The Ringer NBA Show
The NBA’s Tanking Problem Hits Rock Bottom and More Trade Deadline Ripple Effects | Group Chat
09 Feb 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the NBA's tanking problem and why is it significant?
Hello, and welcome to Group Chat. I am Justin Verrier, and joining me, Rob Mahoney. J. Kyle, man. Just want to let the listeners know up front that we're only going to be recording three quarters of this podcast. There are a couple interns that had a couple sharp barbs in the office the other day. Want to get them a little bit of run, you know?
So just a heads up, we're only playing three quarters here.
You're already grinding axes. We're just starting the podcast. Like, what is stuck in your craw, Justin?
I think it's pretty obvious. I don't know if you guys were watching the Utah Jazz last night. Should we just jump into it?
First of all, I don't know if you guys were watching the Utah Jazz last night is the most group chat statement imaginable. So we can only be ourselves.
I was just like kind of spinning around the NBA as I often do on a Saturday night alone in my house. And I saw a photo that Jaron Jackson Jr. was playing. And I was like, oh, I didn't realize he would be playing at all, let alone playing this early. And I was like, let's check this out. And for that quarter, I think it was the third quarter. Pretty interesting, right? Lowry's in there.
Jackson's in there. Nurkic looking reborn as just like a playmaking hub for this team. And then the fourth quarter hit, despite the fact that they were up seven, those guys just disappear. And now there's another layer to this that the Magic actually struggled to win this game at the end. And so that's another question we need to get to at some point.
But the Jazz's tanking has hidden, I want to say hidden another level, but they've been doing this because they did this the game before with Markkanen. And I think it's kind of incumbent on us to be like pointing this out because the tanking has gotten worse.
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Chapter 2: How do teams like the Jazz exemplify the tanking issue?
And I think it's going to keep getting worse until people get mad enough about it.
Yeah, I'm okay with pointing it out. I mean, we can be the ombudsman of NBA tanking and competitive equity, but to what end? Like, what are we hoping to solve or fix here? Because the NBA has kind of been gesturing at trying to fix this stuff for years. Justin, you said the Jazz have been doing this for a while now.
They've been doing it for a while in seasons lengths, like year over year over year have been doing this now. No one really seems to be all that bothered by it.
Yeah, it was last year and the year before. I mean, it was getting to the point with like Lowry Markkinen. And it was like, has anyone seen him?
Chapter 3: What are the initial impressions of teams after the trade deadline?
I, you know, I feel like they were we had varying reports and visuals just to even get an idea of whether he was healthy or whether he was alive, quite frankly, at different points last year. And, you know, I was watching them basketball wise just to speak to that a little bit. Yeah. They did look really interesting.
And I know we were speculating on paper about, you know, Kessler wasn't out there and didn't play, obviously. But the spacing, I put a screenshot of this on Instagram where I was just laughing as I was watching this, where they had Ace in the left corner and they had Lowry in the right corner, deep in the corner.
And the space at the top of the floor with Jaron Jackson screening for Keontae and then the reborn Nurkic, you know, in the play as well. I mean, it was just an incredible vast amount of open space. So this team is instantly interesting and instantly proposed something that was difficult for Orlando to deal with. And, you know, with the victory and reach, they decided not to reach for it.
But, you know, to speak to the tanking part of it, though, It's so wild to like read on Twitter or just wherever these thing or NBA Reddit. Every time someone comes with some very well thought out proposition for how to fix this, they're inevitably every single time are 20 people who come down and say like, well, you just created this cataclysmic problem that would have to be dealt with.
Chapter 4: How do injuries impact the current NBA season and team performance?
to speak to what Rob was saying. It's just like, that's where I am too, Rob, where I'm just like, yeah, we can complain about it, but I don't know what to do. It just seems Occam's razor, like we just might as well stick with what we got.
I get that the incentive system is really the trouble here, especially for a small market team, because as we've seen time and time again, the only way for guys in Utah in Portland, in Memphis.
Chapter 5: What are the implications of load management for NBA fans?
The only way to luck into the type of talent that can put you on a certain level is to do so in the draft. And the only way to do that is to tank. I would argue that in recent years, it does seem like the flattening of the odds has kind of undercut that at the very least. We've seen a lot of teams jump up even in the past couple of years since they've made that change.
I just think it's fine to point that out. But I do think we're at the point where there needs to be action because this is pretty fucking embarrassing. to basically say that we have, what, 30 more games left in the season, and they're just not going to try for a certain quarter, even though that they could be a different thing.
I think this deadline set it up so that the problem is going to be unavoidable, where you had a lot of teams that were bad making the biggest moves.
and so we're used to on this podcast everywhere else in the nba to be like oh old faces new places let's let's kind of diagnose all this new stuff that's going on instead we're seeing teams not play those guys in in dc in india sounds like zubach isn't going to play for a little bit Or you're seeing them just get benched for no fucking reason.
Like the point of basketball as a product, as an entertainment source, is to watch these amazing athletes do what they do. To suggest that they're not going to do that as much as they can is really like kind of chilling in terms of just like the future of the sport, I think.
I wouldn't go that far just because this feels like one of those things that real people, and by that I mean not us, don't care about that much. If you are a hardcore Utah Jazz fan, are you aware of what's happening? Yeah, you're not blind to it. You're watching these games or not, but you're generally aware of how they're managing the rotation to lose these games more or less intentionally.
But so long as it gets you Darren Peterson, no one really gives a shit. And this is kind of one of the problems with trying to fix this is history forgets shamelessness when it works. And if it gets you the guy that you want, no one really cares about how shameless it was in the first place.
I guess my question though, Kyle, is the NBA's goal to just satisfy the fans that they already have? That NBA fans are aware of this and they're keen to the fact that short-term pain leads to long-term gain and that the team could be something and the way to do that is this. Have they honestly been institutionalized to that point? I think we could talk about that as well.
Or do we need to worry about the casual fans, especially as football comes and takes over more and more of like the sports mindset? They're coming into Christmas and all these other parts of the NBA schedule that used to be NBA specific.
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Chapter 6: How do the recent trades affect the playoff landscape in the NBA?
Because if you're a casual fan and you're seeing teams not care, and I think it's going to be like probably a third of the league down the stretch here, just not care, not play good basketball, not even aspire to do so, actually try subterfuge in order to get to that point. Like, is it really causing long-term damage that's just not as loud?
I don't... I honestly don't think so, because I think that we've seen this time and time again. You know... We love a sport. We love the purity of a sport. We love to watch basketball and watch it played well. But when you're talking about casual fans, there is also the NBA is a product. And something that is baked into that product is the theater.
And as sad as it is to say out loud, I think at times, part of the theater is the absurdity of teams tanking. And teams that have no games going on of consequence. You know, if like the...
If the Thunder did something like that, granted, we've seen good teams hold their players out strategically, and that's frustrating, and I think we have to put things in place to deal with that so that fans that spend a ton of money for whatever occasion to go out and see a star play, that they aren't penalized for that thing. But a team like the Jazz, maybe their fans are annoyed.
Chapter 7: What are the potential future impacts of the current NBA strategies?
I think we talk about tanking events all the time because they're humorous.
So as annoying as it is, and as like, as much as I would love to maintain and be a purist and bang my fist and yell at clouds about it, I'm just like, at the end of the day, I don't think it matters that much because the only people who were like on the precipice of, I like basketball, I'm on the market to maybe like a different type of basketball or like people from college communities, like where I'm from, where I'll hear complaining about like, they don't try, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
I just don't think that those people are in line to be won or lost on this. I guess I'm a little more, maybe I'm more closer to where Rob is on this, where I'm just like, I just don't. I don't think so at the end of the day. Like, I feel like the silliness is a part of it all. And, you know, yeah.
I also think, weirdly enough, the NBA gets a lot of cover from the fact that those undecideds that Kyle is talking about, like the casual sports fans who might be trying to figure out how they feel about tanking, are probably just casual sports fans across the board. And the point at which this is the most egregious is happening basically during March Madness.
And so there's just like a lot of other sporting stuff in the ether where if it was as simple as like, we're recording this on Super Bowl Sunday and starting tomorrow, everyone was paying attention and locked in on the NBA without like to a fault, then that might be one thing. But there's about to be a big shiny distraction.
with all of the most appealing college players on full display, while the Jazz and the Nets and the Pacers and the Mavericks and the Grizzlies, and as Justin's alluded to, the growing list of teams that have no real incentive to win, are going to be kind of doing their stuff in the shadows. And then by the time the tournament is over, the NBA playoffs are here.
And then that's really the time for those casual fans to migrate back anyway.
Is that just appropriate cover for what teams have learned works versus what should happen? What if the NBA, just like everybody, actually put together a good enough product so that the stretch run was actually interesting? That these races for the get into the play-in or seeding actually mattered more? And so I ultimately think you guys are right. Griping about the way the league is now
It's tough to really find a way where things can get better because I think humans will always adapt and find ways to do something like this. My thing is I think perhaps the point is we need to start attacking the incentive structure head on.
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