Brian Flores Tanking: What does tanking mean in sports?

With the Super Bowl done and dusted, the talk of the NFL has shifted to the Brian Flores lawsuit. The former Miami Dolphins head coach is attempting to sue the NFL and multiple teams, alleging racial discrimination and that he was urged into “tanking” games.

The latest update in the Brian Flores situation could have serious repercussions for the Miami Dolphins. According to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport, Dolphins owner Stephen Ross could lose ownership of the team if Flores’s allegations against him are proven to be true.

If tanking allegations are proven true, #Dolphins owner Stephen Ross would face severe discipline, up to and including Ross losing the team by a vote of fellow owners, sources say.

My story: https://t.co/4wM3y9AsWT

— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) February 14, 2022

According to Flores, Ross offered him $100,000 for each game that the team lost in 2019 soon after he got the head coaching job. Apparently, when the Dolphins won a few games late in the season, GM Chris Grier informed Flores that Ross was unhappy with the situation, and that was the start of their troubled relationship.

If there is solid evidence to back up Flores’s claim, Rapoport believes that Ross could definitely be forced out of the Dolphins. Three-fourths of the league’s owners would have to vote him out and if they do, there would also be sanctions against the Dolphins, perhaps in the form of heavy fines docked draft picks.

League commissioner Roger Goodell, too, has confirmed that this could be a real possibility. “I do believe that clubs do have the authority to remove an owner from the league,” he said last week.

Ross himself has maintained his innocence and continues to claim that he never offered money to his head coach in exchange for losing games.

“I take great personal exception to these malicious attacks, and the truth must be known”, he told the Miami Herald. “His allegations are false, malicious and defamatory. We understand there are media reports stating that the NFL intends to investigate his claims, and we will cooperate fully.”

What is “Tanking” in sports?

Flores’s claim that he offered a financial incentive to tank games has brought up the question for certain fans of what the term actually means in sports.

Simply put, “tanking” is when a team intentionally tries to lose games in order to secure a worse record at the end of the season, and therefore a better pick in the upcoming draft.

Although we’ve seen that it is not allowed, there is still a clear incentive to do it. For instance, if a team is midway through a season and is mathematically eliminated from the playoffs, it makes sense to start tanking to be in a better position to rebuild the next year.

In the NBA, the lottery system was introduced to discourage the practice. However, teams obviously still do it. Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban even publicly admitted to tanking a few years ago, and was fined $600,000 for his comments.

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