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TrueHoop reader Paul has an interesting idea to change the draft lottery:

An interesting way to revamp the draft ordering system would be to assign teams points (for example one point for each loss they had during the season) and then auction off the draft slots.

This would allow teams more flexibility in how they want to rebuild their team. If the team with the most points isn't enamored with the top player in the draft, they could save their points and bid on the third and twelfth picks. Under the current system, it would be impossible for a team to trade their top pick for the third and twelfth picks (unless one team held both).

You could also allow teams to save points across years, so if you have little interest in Kenyon Martin you could just save your points and wait for Kwame Brown to graduate. This would mean teams are less at the whim of the quality of the players available in a given year. If you have a lot of points but no roster spots, you could just save the points instead of drafting a European player and hoping he'll be available in three years.

People who analyze basketball for a living would have a field day with all the strategy that would go into it. In this draft coming up, you would need to know the relative value of Beasley, Rose, Lopez, etc., and not just the order. Is Mayo + Lawson > Rose?

You also have a ton of flexibility in exactly how the system is set up. You could add some randomness to the point distribution to discourage tanking, or award points for improving from the first half to the second half. You could either pay interest on saved points (encourage patience) or depreciate them (so teams only carry over points if a LeBron-type is coming out next year). Points could be included in trades.

Just a thought on what might make the NBA draft an even more interesting.

There are some problems with this system: it doesn't do anything to prevent tanking, for one, which is the impetus behind most draft lottery overhauls at this point. There are a million potential work-arounds, but that's something that has to be addressed.

Some might see it as a problem that this takes essentially a "dumb" lottery system -- it doesn't take skill to win -- and replaces it with something that requres shrewd scouting and strategy. Essentially, it would be an important new way for the smartest teams to get ahead.

Those teams already have pretty big advantages, for instance by getting guys like Manu Ginobili late in the second round. I'm fine with that: I say incent all teams to hire the smartest front office people. But I suspect that there are a lot of people who are in favor of a luck element, to inspire parity.

Also, I imagine this will seem a little complicated to most fans. What are these points? Huh? Are we getting Joakim Noah or not?

I can think of a way to simplify it a little, but I don't think it will fly: you could scrap the idea of draft slots. Instead of spending your "points" (can we call them "draft bucks?") on the first, second, or third pick, wouldn't it be simpler to spend them on a player directly? Then it would work like an actual auction. How many draft bucks do you want to spend on Joakim Noah? Chicago's willing to spend 30, any other takers? No? Boom, off he goes to Chicago.

Of course this will never ever ever ever happen, and for good reason.

A bunch of rich white guys buying and selling young black men at auction? The reality that his has essentially been happening on draft night forever makes no difference. This is a PR disaster of epic proportions. Regular draft night just doesn't feel nearly as much like the slave trade as an auction would.

Anyway, though, I do think some kind of bidding system would sure be interesting, and in the end probably a better way for teams to get the players they really want. At the moment it's a little weird that you could be the GM of a team with a top pick, and yet fall madly in love with a mid-first round player, but just not be able to get a mid-first round pick (without really reaching). It would be nice if you had a way to "spend" a little more or less to get to the player you want.