Quote: Originally Posted By firemanrob on 2/11/2010
Here's the problem with WIS' current logic. Let's suppose a team wins 57 games in one season. Then lets say that record nets him the #2 overall pick. If he lets a Type A walk and someone signs him with pick #17+, he would almost certainly get that 1st round pick unless the team with the worst record happens to sign a Type A from that same team.
So the team that just lost 57 games, lets his best FAs walk, which in theory would make his team worse. He would get a really good pick that season by virtue of his 57 wins, he would get another 1st round pick if people sign his Type A FAs and by making his team worse, he would almost certainly stand to lose as many games as the previous season netting him another top draft pick and Type A compensation priority the next season. Giving Type A compensation to the worst record teams clearly encourages tanking. If WIS gives two turds about tanking, they would review and change the way Type A compensation is awarded
This just isn't true. Having Type A priority ensures 2 things. First, a very high sandwich pick, and second, the highest pick surrendered by the signing team. That pick, however, still has a 50/50 chance of being a second rounder (albeit in the top half of the round). Thus, no matter what your record was, even if you have absolute top Type A priority, losing a Type A FA doesn't gaurantee anything better than a pick in the 33-36 range (top sandwich pick depending on the # of 1st round Type Ds) and a pick in the top 16 (+ Type Ds) of Round 2, which could be in the 80s.
That doesn't mean that a better system for ordering Type As isn't available. But it just isn't true that bad teams are ensured of getting a #1 pick when they lose a Type A. It's a 50/50 proposition.