NBA Commissioner Adam Silver joined the local Golden State Warriors broadcast during their game against the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday night. Among the things discussed was the potential reformatting of the NBA Playoffs.
Silver echoed a sentiment that many around the basketball world have hinted at over the past few years. Reformatting the playoffs was a possibility.
Indicating that the NBA’s goal is to see the best teams in the playoffs, Silver had this to say (via Pro Basketball Talk).
Ultimately we want to see your best teams in the playoffs. And there is an unbalance and a certain unfairness. There is a proposal (from one of the broadcasters)… where the division winners would all automatically go into the playoffs and then you’d seed the next 10 best teams. I think that’s the kind of proposal we need to look at.
There are travel issues of course, but in this day in age every team of course has their own plane, travels charter. I don’t think the discussion should end there. And as I’ve said, my first year I was studying a lot of these issues and year 2 is time to take action. It’s something I’m going to look at closely with the competition committee. I do think it’s an area where we need to make a change.
Under this idea, all six division winners in the two conferences would earn a spot in the playoffs. The following 10 would then be decided by best overall record.
It’s not a secret that the 2014-2015 NBA season has been defined by an elite Western Conference, especially in comparison to what we have seen in the east.
If the season were to end today, the New Orleans Pelicans (26-23) and Oklahoma City Thunder (25-24) would be on the outside looking in out west. Meanwhile, the Charlotte Bobcats (21-27) and Miami Heat (21-28) would earn the two final spots back east.
If we were to look at Silver’s idea, only five teams from the Eastern Conference—three division winners included—would be among the 16 playoff teams.
It’s an interesting thing to look at. However, it would be a hard sell to owners in the Eastern Conference, who would see their financial bottom line impacted by this potential change.
Photo: Washington Post