The NBA's battle against tanking is heating up, and Commissioner Adam Silver is reportedly all in on a bold new strategy. For years, the league has tinkered with lottery reform ideas—flattened odds, expanded lotteries, and restrictions on consecutive top picks—all aimed at discouraging teams from losing on purpose for a better draft position. But now, a more aggressive concept is gaining serious traction: actively punishing the league's worst teams.

According to reports, a recent call with general managers sparked the idea. One GM suggested barring the three worst teams from winning the No. 1 pick altogether, a move considered too drastic. However, a softer alternative emerged: significantly reducing the odds for the bottom teams and reallocating those chances to slightly better non-playoff or Play-In Tournament teams. The key takeaway? Commissioner Silver reportedly responded to this concept with enthusiasm.

This aligns with broader momentum for change. The leading proposal would expand the lottery to include all 18 non-playoff teams, drawing for every pick instead of just the top four. In this model, the ten teams that miss the postseason entirely would have equal odds, while the eight Play-In teams would have smaller, identical chances. The new "punishment" model would tweak this further, taking percentage points from the very bottom teams to give others a better shot.

The logic is clear: by making the absolute worst records less rewarding, the league hopes to incentivize competitiveness until the very end of the season. A final vote from the board of governors isn't expected until late May, after this year's lottery, and the exact details are still being refined. But one thing is certain—the NBA is serious about changing the game to preserve its integrity, ensuring every night on the court matters for every team and every fan.