This summer’s free agency moves make the result of the upcoming playoffs a foregone conclusion, so why not make it interesting?
Ever since the Warriors burst onto the scene in 2015 and Lebron returned to the Cavaliers, the playoffs have gone the same way each year. Golden State has cruised through every series but two in the Western Conference (OKC in ‘16 and HOU in ‘18) and Lebron’s Cavs have done much of the same. This dominance was especially evident in the 2017 playoffs when GSW and CLE went a combined 24-1 as they hurtled towards their 3rd straight meeting in the finals. Even now that Lebron has moved out west and a different team will finally come out of the East, Golden State is still expected to win it all again. The addition of Demarcus Cousins has only driven the metaphorical nail deeper into the other 29 teams coffins.
With the rise of this Golden State dynasty, the NBA has become predictable. Any basketball fan will tell you that. No matter how many analysts are paid to go on television and convince us otherwise, we know the Warriors are going to be celebrating a championship by the end of the year. Nothing short of injuries, uncharacteristic team drama, or Adam Silver banning Golden State from the league is going to stop that. Instead, Silver should give the league new life by reformatting the playoffs so that the top 16 teams make it in regardless of conference.
This adjustment sounds more challenging than it really is. The playoffs would still keep the same amount of games and rounds, home court would still be awarded to the team with the better record, and four wins would still end a series. The change would come to the seeding. Instead of the first seed playing the eighth seed they would instead play the sixteenth, even if they were in different conferences. The rest of the teams would follow suit as the second seed would play the fifteenth and so on.
With this format, teams like the Denver Nuggets, who missed out on the playoffs by one game last year, wouldn’t be disadvantaged by the conference they’re in. Instead the pressure would be on teams like last year’s Wizards who went 43-39 and landed comfortably in the East’s eighth seed. Meanwhile, the Nuggets were ninth in the West at 46-36 which would have been good for sixth in the East. This example is one of many that highlights the talent disparity between the East and the West, one that has only been amplified by Lebron’s move to LA.
Obviously, the first obstacle that comes to mind would be all the extra travel, especially in a situation where a California team would face off against a team on the East Coast. The answer is simply to allow extra days for the teams to rest after travelling, like how the schedule for the Finals work. It’s not like the NBA minds extending it’s season by a few days.
The possibilities that this revision could create are really interesting. It would allow for new rivalries to be formed between teams that don’t play each other often in the regular season, like Lebron’s Lakers and Kyrie’s Celtics (the prospect of these two teams matching up should be reason enough to make the adjustment). The change would also make it less likely to see the same matchups repeating year after year, at least on a team by team basis (sorry Toronto but you might not have escaped Lebron for long). Finally, it would open the door for a 16 seed to knock off the best team in the league, dropping them from the NBA’s best down to being the internet’s biggest meme.
The move may not be made for years to come but the idea has certainly been talked about. Silver has discussed a playoff change before but the biggest obstacle comes down to a vote. 20 out of the 30 teams in the league would have to agree on the adjustment. It may not seem likely right now but it’s certainly not impossible that this gets done.