NBA commissioner Adam Silver: Tanking does not exist

NBA commissioner Adam Silver says he would take action if teams lost on purpose. (AP Photo/Charles Krupa)

There is lots of bad basketball around the NBA, as "tanking" has been coined to refer to teams that lose on purpose to try to secure a better draft pick.

But NBA commissioner Adam Silver doesn't want to refer to it as tanking, but would rather call it "rebuilding" and doesn't think that tanking exists around the league.

"The coaches and players, or some subset of that group, trying to lose, I don't think that's going on anywhere in the NBA," Silver said, via the Associated Press. "And I would take action immediately if I thought it was."

The Los Angeles Lakers, who have one of the worst records in the Western Conference, the Philadelphia 76ers, losers of 17 straight games, and the Milwaukee Bucks, who sport the league's worst record, are among the teams that have played their way to a possible high draft selection.

DEITSCH: Charles Barkley discusses NBA eligibility, the NCAA tournament, more

"We have a system in place that encourages teams to rebuild," Silver said. "They are responding to the incentives that are built into the system. If the incentives aren't right, we have to change them."