            The NBA is considered to be one of the most popular professional sports, so why is the league run so horribly? The modern day NBA consists of teams trying to collect players known as "superstars".  Such examples are LeBron James, Tim Duncan and Steph Curry.   Unless your team has a superstar or multiple superstars, your chances of winning the NBA finals are slim.  LeBron James, famous for being the best player in the NBA, left the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2010 to join the Miami Heat and start the first "Big Three".  The big three consisted of superstars James, Dwayne Wade, and Chris Bosh. All three of these players left their former teams to join the same team. Since that time, other teams have tried to copy the Miami Heat's big three plan to no avail.  In 2014, LeBron James, left the Heat after winning two titles in four years to rejoin the Cleveland Cavaliers with a new big three consisting of himself, Kevin Love, and Kyrie Irving.  During his career James has played in six NBA finals.  In fact, he has played in five consecutive finals, and has not lost a playoff series to an Eastern Conference opponent in five years.  As an Eastern Conference team, how are you supposed to win a championship when LeBron James' stacked teams are 15-0, in a seven game series over the last five years?   Teams cannot get better using traditional methods to contend against teams filled with multiple superstars. Thus, the modern age NBA is a broken league because of the inability for a team to win a championship without having superstars on its roster.

In the NBA, superstars can help organizations sell out arenas, win championships, and bring in other great superstars. Over the previous 16 years, only seven different teams have won a championship. Tim Duncan's San Antonio Spurs have won five of them, Shaquille O 'Neil and Kobe Bryant's Lakers team won four of them.  LeBron James'  Miami Heat team chipped in by winning two of them, while Steph Curry's Golden State Warriors won the 2014-15 championship and are on track in 2015-16 season to break the all time win record for a single season.  What do all four of these teams have in common? The answer is superstars. All four of these teams had three NBA All-Stars on their roster at one time. The problem that the NBA faces is that superstars want to play with other superstars.  Therefore, the trick is to get one superstar on your roster and then use that superstar to attract other superstars to gravitate to your team.   Usually players are acquired in one of three ways. Players can be drafted by a respective team. They can also be acquired in trades between two or three teams, or they can be acquired via free agency. Free agency is when player's contracts are finished with one team and have the option of signing another contract with the same team, or leaving their old team to sign with a new team. It is virtually impossible to trade for a superstar and rarely will an established superstar sign as a free agent with a team that does not already have a superstar on its roster.  Therefore, the most likely way to get a superstar on your team is through the draft.  Once you get that superstar than it will attract other superstars who want to play a long side of them. With this theory in mind, Sam Hinkie, general manager of the Philadelphia 76ers brought in a strategy to use the NBA draft to find a superstar to build around.

The Philadelphia 76ers brought a new strategy in order to try to change their team from a constant 8th or 7th seed to a 1 or 2 seed in the Eastern Conference. As reported by the Associated Press in their article "76ers formally hire Sam Hinkie", Sam Hinkie was named the general manager of the Philadelphia 76ers after the conclusion of the 2012 NBA season. The article focuses on Hinkie and how he has changed the way teams rebuild. Hinkie has been trying to lose basketball games on purpose in order to receive a higher draft pick in hope of finding a "superstar" through the draft. Hinkie's whole plan is to use the draft to find one superstar and then use that player to attract other superstars to the franchise. In today's NBA, even role players prefer to play a long side a superstar. Therefore, less is expected of them and they can concentrate on the parts of the game that they excel in. Ric Bucher, an NBA expert analyst, went on 97.3 Espn "The Fan" to discuss how the league has not been happy with the 76ers during their "tanking" process. Bucher argues that many teams around the league consider them to be the laughing stock of the NBA. Bucher thinks the 76ers tanking is a bad image for the NBA, but understands what they are trying to accomplish. Before the tanking started, it was not always this way for the 76ers historically.  During the 1980's the 76ers were one of the NBA's most dominant teams.  They appeared in three NBA finals in a four year span and finally won the championship in 1983.  They were always considered as one of the best franchises in the league. The 76ers having to lose games on purpose with the hope of acquiring a high draft pick to select a "superstar"  is a perfect example of what is wrong with the NBA.

            After the 2012 NBA Basketball season, which ended with the Sixers losing a game seven on the road to the Boston Celtics in the Eastern Conference Semi-finals, the 76ers were a part of a massive trade. The trade involved four teams, 76ers, LA Lakers, Denver Nuggets, and the Orlando Magic. Chris Broussard, author of "Basketball Reference" asserts in his article that the trade was headlined by Dwight Howard going to the Lakers, Andre Iguodala going to the Nuggets, and Andrew Bynum going to the Sixers. Broussard argues that the Sixers got the best of the trade since they finally had their superstar in Andrew Bynum that could help them get over the hump in the Eastern Conference.  Andrew Bynum never turned out to be a superstar.  He ended up injuring his foot in the off-season and never stepped on the court in the season following the trade.   In fact, he never played a game in a 76ers uniform.   After the foot injury to Bynum the 76ers were forced to make changes. Sam Hinkie was hired as General Manager on May 14, 2013, a day that changed the direction of the 76ers future.

            Upon his assumption of the GM position Sam Hinkie had a reputation around the league preferring an analytic approach to build his basketball team. Once hired, Hinkie asserted his authority immediately, making tons of changes to the Sixers Roster. Hinkie's plan was to build assets through the draft rather than through free agency, because landing superstars in free agency is extremely difficult unless you already have one on your roster. In his first NBA Draft as GM of the 76ers, HInkie traded Jrue Holiday the Sixers leading scorer to the Pelicans for Nerlens Noel and the Pelicans first round draft choice in the 2014 draft. Josh Martin, author of "Philadelphia 76ers' Future Preparing to Arrive Right on Schedule.", argues this was Sam Hinkie's best move. He claims that Noel was considered to be the first pick in the draft, if he had not torn his ACL towards the end of his first and only college season and Holiday still was not the player the Sixers hoped he would become. The Sixers also drafted Michael Carter Williams, a very tall combo guard who could do almost everything but shoot. By the end of the 2013-2014 season, the Sixers traded away four of their five opening night starters to acquire five second rounds picks in the 2014 draft and finished with a record of 19-63 second worst in the NBA.  This gave them a 17.7% chance in the draft  lottery to secure the first pick in the 2014-15 NBA Draft.

            The NBA is the only professional sport where the team that finishes with the worst record does not get the first pick. In Major League Baseball, National Hockey League, and National Football League the draft order is based on your record at the end of the regular season. The NBA uses a lottery system that gives each team that fails to make the playoffs a chance to receive a top 3 draft pick.  The worst record in the NBA is awarded a 25.00% chance at the first pick in the draft, the second worst is a 17.7% chance, and the third worst is a 15.6% chance. The lottery is revealed during a certain game of the Eastern Conference Finals at halftime. According to Wikipedia, in the past 11 years only twice has the team with the worst record been awarded the first pick in the draft. This is a huge problem with the NBA, because how is the worst team expected to get better when they are not even guaranteed the right to select the best player available?  This causes for a huge problem with the NBA and many fans have called for the rules to be changed. The NBA thinks the draft lottery brings excitement, but in reality all it brings is doubt towards the respect and honesty of the NBA since they do the lottery behind closed doors and then reveal the winners on National TV.

             During the 2013-2014 season, the Sixers coined two important phrases, "Trust The Process" referring to Sam Hinkie's idea of tanking, and "Tank for Wiggins". Andrew Wiggins the highly regarded 18 year old from the University of Kansas seemed to be the sure first pick. It was no secret every team wanted him, especially the Sixers. Wiggins is an extremely good basketball player and currently he has already turned into a modern day superstar in the NBA averaging 20 points a game in only his second year in the NBA. Despite having the second worst record, the Sixers were awarded the third pick in the draft due to the corrupt lottery system. HInkie selected Joel Embiid, another player that is seven feet tall, who also had a problem with staying healthy like Andrew Bynum. Embiid is very talented and is considered to be one of the best young players in the NBA if he ever plays. Indeed, Philadelphia is cursed with acquiring very talented injured big men, considering Embiid has now been in the NBA for almost two years and has yet to set foot on the NBA court in a live game. With the Pelicans pick at #11, the Sixers chose Dario Saric. Saric is another seven feet tall man and is from Croatia. The Sixers have stashed Saric overseas in order to keep losing in hope to receive a top pick in 2015 NBA Draft. Adam Fromal, author of "Final Season of Philadelphia 76ers Tanking Era," argues that this was Sam Hinkie's best draft yet, because he got a really good player in Joel Embiid and Dario Saric should be a starter for this team in the future.

            The 2014-15 NBA season went similar to previous seasons for the 76ers. Losing, losing, and losing some more. Sam Hinkie traded Carter Williams the 76ers best player away for a Lakers future first round pick, and the right to lose more games.  Phil Taylor, writer for Sports Illustrated wrote an article called "76ers Tanking". In this article, Taylor focused on how the NBA needs to step in and help the 76ers in order for this tanking to stop. Taylor argues that the 76ers are easily the league's most disliked team to watch and that fans are fed up with it. Much to Sam Hinkie's dislike, the 76ers ended up with the third worst record in the league and ended up having the third overall pick in the 2015 draft once again. The 76ers selected another seven feet tall player named Jahlil Okafor from the University of Duke. Okafor is considered to be one of the best young big man's in the game.

            The NBA has let the 76ers tank for three straight seasons, but have finally stepped in and aided them in the current 2015-2016. Jeff Zillgitt, author of "Colangelo Will Make Mark" talks about how the NBA stepped in and awarded the 76ers Hall of Fame General Manager Jerry Colangelo. Colangelo is known for stepping into toxic organizations and changing around the culture. The 76ers have said that Sam Hinkie is still the General Manager but it seems that Colangelo may be calling the shots now. In the 2015-16 season the Sixers have locked up the worst record in the league and have the greatest chance to win the overall #1 pick. Trevor Conley, author of "Philadelphia 76ers" from the Philadelphia Sun Times asserts that the 76ers ticket prices are down 31% from the 2014-2015 season. Attendance is also down 26%, which proves Philadelphia fans are becoming restless with this rebuilding process and are not even attending home games anymore even with such low ticket prices.

            Brian Windhorst, the author of the article "The Big Short" does a magnificent job comparing the 76ers to the movie The Big Short. He compares the gamble Sam Hinkie is doing with the 76ers to the gamble Michael Burry made in the movie. Windhorst discusses how they both use analytics to back up their ideas and in Hinkie's case "acquisitions". Windhorst thinks the 76ers gamble has been longer than expected, but sees a light at the end of the tunnel. The 76ers have three guaranteed first round picks (possibly for), and four second round picks in the upcoming 2015-16 draft. This should give the Sixers a chance to finally find the superstar to build around that they have been looking for. The NBA has something called the salary cap, where teams have to make sure the contracts on their current roster do not go over. A hypothetical example would be, if the salary cap is eighty million dollars per year and the Sixers roster is only being paid sixty million dollars, then they twenty extra million dollars to go acquire additional players. As Windhorsts points out, he Sixers also have a ton of salary cap room. They have enough salary cap room to sign three maximum paid superstars such as upcoming free agents LeBron James, Kevin Durant, and Dwayne Wade. Although the 76ers rebuilding process is not over yet, for the first time in a while the 76ers future looks bright. George Kondoleon, author of "State of the Process", argues that the 76ers are set up to become one of the NBA's best. Kondoleon has been extremely impressed with rookie Jahlil Okafor and is optimistic about Dario Saric, Nerlens Noel, Joel Embiid, and the 2015-16 draft.

            The Philadelphia 76ers are a perfect example of what is wrong with the NBA. Rebuilding your team should not have to take four awful seasons to finally see improvements. The NBA will face an even bigger problem if the 76ers tanking is a success. If the Sixers prove to be successful, other teams will try to copy their model. The NBA has been publicly criticized that the league is the worst it has been in years. The NBA cannot afford more teams to start tanking. One of the main problem with the current NBA and the rebuilding problem is superstars run the NBA. Back in the older days, role players, veterans, and scrappy players were significant to winning a championship. In the current NBA, players are labeled as "soft". Many former players and champions have come out and said they could never play in the current NBA filled with super teams, and uninterested defense.

            Although the NBA cannot change the idea that the current players are "soft", they can change the rebuilding process. The first step is to change the lottery. There is no reason that the team with the worst record should not receive the first pick. The second step, is to change the salary caps. The NBA needs to limit the salary caps, so that the superstars cannot afford to team up together. This would make the games way more competitive and help make the NBA teams much more spread out rather than continuously forming super teams.  By changing the salary cap, they can also give more incentives for players to stay on their current teams. A perfect example is Lamarcus Aldridge. Aldridge played for the Portland Trail Blazers for his first eight years in the NBA, but decided to leave them last summer and instead join a super team in the San Antonio Spurs. He signed a four year, 88 million dollar deal, the exact same deal he could have signed in Portland. The NBA should make it that instead Portland could offer him four years 88 million, while the Spurs can only offer 4 years 66 million. This would help keep superstars from leaving their original team. Most of the NBA players care about money and not many players would want to leave their home in order to make almost 22 million dollars less. Instead, the players have all of the leverage over the NBA teams and Portland lost their best player last offseason, with nothing to show for it.

            Basketball is one of the most popular sports in all of the world, but they need to change. The NBA needs to take back the power and stop the players from manipulating who and where they want to play for and with whom. My research topic is significant because many people like myself are fans of basketball and the NBA. Nobody wants to see the NBA become a better league then myself, which is why I chose this topic. I have been a huge follower of the 76ers since I was a little kid. My father used to take my sisters and I to all of the 76ers  playoff games during the Allen Iverson era. The 76ers have been the scapegoat throughout the NBA over the last couple years, when it is not their fault. Sam Hinkie stepped into the General Manager spot and did what he thought was best to make the 76ers dominant once again. The NBA needs to change the game for the better, so teams do not have to do what the 76ers did. The main reason why I wrote this paper is because I love the NBA and just want the league to improve for the better.

