NBA commissioner Adam Silver held a press conference at the league’s Vegas Summer League, and one of his topics was how to create more revenue. He spoke of an in-season tournament like many of the European leagues have. He also spoke about how much all of the league’s executives love coming to Vegas.
If he wants to add revenue by adding a few more games in a tournament format, while allowing the league’s higher-ups to have another entertaining trip to Vegas, the solution is fairly simple.
Let all 30 teams participate in the NBA playoffs.
Before you call the dudes with the white jackets and have me locked in an insane asylum, hear me out. Obviously (I would hope), I’m not talking about adding 14 more best-of-7 playoff series.
I’m only talking about a minor tweak in how the 8th seed in each conference is determined. Instead of automatically giving the 8th seed to the team with the 8th-best record, let the teams who finish 8th through 15th in each conference battle it out in a single-elimination tournament.
The NBA regular season usually ends on a Wednesday, and the playoffs start on Saturday. That first weekend of playoff games, with four games each day, is one of my favorite of the year. We certainly don’t want to lose that. So under my proposal, the regular season would end on a Sunday.
Usually, the last two or three games of the regular season involve teams sitting out many of their regulars, because teams want their star players to be fresh and well-rested heading into the playoffs. That makes perfect sense, but it also leads to some really ugly games during the last week of the season.
Under my plan, the top seven teams in each conference wouldn’t play their first playoff game until either Saturday or Sunday, meaning they would get a minimum of six days off following their final regular season game. Hopefully, this would enable teams to play their best players for all 82 games, and the fans wouldn’t have to watch so much bad basketball at the end of the season.
Instead of fighting to hold on to the #8 seed and a playoff berth, teams would be fighting to hold on to the #7 seed. The eighth seed would have to play an extra three games before the “real” playoffs start, which might lead to a few more interesting games during the final week.
Under my plan, teams who are tanking – either intentionally or otherwise – would still have a shot at making the playoffs. Certainly nobody expects a 20-win team to win a best-of-7 series against a number one seed, but I have to imagine their team’s fans would enjoy the hell out of seeing them have a chance.
A team that suffered through numerous injuries early on wouldn’t automatically have their season end in January – even if your top 3 scorers were hurt and you only won 10 of your first 60 games, you would still have a shot at making the playoffs once those guys were all healthy.
And teams wouldn’t have to rush injured players back hoping for an eight seed, they could simply win three games in Vegas and make the playoffs without endangering the long-term health of their best players.
Instead of rushing your superstar back into action so you can move up from tenth in your conference to eighth, you could let him heal properly and still have a shot at the playoffs.
So the regular season would end on Sunday, and the bottom eight teams in each conference would head for Vegas.
On Monday, the Eastern Conference play-in tournament would begin. The #8 seed would play the #15 seed, #9 would play #14, #10 would play #13 and #11 would play #12. Tuesday, the Western Conference’s bottom eight teams would have their first round.
On Wednesday, the four East teams who won their first-round games would meet, lowest seed remaining versus the highest seed. The West semi-finals would be on Thursday.
Then on Friday night, each conference would hold its “championship game”, with the two winners earning the #8 seed in their respective conference. The “real” playoffs would still start on Saturday, and the two teams that won their way in would be guaranteed not to play until Sunday.
Hopefully, my playoff system would also give the top teams in each conference even more incentive to try and finish with the #1 seed. In addition to having home-court advantage throughout the playoffs, it’s possible the #1 seed might get to play their first-round series against a 25-win team. That might it easier for them to sweep their opening series, giving them more rest for later rounds.
The downside of my proposal? Honestly, I can’t think of any. If you come up with one, leave a comment and we’ll discuss it.
Don Ellis started covering sports professionally when he was 15. He attended Ball State University, and some of his past credits include InsideHoops (columnist) and ESPN Florida (The Florida Sports Reporters, SportsCenter anchor). In addition to running Bullsville.net and writing for The Sports Bank and ChicagoNow (Bullsville), he is also a KHSAA baseball umpire. He’s a 3rd-generation Cubs fan, a Bulls fan since the days of Van Lier and Sloan, and a life-long New England Patriots fan. Follow Don on Twitter @Bullsville and like Bullsville on Facebook.