norm for too long. Up until last season the Pacers hadn’t truly been relevant since the ’03 Malace at the Palace. Even now that they’re currently the second best team in the Eastern Conference, their attendance numbers are shameful. Perhaps the extended rebuild and refusal to bottom out was too protracted for any fan base to weather. Time will tell if any amount of success brings Pacers fans back in meaningful numbers.

So, why now? Why, after all these years of needing to bottom out, are two teams rising from late lottery purgatory to the ranks of NBA elite?

Follow the dollar.

Lockout With Your Increased Luxury Tax Out

With the new collective bargaining agreement, incredibly stiff luxury tax penalties will take effect beginning next season. Repeat offenders will see their tax bill multiply. Even big market teams such as the Knicks who used to try and spend their way through any problem are suddenly showing tangible fiscal restraint.

Suddenly, a few extra million on the back end of a contract could turn into tens of millions in extra luxury tax payments. Small market teams such as OKC and Memphis have flipped expensive assets for solid draft picks and young, cheap talent in order to avoid a hefty bill down the road.

For years, the only ways to acquire a true superstar were to draft one or to pay the Vince Carter’s and Joe Johnson’s of the world a truckload of money and pretend they fit the bill. Now with the new CBA, deep teams are struggling to keep all of their elite talent, especially after their rookie contracts expire. With this recent player movement, it’s possible that the NBA is inching toward parity.

Stay the Course

All of that being said, I fully support Dan Gilbert and Chris Grant’s decision to overtly tank the past few seasons. Not a single move has been made since 2010 with the idea of winning now. Grant has patiently collected draft assets, and Dan Gilbert—to his eternal credit—opened his check book to facilitate this process.

All of this has given the Cleveland Cavaliers amazing flexibility to build their roster exactly how they desire. Think about all of the draft day options Chris Grant has had over the past two seasons. We easily could be watching a Cavs roster with Brandon Knight, Derrick Williams, Harrison Barnes, and Evan Fournier. Instead, Chris Grant and Byron Scott have targeted players who fit Scott’s system and the Cavs’ culture.

That level of choice only comes with top 5 picks—by the late lottery the options are much less appealing. The Rockets and Pacers have been forced to take what the market is willing to offer, both in the middle of the draft and with trades and free agents. They’ve hit on a enough of their recent moves, but there’s also been an extensive amount of luck involved on a macro scale.

I can’t tell you where to fall on this issue as a Cavs fan. Maybe you’d prefer that Chris Grant follow Darryl Morey’s Rockets plan rather than Sam Presti’s Thunder plan. It’s definitely been a drag each March over the past three seasons as the Cavaliers go through the painful motions that tanking requires.

Honestly though, who cares about your feelings? Or my feelings, for that matter? Tank or not, it’s definitely refreshing that conventional wisdom has met a serious challenge under the new CBA. Rebuilding should not be a one size fits all operation in any league. The league is stronger when it doesn’t require years of bottom feeding just for a chance to win.

Maybe the suits on Madison Avenue prefer a league where big markets have an eternal upper hand. Keep in mind though that those same people are responsible for trying to make a TV show out of the Geico cavemen commercials. So who gives a damn how they feel, either?

The Cavs chose their path, and so far it seems that they’re on the right track. But, if the rebuild should stall out somewhere in the middle of the pack, it’s nice to know that Dan Gilbert won’t necessarily need to blow it all up and start from the bottom again.

Here’s hoping next year’s Cavs will graduate from Tankington University and finally starting climbing from the bottom to the top. I just hope that those nerds over at Prideland don’t beat us there.