Bleacher Report - NBA Finals

The NBA Needs to Change Their Playoff Format

Jay Singh — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 09:38:52 -0500

As the NBA season rolls on and the Nets continue to search for that precious first win, the Lakers, Magic, Cavaliers, and Nuggets continue to roll.

Now should we even call the Lakers, Magic, Cavs, and Nuggets teams? Or should they be called, Kobe, Dwight, LeBron, and Carmelo?

It is completely true that an NBA team needs a centerpiece to build around. The more talented the main player, the better the team ends up being over time.

It’s a foregone conclusion that these will be the teams at the end of the year competing in the final rounds of the playoffs.

Those final rounds can be said to be the most exciting time of the playoffs. Though the first round of the playoffs can be said to be the exact opposite.

The disparity in talent in the NBA really creates an elite group of teams, a mediocre group, and a group of teams vying for a 25 percent chance at the next superstar.

An NBA season cannot be made any more competitive and will always have these three groups of teams. Each group can be said to be made of about 10 teams.

This usually makes the second round of the current format of the NBA playoffs the beginning of highly competitive basketball.

Thus the basis of creating a better system, means less teams must be let into the premier event. Though this doesn’t start by just allowing fewer teams into the second season, but instead it must start with a complete restructuring of the league and its divisions.

Currently, the 30 NBA teams are split up into six divisions in two conferences. Each division winner is guaranteed a spot in the playoffs and then the next five teams ranked by winning percentage.

This brings the total number of playoff teams to 16, and some do not even have a winning record.

The NBA needs a more selective process. This can be achieved by completely restructuring the league. First, the NBA needs to expand to 32 teams. The second step is splitting up each conference into just two divisions.

Teams would play every other NBA team twice (62 games) and each division member twice more (14 games). This would create a 76-game season, only six games fewer than the current format.

Now to the main reason for the structural change, the playoff format. In total, only eight teams would make the playoffs in the entire association.

One team from each division will get a guaranteed spot; otherwise, it is all dependent on overall win percentage.

This creates a highly competitive field of eight teams. An even amount of teams from each conference is not required, but instead the most competitive set of teams is the goal.

Since the playoffs would only have three rounds in total, each series can be increased to best five out of nine, which requires the eventual champion to win 15 games, one less of the mark needed now.

But, every one of the rounds will contain high octane competitive matchups, that require a team to win 15 quality games.

For example, in the 2008-2009 NBA season, the playoff teams would have been:

Cleveland
LA Lakers
Boston
Orlando
Denver
San Antonio
Portland
Houston

From the 2008-2009 season this set of teams include all the teams from the respective conference finals. What this method would increase would be competitiveness from the first round.

Imagine, having teams go into the first round with matchups like, Orlando-Denver, Boston-San Antonio, LAL-Portland, and Cleveland-Houston.

These matchups are bleeding headlines and then for each team to go through a grueling nine-game series with the other is just the essence of competition.

The possible second-round matchups up the ante, leading up to the final. The final also does not necessarily have to be one team from each conference.

Another problem this fixes is when one conference is talent heavy, teams often were burnt out by the finals because of the level of conference play.

So please David Stern, go from your standard playoff format with uneventful first rounds and biased conference strength, to this much more competitive and high intensity format.

Not only will it balance the playing field for all teams, it also brings more attention and excitement to the big matchups.

Read more NBA Finals news on BleacherReport.com

Prodigal Iverson: The Answer To Philadelphia's Prayers?

Andrew Sexton — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 20:06:46 -0500

With Allen Iverson back in Philly, all the “experts” are wondering if this makes the Sixers a playoff team.

Forget the playoffs. Shoot for the moon, because even if you miss you’ll land with home-court advantage in the first round. That’s right, it looks like the Sixers might suddenly be the team to beat in the Eastern Conference.

Iverson is as hungry as he’s ever been, and he fits this Sixers team like a glove.

Philadelphia has less chemistry than Tiger Woods’ marriage. They have fewer shooters than the French resistance. Until this morning, the city cared more about Penn basketball (0-4) than Sixers basketball.

Iverson is the perfect guy to step in and take this team to heights it hasn’t seen since 2001. He can lead, he’s healthy, and he’s the volume shooter that Philly desperately needs.

If that isn’t enough, take a look at the rest of the East. This might be the weakest Eastern Conference in the last 10 years.

You can summarize the conference with four very vulnerable teams: the Celtics, Cavs, Magic, and Hawks.

Nobody in Boston wants to admit it, but they rolled the dice one too many times when they signed Rashweed. These days, all Sheed can really do is jack threes and get technicals.

The Celtics have Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, Eddie House, heck even Brian Scalabrine. All of them more than competent outside shooters. The last thing Boston needed was a hot-headed big man who never met a 3 he didn’t like.

This team is downright elderly, and the chemistry went from adequate to abominable when they added Wallace. Expect these old dogs to flame out when spring rolls around, they’ll be lucky to get out of the first round.

The 2009-2010 Cavs are no better than the 2008-2009 Cavs, and that’s not a compliment. The Shaq experiment, promising though it was, is not panning out by any stretch of his imagination. Delonte West, a key cog from last season, just hasn’t been himself since shotgun in guitar case-gate.

Something tells me that the season will end once again with LeBron heading to the locker room early. Don’t worry Cleveland, at least you will always be remembered as the one city where King James didn’t get a ring.

Is there a team in any of the four major sports with less heart than the Magic? This team blows leads like Dick Cheney blows covers. Their cornerstone big man, Dwight Howard, practices farting when he should be practicing low post moves. Last year, the hook shot was George Mikan rolling-over-in-his-grave bad. This year, it’s merely gawd-awful.

If Superman works hard, he might upgrade the hook to cover-your-eyes ugly by the spring of 2013. As a side note, this gutless team needed to bring in leadership over the summer if it wanted any chance of getting to the next level. When you think leadership, apparently Orlando thinks Vince Carter.

The Hawks are a pretty simple team to figure out. They are young, relatively experienced, and generally have nowhere to go but up. They’re good enough to be a team the Sixers should be concerned about, but bad enough to be a team that the Sixers shouldn’t be worried about. Also, Joe Johnson says they’re soft. Ummm, this is awkward.

And there you have it, a conference clearly ripe for the picking. Most of the teams don’t matter, and the ones who do matter have fatal flaws. The Sixers’ work is cut out for them.

Here’s a little secret. Philly didn’t bring Allen back to sell tickets. They didn’t bring him back out of good will. They brought him back for one last glorious title run, before The Answer retires for good.

Funny how things change. Last week the Sixers were thinking about the lottery, now fans can ponder a best-of-seven with the Lakers.

Read more NBA Finals news on BleacherReport.com

Ranking the NBA Teams of the Decade

Ethan McVansen — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 00:08:21 -0500

From the '00-01 to the current NBA season, two clear teams have prospered: the Spurs, and the Lakers. There are many other teams who clearly did not, such as the Knicks, Warriors, and Clippers. Here is the ranking of all of the 30 NBA teams based on their performance in being a solid NBA team for the past 10 years.

Begin Slideshow