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Even the mere concept of losing intentionally sounds absurd. It goes against everything that makes sport so great: competitive spirit, fight, passion. The art of conceding defeat on purpose is more often associated with match-fixing than genuine strategy so why has it become the favoured approach for sports franchises stuck in a cycle of mediocrity?  

The first thing that you need to know is that the 4 major sports leagues in the US (NFL, NBA, MLB and NHL) are fixed on the concept of having a league system in which relegation or promotion does not exist. To the average English sports fan, this is inconceivable, I must say, as a Norwich City fan myself, the prospect of not perpetually “yo-yoing” is an intriguing one. So, what does this mean for the teams at the bottom? Well, professional embarrassment aside, not much. In fact, they are often rewarded for their subpar sporting displays through the draft system.   

It is worth noting that, across the pond, sporting franchises don’t have academy development pathways in place in which they sign the quickest 6-year-olds from the local area to an amateur contract. Instead, talented, young athletes work their way through middle school, high school and, in most instances, university and college systems, at which point, upon reaching the age of 19, they may declare themselves eligible for the draft of their respective sports. The draft is essentially where professional teams are allowed to pick up the most exciting prospects in the hopes of developing them into the stars of the future. Many have said that this is a more humane approach to developing athletes, as it ensures that young players involved in academies are not injected with false hope of making it ‘pro’ from an early age, saving teenagers from the bureaucracy that surrounds professional sports.   

In an attempt to maintain parity and raise the stakes in a league made up of the same teams year in and year out, it was decided that the worst-performing teams would get to pick first in the draft. It would be similar to if Sheffield United were gifted Erling Haaland as a consolation prize for finishing rock-bottom of the Premier League last season. It certainly is a compelling alternative to the relegation system, but it also presents clear drawbacks. Firstly, there is no guarantee that your high pick translates to a good player, go no further than the Detroit Pistons who, despite having three top 5 picks in as many years, find themselves dead last in the NBA fresh off a record-breaking 28-game losing streak. The second, more fundamental issue is that it rewards poor performance and this is being increasingly exploited. It used to be taboo to admit that you were trying to lose or “tanking” for better draft picks but it has become far more accepted and overt in recent years with teams benching any players who would run the risk of making the team competitive and losing out on those sweet draft assets. This process of building a good team from scratch through the draft can take years and backfire dramatically but when it all comes together it can make all that losing quite glamourous.   

The Oklahoma City Thunder fell apart in a big way during the 2019 NBA playoffs. Their experiment that centred around franchise legend Russell Westbrook, All-Star Paul George and an ageing Carmelo Anthony had blown up in their faces. A humiliating 4-1 series defeat to the underdogs Portland Trailblazers led General Manager Sam Presti to trade away the core of the team and start again. No one can claim to understand the psyche of the elusive Sam Presti fully, but one thing that is certain is that underneath that well-groomed head of hair is a man who loves draft picks. Since 2019, he has accumulated a treasure trove of over 40 draft picks in the next 7 years. This endless stream of choices matched alongside Presti’s eye for talent is a scary thought for other teams across the NBA. So far, his selections have transformed the Thunder from bottom feeders into the hottest young team in the NBA finishing the 2023/24 season as the number 1 seed in the tightly fought Western conference. Not all teams are so successful in the draft and picking young talent that has never played at a professional level brings its own pressures but the promise of competitive parity has been kept. In the same time that Manchester City has won 6 of 7 premier league titles the NBA has seen 6 different teams win a championship, MLB has also seen 6 and the NFL 5. It seems that not allowing oligarchs and nation-states to use sports teams as a vanity project with no restrictions can produce a more unpredictable product for fans.   

So, could we ever see a draft-style system in European football? Probably not. It has been suggested by some clubs, but the majority in the football pyramid rely on transfer fees to stay afloat and league-wide franchising of teams has not been established like in the US. But there are lessons that can be learnt; sometimes intentionally losing is the only way to stop the same few from always winning.