NBA Playoffs 2011: 10 Reasons Why NBA Postseason Is Better Than March Madness
Last night, the NCAA Tournament ended with one of the worst basketball games ever televised to a national audience.
Butler shot 18 percent, Connecticut's Kemba Walker played his worst game of the tournament and we all sat and watched a team who finished ninth in their conference be crowned the national champion.
This would never happen in the NBA.
Nobody spends nearly as much time filling out an NBA bracket as they do with the NCAA Tournament, but don't let a few cheap thrills and an occasional Cinderella story fool you, the NBA Playoffs are a much better tournament.
10. Basketball Fans Need the NBA Playoffs
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The worst day of the year, for basketball fans, is three days after the NBA Finals finish. Once Sportscenter can no longer analyze the series, we are all held hostage to baseball highlights for the rest of the summer.
During the NBA Playoffs, basketball fans become like the people in the Buffalo Wild Wings commercials, desperately hoping for a few extra minutes of action before returning home to cry in front of a 3 a.m. episode of Baseball Tonight.
When the NCAA Tournament ends, there is still light at the end of the tunnel. When the NBA Playoffs end, there are Pirates-Nationals highlights awaiting.
Basketball fans need the NBA Playoffs.
There's a reason the LeBron James free agency story became as big a deal as it was last summer. Basketball fans simply were not ready to let go, and even though no new information ever really came out during it, seeing LeBron James's name in the ESPN ticker at least gave basketball fans hope.
9. Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith and Ernie Johnson
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If you felt uncomfortable watching Charles Barkley and Kenny "The Jet" Smith breaking down college basketball, don't worry, you are not alone.
However, sending in the TNT studio guys to CBS to cover March Madness is like telling Sacha Baron Cohen to remake Borat for a PG audience. Charles Barkley is not meant to have restrictions, and the NBA Playoffs allow him to be set free.
During the NBA Playoffs, you want to stick around the television at halftime, and even tune in for the post game, just to hear what Barkley will say next.
Kenny Smith is the perfect sidekick to Barkley and Ernie Johnson's dry humor holds the entire show together.
In the NCAA Tournament, Barkley was not allowed to harp on the players or be overly critical of the college athletes. In the NBA Playoffs, he will call a player stupid or rip into LeBron James for not playing hard enough.
The TNT crew on NBA games is a well-oiled machine, and watching their halftime show feels more like a hilarious, late night talk show than a frustrating delay in the action.
8. More Games
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The NCAA Tournament has a total of 67 games. If the NBA Playoffs had four game sweeps in every single series, which will never happen, they would still have 60 total games.
To win the NCAA Tournament, you have to win six games in a row over a varying level of competition. In the NBA Playoffs, the champion wins 16 games and does not have the luxury of playing any Bucknells along the way.
Connecticut did not have to play a No. 1 seed on their way to a title this year.
In the NBA, the Boston Celtics knocked out Dwyane Wade, LeBron James and Dwight Howard out of last year's playoffs, and still finished in second place.
March Madness gives you 67 games that occasionally turn out to be exciting and more often than not turn out to be duds. When you do get a great game—for example, Kentucky vs. Ohio State—and wish you could see those two teams play six more times, the NCAA Tournament comes up short.
In the NBA Playoffs, you get to see great matchups more than once.
7. Frequency of Games
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The first four-day weekend of March Madness is probably the most exciting times in all of sports.
In the span of Thursday to Sunday, 52 total games take place. There are buzzer beaters, chaos in the brackets and plenty of Cinderella stories to go around. I can not argue for the NBA against that, the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament is incredible.
The problem is, there's that gap during the week between the excitement. The NCAA Tournament is like a long distance relationship where your girlfriend/boyfriend visits occasionally, then disappears for awhile. The NBA Playoffs, on the other hand, are like having your significant other at home every single night with a freshly made meal and a "do not disturb" hanger on the bedroom door.
The NBA Playoffs happen almost every single night for two months. There may not be a 52 games in four days streak, but the sustained presence of basketball throughout the week makes the NBA Playoffs far more enjoyable.
6. No Cinderellas
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This may be a controversial point, but Cinderellas are not good for a tournament. A Cinderella storyline is something the NCAA Tournament clings onto when their one-and-done format ruins good basketball matchups.
Here's an example, imagine that the NBA let all 30 teams into the playoffs. Now, imagine that the Cleveland Cavaliers had one of their strange productive nights and knock the Boston Celtics out of the first round. Out West, let's say the San Antonio Spurs go down to the Los Angeles Clippers. In the next round, Kobe Bryant has a poor shooting night and the Lakers go down to the Memphis Grizzlies, while the Charlotte Bobcats upset the Miami Heat the following night in the East.
All of a sudden, the single elimination style has given us an Elite Eight that doesn't include the four best teams. This is not worth celebrating. As a basketball fan you want to see Kobe battle LeBron or another classic Lakers v. Celtics Finals.
Cinderellas provide cheap thrills and can ruin the later stages of a tournament, a la this year's Final Four. In the NBA, there has only been one Cinderella (the No. 8 seed New York Knicks from 1998-99), but even then, they had tons of talent with Allan Houston, Latrell Sprewell and a young Marcus Camby.
If your a fan of basketball, you want to see the two best teams square off in the finals. The NCAA Tournament rarely gives you this.
5. Rivalries
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The best rivalry in basketball, Duke v. North Carolina, has never happened in the NCAA Tournament. However, the best rivalry in the NBA, Celtics v. Lakers, has happened two times in the last three years.
In this year's playoffs alone, the Miami Heat/New York Knicks rivalry will be renewed in the first round, the Los Angeles Lakers and Oklahoma City Thunder may add a second chapter into their young rivalry and somewhere along the line, LeBron James will face a bitter foe.
Most rivalries in college basketball are within conferences, which keeps them from happening too often in the NCAA Tournament. Also, players move on in college basketball, so rivalries rarely have that personal feel of a Larry Bird v. Magic Johnson matchup that you find in the pros. If Kobe Bryant plays LeBron James in this year's NBA Finals, they don't move onto another level the next year, but instead could square off two or three more times in the future.
Rivalries are not just about the teams in the NBA, it's about the players.
4. "Players Don't Care" Argument Is over
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Here are the most common complaints I hear about the NBA:
The players don't even care, they aren't even running up and down the floor
Of course they take nights off, they're getting paid millions anyways
College players are doing it all for the love of the game, NBA players are just spoiled millionaires
These arguments have no bearing come playoff time.
There is not enough money in this world that could make Kobe Bryant say, "Oh, I guess I don't really need to catch Michael Jordan in number of rings." Also, do you think LeBron James will take a night off and risk still being ringless in Miami?
The players on the Boston Celtics and San Antonio Spurs are running out of time, and Derrick Rose along with Kevin Durant always play their hearts out during the regular season. It goes to another level in the playoffs.
The NBA Playoffs are the highest level of competitive basketball on this planet, and the best players hold nothing back once they begin.
3. NBA Playoffs Get Better Each Round
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Here are the matchups from the Elite Eight of this year's NCAA Tournament:
Kentucky v. North Carolina, Connecticut v. Arizona, Kansas v. VCU and Butler v. Florida
Here are the likely matchups in the NBA's version of the Elite Eight:
San Antonio Spurs v. Oklahoma City Thunder, Los Angeles Lakers v. Dallas Mavericks, Chicago Bulls v. Orlando Magic and Boston Celtics v. Miami Heat
As the NCAA Tournament goes on, all the chaos prevents the marquee matchups from actually happening.
In the NBA, teams can not fake their way through seven game series, which results in the elite teams advancing thus creating better matchups each round.
2. Storylines
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Will Kobe Bryant win ring number six?
Will LeBron James, after all the media attention and summer spectacle, win his first ring?
Can the old guys (Boston or San Antonio) win one more?
Is this the year the young guys (Kevin Durant or Derrick Rose) lead their teams deep into the playoffs?
Will Dwight Howard make a run with Orlando, or could this be the beginning of the end for him in a Magic uniform?
What about the Knicks? What about the Mavericks? Can the Denver Nuggets upset someone in the first round?
The storylines in the NBA Playoffs are part of what makes things so exciting. In the NCAA Tournament, the storylines are not developed at the beginning, which results in CBS trying to create magical Cinderella tales out of teams like VCU and Butler to keep us interested.
1. Better Players
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In last night's championship game, Butler may only have had one NBA player on their team (Shelvin Mack) and there is no guarantee Kemba Walker will be a star at the next level.
In the NBA, especially with the playoffs, there is no question you are watching the greatest basketball players in the world.
Here's a list of players attending this year's NBA Playoffs:
Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Dwight Howard, Kevin Durant, Derrick Rose, Rajon Rondo, Chris Paul, Amar'e Stoudemire, Carmelo Anthony, Russell Westbrook, Dirk Nowitzki, Paul Pierce.
Just to name a few.
The NBA Playoffs is the top level of basketball, and fans get to see these elite players battle each other in a best of seven series. In the NCAA Tournament, we could start the same exact single elimination tournament next week and end up with a completely different Final Four and probably a different national champion.
With the NBA Playoffs, there is no question that at the end, the champion is the absolute best team.
