Warriors' Draymond Green floats NBA tanking fix, says play-in tournament 'ain't working'

The practice of NBA teams losing games to boost their draft lottery odds continues to be widely debated.

The NBA may claim progress, and just last month introduced multiple anti-tanking proposals to its board of governors. But that hasn’t stopped Warriors forward Draymond Green from offering a tougher possible solution.

After the Warriors’ 110-105 win over the Kings on Tuesday, Green urged the NBA to take a more bold stance on issuing teams for tanking.

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"I think I get fined when I do wrong," Green said. "Just fine the hell out of people. We love taking money from players, keep fining the teams. I’ve seen two fines. And we all know everybody tanking. But you’ve seen two fines."

Green’s comments appeared to reference recent fines the NBA issued to the Utah Jazz and Indiana Pacers. The league ruled the Jazz committed "conduct detrimental to the league" after several top players were pulled late in two February games.

Utah was fined $500,000. The Pacers were fined $100,000 for violating the NBA’s Player Participation Policy during an early February game against the Jazz. Green is pushing for the league to more aggressively fine teams when tanking is suspected.

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"If it was players (the league) would have snatched that money in a heartbeat," Green continued. "Why isn’t it the same? Everybody love money. The punishment for players is always, let’s take the money. Well, now it becomes time to punish teams and all of a sudden nobody don’t know what to do. Why not? We know exactly what to do when somebody gets a technical foul. Or suspended for a game. We know exactly what to do."

The latter part of the 2025-26 season sparked renewed debate over how to curb tanking, as teams with fading playoff hopes appeared to eye top prospects in this summer’s draft.

"All of a sudden we got team issues, we don’t know what to do," Green added. "What happened to the whole take the money stuff? Everybody else trying to reach a quota too. But when it comes to player discipline, we want to snatch the money as fast as we can. When it comes to team discipline and we see 12 teams tanking, we’ve seen two fines. If my math serves me correctly, that’s ten that ain’t been fined. Just some quick math. It could be wrong so don’t judge me if it’s wrong.

"But we don’t keep that same energy when it comes to teams, when it comes to officials, when it comes to everybody but players, we don’t keep that same energy. But this is a players’ league."

Before addressing tanking, Green weighed in on the Play-In Tournament, a concept widely credited to NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. The format was designed, in part, with the aim of curbing tanking.

"I think it worked initially, and now to have a team stuck in 10th, it ain’t working," Green said. "So we could have lost our last 15 games and been stuck in 10th, it ain’t working. It worked for a little bit, but if you can be stuck in 10th and lose the last 15 games of your season, and you can be stuck in 10th, it ain’t working."

Golden State enters Wednesday in the 10th spot in the Western Conference standings and has clinched a Play-In berth. Green recalled what the format was designed to do when it was first introduced.

"I think the Play-In was made for teams to not tank," he said. "I think that’s the part that everyone forgets. The Play-In came about to make teams like maybe through 12 or 13th keep going. They ain’t keep going. They kinda slowed down, and then they hit the brakes."

Green, who has spent his entire career with the Warriors and won four NBA titles, acknowledged the stark contrast between preparing for the Play-In Tournament and a deep playoff run as a true contender.

"You go on the road in a game that you need to win I think, as a competitor, you’re going to rise to the challenge," the four-time All-Star said. "But I’m not going to sleep (Wednesday) night like, man, we got this Play-In next week, I got to get my rest. Nah, it ain’t that exciting."

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