If you have been reading me for any period of time you know how much I hate the idea of teams tanking. The only thing I hate more is fans of teams pulling for their teams to lose. I don't blame fans for this of course...the system is set up to reward failure and it does just that....while dumping our top talent into the same few cities...
Anyway, no one can ever prove a team is trying to lose, right? Well, a change in the way the draft lottery works after last season is showing some truly fascinating results that prove how last yeart...a few teams were definitely, at the least, playing "not to win."
Last year in March teams were playing with the knowledge that if they finished DEAD last the worst they could pick was #2. The resulting record of the bottom four teams in March reflected a certain....well, "suckiness."
March 2015 Sabres 4-12-3 Win % of .289 GF38,GA62 -24 Leafs 5-12-3 .325 41-73 -32 Arizona 4-14-1 .281 32-58 -26 Edmonton 6-9-4 .421 55-75 -20
That made for a combined .318 Winning Percentage and a -102 Goal Diff
Fast forward to this March...With the Rule change teams now know that finishing DEAD last only assures them the 4th overall pick....So how have the bottom four teams played?
March 2016 Leafs 7-7-1 500 39-40, -1 Sabres 6-4-3 576 38-40, -2 Winnipeg 5-7-3 .433 35-40. -5 Edmonton 7-8-0 .467 39-41 -2
That is a combined .491 and a -10
So in one year the bottom four teams in March are playing almost .200 BETTER? And are essentially in every game...
I would say this system is working pretty damn well...
ALSO>>>
The Calgary Flames have signed Mark Jankowski.
We will discuss all this and more on today's Podcast at 1pm