Thoughts on NBA Realignment and a New Playoff Format

Now, this is not only an NBA problem. Sports like college football have had questionable methods of determining champions for years. The problem arises primarily from failing to match up the quality teams in an effort to ultimately decide which team is best. The history of college football is littered with teams that feasted on lesser competition, built up a bloated won-loss record and laughably were "voted" a top team – a "mythical" national champion indeed.

Fortunately, the NBA has a regular season that could easily determine the quality of a ballclub. Once the various team strengths are ascertained, a championship tournament could be easily implemented. And surprisingly, the methodology doesn't have to be so shockingly different.

There are two incredibly unfortunate aspects of the regular season in the NBA. One is that the visiting team loses 60 percent of all regular season games. This is the biggest disparity in any of the four major sports. The other is that the Western Conference has become so dominant that any type of playoff system that doesn't acknowledge this truism is flawed.

Now, one look at an NBA team's schedule gives you a good idea why road teams rarely win. Tons of travel, back-to-back games, and four games in five nights in multiple time zones all take its toll on the traveling team's play. Having broadcast NBA games for 15 years, I can tell you that I am physically beaten up on these trips, and I am only required to speak to perform my job.

Players endure physical hardship and injury during a season (more than 300 players have missed a total of 4,400 games each of the past two seasons) and this is despite being some of the best conditioned athletes in the world. Having players perform at less than their best is not good for fans, the quality of play, games being broadcast and competition in general.

All of this can be addressed by adjusting the "conference" setup in the NBA. This has happened in the league's history several times and teams like Chicago and Milwaukee were once even in the Western Conference.

Fortunately, the NBA's current regionally-based six-division setup would still work. However, rather than having the six divisions placed within two conferences, it would make more sense to have them broken into three conferences - West, Central and East. To view how the league's two conferences are currently set up, click here. To see how my proposed three-conference setup would look like, click here.

Now, the hypothetical team schedule (let's use the Warriors) is slightly different but much better for travel, television broadcasts, fans attending road games and development of regular season rivalries.

Currently, the Warriors play each Eastern Conference team twice (home and away). They would continue to do exactly the same thing under this suggested format. Ten Eastern Conference teams would result in 20 regular season games for the Warriors.

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