Revised NBA Schedule Idea (Tanking, Draft Order, Tournaments, Etc.)

[nebist]

NBA Schedule Proposal
 
Eastern and Western Conference is abolished.
 
Regular Season:
1. All 30 teams play 58 games. The 58 games consist of a home and home with the 29 other teams.
2. After the regular season, there is a 2-week “break”, which includes All-Star weekend, the trade deadline, buyouts deadline, etc. This time also allows the league to finalize the schedules for the Seeding Season and Draft Season.
3. The top 22 teams by record qualify for the Seeding Season.
4. The bottom 8 teams by record qualify for the Draft Season.
 
Seeding Season:
1. Teams 1-22 play each other once each (21 games).
2. Their record adds to their initial record from the first 58 games, so they will have played a total of 79 games at the end of the Seeding Season.
3. Seeds 1-11 get 11 home games and 10 away games during the Seeding Season.
4. Seeds 12-22 get 10 home games and 11 away games during the Seeding Season.
5. After the Seeding Season is complete, the top 16 records make the playoffs. Playoffs follow traditional formatting (7 game series) but matchups are based on 1-16, 2-15, 3-14, etc.
6. After the Seeding Season, records and draft order is set for the teams that finish 17-22.
a. 17th best record receives 9th pick in draft.
b. 18th best record receives 10th pick in draft.
c. 19th best record receives 11th pick in draft.
d. 20th best record receives 12th pick in draft.
e. 21st best record receives 13th pick in draft.
f. 22nd best record receives 14th pick in draft.
 
Draft Season:
1. Teams 23-30 play an additional 14 games. The 14 games consist of a home and home with the 7 other Lottery teams.
2. Their record adds to their initial record from the first 58 games, so they will have played a total of 72 games at the end of the Draft Season.
3. Their 72-game record becomes their 1-8 seed for the Draft Tournament. The team with the best record is the 1 seed, etc.
a. The Draft Tournament is an 8-team, double elimination tournament where the high seed plays at home.
b. It determines the order of picks 1-8 in the draft.
c. You can play as little as 2 games in the Draft Tournament if you lose your first 2 games.
d. You can play as many as 5 games in the Draft Tournament if you win the whole thing while losing 1 game along the way. So teams in the Draft Tournament would play a total of between 74 and 77 games combined in their complete season.
e. The bracket for an 8-team, double elimination tournament can be found online.
f. The losers of the A/B game and C/D game pick 7 and 8 in the draft. The higher seed picks 7 and the lower seed picks 8.
g. The next two teams eliminated (loser of E vs. A/B and loser of F vs. C/D) pick 5 and 6 in the draft. The higher seed picks 5 and the lower seed picks 6.
h. So on and so forth. The team that wins the Draft Tournament picks 1st in the draft.
 
 

 
Possible Cons:
1. Owners would lose a couple of regular season home game gates.
2. Would be more travel (at least in the regular season) with the balanced scheduling (no conferences).
 
Benefits:
1. Every team would have to play to win for the entire season. It essentially abolishes the concept of tanking altogether as every part of the process prioritizes winning.
2. The increase in travel would be more than offset by the extra breaks afforded by having a 3 fewer regular season games and a 2-week break around the all-star event and trade deadline.
3. The Seeding Season and Draft Season/Tournament would be must-watch TV for fans of all teams. Fans of bottom 8 teams would still be heavily invested in rooting for their teams to win to earn a high draft pick all the way until they are eliminated. The Draft Tournament in particular would likely get big ratings in home markets, especially when there is a generational talent in the draft like a LeBron or a Zion.
4. The Seeding Season would be great basketball. The bottom 8 teams would be out of the picture, eliminating blowout games between two teams with seasons going in different directions. All 22 teams would be scrapping for playoff spots and/or playoff positioning.
5. I would have to think whatever revenue lost in dropping some home gates would be more than made up for in the far more consistent TV ratings this schedule would generate.

[otherdave]

Bloody brilliant!!!!

Thank you!

[slamtheking]

TP for the in-depth thought and concept.  one other con you missed though.  the truly bottom feeder teams will be stuck in the 5-8 draft positions for several years at a pop unless they can hit it big in free agency which is pretty unlikely if they suck that bad.

[nebist]

TP for the in-depth thought and concept.  one other con you missed though.  the truly bottom feeder teams will be stuck in the 5-8 draft positions for several years at a pop unless they can hit it big in free agency which is pretty unlikely if they suck that bad.

This is possible, but I don’t think there would be as many truly awful teams each year. Currently, there seem to be 3-4 teams by the end of each season that have fully gone in the tank. With tanking totally disincentivized in this system, the worst teams wouldn’t be as bad. To take last year as an example, the Thunder would not send Horford home, the Pistons would not buy out Blake Griffin, etc. They would want those players to help them win the Draft Tournament.

[blink]

tp for the well thought out proposal
that would def make for a more interesting 'playoff time'