{"id":708016,"date":"2026-04-11T08:00:54","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T08:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/708016\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T08:00:54","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T08:00:54","slug":"a-night-to-be-ashamed-of-in-the-nba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/708016\/","title":{"rendered":"A night to be ashamed of in the NBA"},"content":{"rendered":"

After months of talk about tanking<\/a>, with an endless debate over solutions \u2013 some seemingly on the way \u2013 that risk doing nothing (solutions that solve nothing) or, worse still, making matters even worse through unintended side effects, the end of the regular season arrives dressed up as a grand finale. Two all-in slates, Friday and Sunday, with every team in action and a day\u2019s rest in between. It should feel like the old transistor-radio afternoons, fans biting their nails, crossing their fingers their team doesn\u2019t slip, nervously glancing at other scoreboards. There should be spots under threat, teams pushing for home-court advantage, permutations tied to that play-in designed to spice up the Florida bubble and kept alive, in theory, so moments like this actually matter. It should feel alive, unpredictable, urgent. But the promise of chaos and consequence dissolves almost instantly into something far flatter.<\/p>\n

The reality is that, in the end, the finish line becomes \u2013 as with so much in today\u2019s NBA \u2013 just another reminder that, one way or another, the games barely matter. The calculations that count most revolve around losing, tanking and the draft. The list of absences, whether for rest or injury, could circle the league offices in Manhattan. Play-in and playoff positions are largely locked. The permutations of moving up or down a spot don\u2019t seem to carry much weight \u2013 some would rather figure out if it\u2019s better to lose to pick an opponent. And the bottom of the standings is a mockery of the competition on a dramatic scale. What should be tension turns into a spreadsheet of incentives pointing the wrong way.<\/p>\n

For the Machiavellian \u2013 or simply the practical \u2013 it makes sense. Understandable, even. Those who have spent months committed to it, long past any trace of embarrassment or guilt, aren\u2019t about to have a late surge of pride that costs them the percentage points they\u2019ve chased through a parade of indignities. Much of their fan base prefers it this way. Social media has a field day producing content. And whoever hits the jackpot, dives into the depths and then resurfaces in style will be applauded in a few years as a model of front-office engineering. That\u2019s how it\u2019s done \u2013 if the lottery smiles and enough things break your way. Victories are terrible for memory and therefore excellent for the release of endorphins.<\/p>\n

The league, for its part, signals that it\u2019s working on it, turning over complex, technocratic ideas that seem to cling to the notion that the more complicated something is, the better it must be. At least it keeps the content machine humming, feeds the endless stream of takes, rankings and reactions. The last set of changes \u2013 flattening the lottery odds \u2013 has backfired spectacularly, leading straight to this awkward, distorted finish. Instead of simplifying, the instinct is to keep adding layers. If this doesn\u2019t work, there will be more formulas, more tweaks, more unintended consequences.<\/p>\n

The monument to all this \u2013 the epic closing act of a grand farce \u2013 was a Jazz-Grizzlies game that neither side wanted to win. Not a new reality for the average NBA fan, let alone the more invested ones, but here pushed into the grotesque. A Viking funeral for what remains of meaning, somewhere between the practical and the incomprehensible, between the letter and the spirit of the rules, across a wider-than-usual group of teams this season. The draft looms so large that it distorts everything around it. Rebuilds pile up, decisions blur, and what should be competition turns into choreography.<\/p>\n

Teams don\u2019t procrastinate for the sake of it, but they make mistakes, or they\u2019re worse in the front office than others, or they lack luck \u2013 which matters \u2013 and end up punished by new formulas that drift away from a simple idea that perhaps deserves to be restated: the worst teams should get the best young players and accelerate their rebuilds. That\u2019s the spirit of the draft. The clever minds have made it sound na\u00efve. Yet simplicity is often where both logic and fairness meet.<\/p>\n

Some of this should at least ease the burden on the Grizzlies and Jazz. I won\u2019t say blame the game, not the player, because that axiom risks reopening another murky issue \u2013 betting \u2013 which could lurk behind the NBA\u2019s interest in the manipulation of certain scores and stats, even if recent appearances by Adam Silver have induced a convenient amnesia around that dark, highly lucrative subject. The league\u2019s justice hammer swings at those who flirt with the integrity of games. Remarkable. A system under strain tends to reveal its weakest points.<\/p>\n

The Jazz were already fined in what felt like a performative gesture, and subsequent events have shown just how hollow it was. There was, in any case, a game, and it ended 147-101. The Jazz, who had lost ten straight, beat the Grizzlies, now on a seven-game skid. Utah now sits at 22-29, Memphis at 22-56. The Jazz risked losing up to 10% of their chances at a top-four pick\u2026 by winning. Even victory comes with consequences when the incentives are inverted.<\/p>\n

They did \u2013 ties aren\u2019t not allowed, not yet \u2013 but the first win since March 19 didn\u2019t sting much, because the Kings beat the Warriors in a game that, by this point\u2019s logic, they probably should have lost. Sacramento, never quite sure what it\u2019s doing, pushes buttons until something lights up green. At least it introduces a human dose of chaos, which, in these shifting sands, is oddly welcome.<\/p>\n

The Grizzlies, too, could have lost up to 7% of their top-four odds by winning (imagine that). Now they\u2019ll face the Mavericks on the final day to decide who ends up with the sixth-best odds at the No. 1 pick. Let\u2019s see who loses better. The Jazz, meanwhile, should defend their bottom-four status with a loss to the Lakers, one of the four worst records and a small but meaningful bump in the odds. Strategy spirals into parody when defeat becomes a tool.<\/p>\n

Before tip-off, Jazz and Grizzlies \u2013 essentially playing a G League game \u2013 listed 24 players on their injury reports, either out or doubtful. Utah had nine ruled out by designation and rested three more. Memphis had 12 absences, more than $140 million in salaries unavailable on a payroll of $173.5 million. Thirteen players took the floor in total: seven for the Jazz, six for the Grizzlies. Most were barely recognizable even to devoted fans. A professional league reduced, for a night, to something unrecognizable.<\/p>\n

G League call-ups, 10-day contracts, undrafted players. I won\u2019t list the lineups \u2013 it would feel like an insult to those who played and did what they could, many fighting for a future from the margins of a league that generates record revenues while moving through contradictions and shadows at high speed. They are not the problem.<\/p>\n

In a statistical farce, it was the first game in NBA history where one team (the Jazz) had ten players score in double figures, four with at least ten rebounds, five double-doubles and two triple-doubles. Utah went from 2008 (Carlos Boozer) to 2024 (Jordan Clarkson) without a triple-double \u2013 a rarity in this era \u2013 only to get two here from the only bench players who saw the floor: John Konchar (11 points, 11 rebounds, 10 assists) and Bez Mbeng (27, 11, 11). Numbers piled up, but meaning drained away.<\/p>\n

For Memphis, Isaiah Whitehead had 16 points, shooting almost every possession, when the score was 34-34. Lest he get hot and ruin the script, he sat until the fourth quarter, by which point his team trailed by 42. The deficit peaked at 55 for a roster with five and a half players, and Jahmai Masack posted a triple-double \u2013 almost a quadruple if you count turnovers: 13, 15, 14 and 10. But again, singling out the players would be unfair. The absurdity lies elsewhere.<\/p>\n

The issue is the system. One that creates monsters and ends in tragicomic skits like this, while some shrug and say what else can they do \u2013 and they may not be wrong \u2013 and the league strikes a pose, floats solutions that seem to please almost no one, and keeps the machine running. When the structure bends this far, everything built on it follows.<\/p>\n

Related stories<\/p>\n

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Utah Jazz<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Stats <\/p>\n

2<\/p>\n

\n Blake Hinson\n <\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

\n Cody Williams\n <\/p>\n

34<\/p>\n

\n Oscar Tshiebwe\n <\/p>\n

19<\/p>\n

\n Ace Bailey\n <\/p>\n

1<\/p>\n

\n Kennedy Chandler\n <\/p>\n

55<\/p>\n

\n John Konchar\n <\/p>\n

42<\/p>\n

\n Kevin Love\n <\/p>\n

21<\/p>\n

\n Bez Mbeng\n <\/p>\n

10<\/p>\n

\n Svi Mykhailiuk\n <\/p>\n

Stats <\/p>\n

Min
\n Pts
\n TR
\n OR
\n DR
\n Ast
\n Los
\n Rec
\n Blk
\n S1
\n S2
\n S3
\n RF
\n CF<\/p>\n

2<\/p>\n

\n Blake Hinson\n <\/p>\n

34
\n 30
\n 2
\n 0
\n 2
\n 2
\n 2
\n 2
\n 0
\n 2\/2
\n 8\/10
\n 4\/9
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

\n Cody Williams\n <\/p>\n

33
\n 14
\n 3
\n 0
\n 3
\n 5
\n 2
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0\/2
\n 4\/10
\n 2\/6
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n

34<\/p>\n

\n Oscar Tshiebwe\n <\/p>\n

28
\n 16
\n 22
\n 4
\n 18
\n 3
\n 1
\n 1
\n 2
\n 2\/4
\n 7\/11
\n 0\/0
\n 0
\n 2<\/p>\n

19<\/p>\n

\n Ace Bailey\n <\/p>\n

28
\n 23
\n 10
\n 2
\n 8
\n 2
\n 3
\n 3
\n 1
\n 0\/0
\n 7\/12
\n 3\/7
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n

1<\/p>\n

\n Kennedy Chandler\n <\/p>\n

40
\n 26
\n 5
\n 0
\n 5
\n 10
\n 4
\n 2
\n 0
\n 0\/4
\n 7\/13
\n 4\/7
\n 0
\n 2<\/p>\n

55<\/p>\n

\n John Konchar\n <\/p>\n

35
\n 11
\n 11
\n 2
\n 9
\n 10
\n 3
\n 5
\n 2
\n 2\/2
\n 3\/3
\n 1\/3
\n 0
\n 4<\/p>\n

42<\/p>\n

\n Kevin Love\n <\/p>\n

0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n

21<\/p>\n

\n Bez Mbeng\n <\/p>\n

38
\n 27
\n 11
\n 4
\n 7
\n 11
\n 1
\n 3
\n 0
\n 2\/3
\n 11\/16
\n 1\/3
\n 0
\n 1<\/p>\n

10<\/p>\n

\n Svi Mykhailiuk\n <\/p>\n

0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n

Memphis Grizzlies<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Stats <\/p>\n

72<\/p>\n

\n Adama Bal\n <\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

\n Toby Okani\n <\/p>\n

21<\/p>\n

\n Jahmai Mashack\n <\/p>\n

0<\/p>\n

\n Dariq Whitehead\n <\/p>\n

55<\/p>\n

\n Lucas Williamson\n <\/p>\n

67<\/p>\n

\n Taj Gibson\n <\/p>\n

32<\/p>\n

\n Rayan Rupert\n <\/p>\n

10<\/p>\n

\n Javon Small\n <\/p>\n

Stats <\/p>\n

Min
\n Pts
\n TR
\n OR
\n DR
\n Ast
\n Los
\n Rec
\n Blk
\n S1
\n S2
\n S3
\n RF
\n CF<\/p>\n

72<\/p>\n

\n Adama Bal\n <\/p>\n

38
\n 18
\n 2
\n 0
\n 2
\n 4
\n 1
\n 1
\n 1
\n 3\/3
\n 3\/4
\n 3\/8
\n 0
\n 2<\/p>\n

5<\/p>\n

\n Toby Okani\n <\/p>\n

41
\n 20
\n 2
\n 2
\n 0
\n 2
\n 1
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0\/0
\n 7\/14
\n 2\/8
\n 0
\n 3<\/p>\n

21<\/p>\n

\n Jahmai Mashack\n <\/p>\n

48
\n 13
\n 15
\n 1
\n 14
\n 14
\n 10
\n 2
\n 0
\n 1\/2
\n 6\/11
\n 0\/2
\n 0
\n 3<\/p>\n

0<\/p>\n

\n Dariq Whitehead\n <\/p>\n

23
\n 21
\n 3
\n 1
\n 2
\n 0
\n 3
\n 0
\n 0
\n 2\/2
\n 5\/8
\n 3\/10
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n

55<\/p>\n

\n Lucas Williamson\n <\/p>\n

48
\n 13
\n 13
\n 3
\n 10
\n 3
\n 1
\n 4
\n 0
\n 1\/1
\n 3\/6
\n 2\/13
\n 0
\n 3<\/p>\n

67<\/p>\n

\n Taj Gibson\n <\/p>\n

0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n

32<\/p>\n

\n Rayan Rupert\n <\/p>\n

39
\n 16
\n 12
\n 4
\n 8
\n 4
\n 3
\n 3
\n 1
\n 1\/1
\n 6\/14
\n 1\/11
\n 0
\n 4<\/p>\n

10<\/p>\n

\n Javon Small\n <\/p>\n

0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0\/0
\n 0
\n 0<\/p>\n