Tanking is the hot topic right now. At ESPN.com, Henry Abbott writes that the lottery system encourages tanking, and that tanking — intentional losing — allows under-qualified executives to keep their jobs rather than lose them to smarter and/or hard-working people. The lottery does this in two general ways, Abbott argues: It provides poorly run teams with superstar-level players on the cheap, and it allows GMs with ugly trade and drafting records to essentially tell the owners, "Hey, don’t worry, the next great player that will save our franchise is just a ping-pong ball away" — and to pretend this was a viable strategy all along. It’s an interesting piece. I’d encourage you to read the whole thing. -From sports illustrated's Point Forward