[Itse]

It would be very easy to stop tanking. First 16 spots go to non-playoff teams, randomly. There, fixed it.

In fact, give the non-playoff teams two picks each before playoff teams start. Two good young players can after all make a big difference fast, so non-playoff teams would be encouraged to keep a team mostly together, because there would be a pretty legitimate chance that in a couple of years things look up again, and there would really be little incentive to do anything else.

This current system is really the worst system you could have. The idea of draft pick odds changing with final standings is so dumb only NHL executives could have come up with it. The current system massively encourages tanking, but then doesn't necessarily even reward teams for doing it,

Either you want to give the absolute best players to the absolute worst teams, or you don't. Clearly the NHL is going with "we don't". They've already accepted that any non-playoff team can have the #1 pick. Just go with that.

The current system discourages teams from trying to be better, but doesn't do enough to actually pull them up once they've dismantled, resulting in teams getting stuck as perpetual non-playoff teams.