Building or Rebuilding?

SOURCE: https://howtheyplay.com/team-sports/How-to-Rebuild-an-NBA-Team

The economic principle I’m exploring is “Because of scarcity, people choose. All choices have an opportunity cost.”

My research question to help me study the economic principle is “How do teams decide when to rebuild, and how do they do it?”

The article published in CBS Sports titled “Should NBA teams rebuild through the draft, free agency, or trade?” by Matt Moore discusses why and when teams decide to rebuild and highlights each of the possible methods, describing their strengths and weaknesses as well as statistical success. 

As explained in the last blog post, many teams, especially in the NBA, decide to focus on rebuilding rather than winning. But what exactly is rebuilding? Rebuilding is essentially adding or removing any person/thing on the team that influences their abilities; whether it be players, coaches, plays, strategies, etc. According to author Matt Moore, this is most commonly done by acquiring new players through trades, free agents, and the NBA draft. The draft, however, seems to stand out the most. Moore took a list of each team’s three best players and recorded whether they were acquired via the draft, trade, or free agency. Of the 90 stars that were taken, 46 of them were acquired via the draft alone - over 50%. This is more than the other 2 methods (trading and free agency) combined. It also brings up the related topic of tanking, which many teams still seem to do in order to get a better draft pick. Tanking is when rebuilding teams purposely lose early in the playoffs so that they can get a higher draft pick for the next season, and based off the statistics shown by Moore, it still seems to be common to this day.

Although it is not very common, there are times for every team when a rebuilding phase is needed. Moore says that star players eventually get old, and many teams tend to revolve their game around their star players. Thus, when a star player gets old, the team’s entire strategy needs to be changed. This usually means a change in roster, or otherwise an attempt to get newer star players as a replacement. Teams also tend to change their playbooks frequently because other teams catch on and make adjustments over time, although this is not necessarily considered rebuilding.

Moore stresses how teams only rebuild when they are in dire need. This means that they usually have a consistent losing record, an inefficient roster, and no overall plan for the future. If they do not meet this criteria, then they more often than not will try to work with what they have. Moore says that teams are “more likely to keep their own players because they believe in them, which brings up a key point when we look at teams’ options for rebuilding. The good players just aren’t available.” What this is saying is that the younger players on the team have much more time to grow and reach their full potential, and so unless a team’s roster is loaded with older players, then keeping their current roster is usually a smart option as they still have much time to get better and become more experienced. This quote also brings up a key point, which is that the good players usually aren’t available. Teams are highly unlikely to trade any superstars, because they will often try to build themselves around their superstars, and even if they don’t, their fame/reputation is still greatly boosted by having those types of players. Therefore, they are almost never up for grabs, and so teams will usually try to acquire these ‘superstar-like’ players through the annual draft instead. This is one of the reasons why rebuilding through the draft is the most common of the three methods.

Lastly, Moore says that teams’ “cores” usually consist of at least three good players that they can rely on. Their plays, strategies, and game plans are often built around these cores. Having three talented, reliable, leader-like players is usually the most efficient option that most teams shoot for. A team’s core determines whether or not they will need to rebuild; they will generally tend to rebuild if their core is dying out or if they don’t have a core at all. If they do have a core, or even at least somewhat of one, then they will generally try to keep their players and allow time for improvement, relying on the assumption that their core will grow stronger over time. This is again why it’s important that these players are not old, because if they are, then the core would shortly die out as the players lose talent and prepare for retirement. If they are young, then it can be assumed that they will only get better and more experienced over time, which could eventually turn into a very strong core. If they do not have a core, or if it is in a dying phase where their players are aging or getting injured, then they are likely to make trades, sign free agents, and tank for better draft picks in order to rebuild their roster.

In my next blog post I will research: What makes an NBA player considered a “superstar” and how high does the demand for these types of athletes tend to be?