The Brooklyn Nets may need to think twice before hitting the reset button in 2027, as NBA Commissioner Adam Silver is cracking down on tanking like never before.

Fresh off Sunday's 2026 NBA Draft Lottery, the Nets landed the No. 6 pick—a reward for enduring a grueling 20-62 season in 2025-26. While that painful campaign could yield a franchise cornerstone, the league's proposed anti-tanking reforms might make similar rebuilds far riskier in the near future.

"What we've essentially done, and we have a proposal that we're going to be bringing to our team owners at the end of May, and that is to create essentially a system of flat odds, so that you have no particular incentive to be bad," Silver revealed on ESPN's Stephen A. Smith show this week, per ESPN's Tim Bontemps. The proposed "3-2-1" format, which the NBA's board of governors is expected to vote on, would dramatically shift draft odds away from the league's worst teams.

"There's even something we're calling draft relegation, that if you're one of the bottom three teams in the league, you'll actually have worse odds than teams that sort of are four through up until teams make the playoffs," Silver added. Under this system, teams finishing between 4th and 10th in the lottery standings would actually have the best chance at the No. 1 pick starting in 2027.

For Brooklyn, the timing couldn't be more critical. While the Nets don't control their own 2027 first-round pick, their trajectory next season carries huge implications. A non-playoff finish could potentially hand the Houston Rockets the top selection—a nightmare scenario for any front office.

General Manager Sean Marks and his staff already face a summer of tough decisions. Now, with Silver's proposed reforms looming, they'll need to weigh short-term competitiveness against long-term flexibility more carefully than ever. In a league where patience is a virtue, the Nets may find that patience has never been more expensive.