Why dont we recognize league play with a Trophy

[Ogaju]

I wouldn't care about trophies given for good seeding.

Should F1 give a trophy to formula 1 pilots with the best pole positions during the year?

I wouldn't care for that meaningless trophy, It would look like just another trophy inflation.

It is obvious from cheating KL that playing a whole season is too much for him. Therefore it takes a different skill set to compete in league play. K KL is only built for the playoffs. L is the perfect reason why Regular season success deserves its  own recognition. Lets see which teams can actually  survive the brutal 82 game regular season schedule.

Throw in a preseason and best team in the first round of the PO trophy while you are at it. Maybe even some smaller looking monthly championship trophies. October trophy sounds prestigious.

I just dont know why you do not appreciate the difference between a league play competition and a knockout competition. League competition is more exhaustive than knockout competition.  With league competition you are tested over an entire season and get to play all other teams. In knockout competition you avoid a whole lot of teams and may get very lucky with match ups and injuries JUST like Last season with Durant and Klay going down in the playoffs. You think Raptors get an asterisk? You do not think KL got an advantage over all else by sitting out 22 games in reg season?

I see the regular season as a preseason for the playoffs.
Kinda like Fridays and Saturdays in Formula 1. Playoffs are Sundays, time when championships are being decided.
Good pole position can surely help you to achieve good results in the actual race but they aren't that decisive.

Tanking bothers me much more as teams are trying to be worse for the sake of being worse.
Whereas when teams are resting players they are worse for the sake of being better when it matters the most.

You think the regular season is pre-season for the playoffs? Apart from basketball and Formula 1 do you follow any other sports?

You think the regular season is pre-season for the playoffs?
Yes I wrote that just a bit upwards.
You can be 16th best team in the regular season and still walk away with the ring on your finger.

Apart from basketball and Formula 1 do you follow any other sports?
Yes, I do, Football, Handball, Chess, Track and Field, Tennis, Boxing, and from time to time others aswell.

Why are you trying to discredit me?
C'mon.
I am not offensive toward you, I just formed a different opinion based on the same info you have.

Not trying to discredit you ...I wanted to know which sports you follow before I give examples. I was actually hoping you followed soccer because that is the best example of the difference between a regular season league format and a playoff knockout format. That is all. Thank you for the discussion.

[Somebody]

Holy Participation Award, Batman!!!!!!

Nope, they should not have them in the big boy sports,  only the champions get them.  This is not grade school.   We already have a ton of people thinking they are special, when they are not in this country, and sports in general because of this mindset.

To be fair it's really only American sports that value the playoffs to this degree, most major trophies in European sports are based on results over the course of the season. But yes I do agree with you that an RS trophy in the NBA would be nothing more than a glorified participation award given the history of American sports.

[Androslav]

You think the regular season is pre-season for the playoffs?
Yes I wrote that just a bit upwards.
You can be 16th best team in the regular season and still walk away with the ring on your finger.

Apart from basketball and Formula 1 do you follow any other sports?
Yes, I do, Football, Handball, Chess, Track and Field, Tennis, Boxing, and from time to time others aswell.

Why are you trying to discredit me?
C'mon.
I am not offensive toward you, I just formed a different opinion based on the same info you have.

Not trying to discredit you ...I wanted to know which sports you follow before I give examples. I was actually hoping you followed soccer because that is the best example of the difference between a regular season league format and a playoff knockout format. That is all. Thank you for the discussion.

On this side of Atlantic Football is Soccer. Of course, I follow it.
The Croatian national team is 2nd in the world.

[Ogaju]

Holy Participation Award, Batman!!!!!!

Nope, they should not have them in the big boy sports,  only the champions get them.  This is not grade school.   We already have a ton of people thinking they are special, when they are not in this country, and sports in general because of this mindset.

To be fair it's really only American sports that value the playoffs to this degree, most major trophies in European sports are based on results over the course of the season. But yes I do agree with you that an RS trophy in the NBA would be nothing more than a glorified participation award given the history of American sports.

If the league     recognizes it, and rewards it, the teams, players, and fans will adjust. It will become as competitive as the playoffs. And every game will count!!!!

[Ogaju]

The league apparently believes that the regular season needs to be tweaked to ensure that the competition is not lost during the regular season. It may not be a trophy, but it is clear the league us looking for a way to reward regular season accomplishment above merely as a stepping stone to a playoff at the end of the season.

[Somebody]

The league apparently believes that the regular season needs to be tweaked to ensure that the competition is not lost during the regular season. It may not be a trophy, but it is clear the league us looking for a way to reward regular season accomplishment above merely as a stepping stone to a playoff at the end of the season.

Not in favour of the changes. I think it'd drastically change the nature of the game to the point that we'd be unable to compare the great teams of the past to current ones, taking out a large chunk of NBA debate.

[ederson]

A trophy won't do it. Any change should have an effect on the way the NBA champion in decided. Otherwise it will be a minor trophy on the way to the actual one. Same thing as the local cups in European football. Top teams are more interested in Champions league, the local league. In cup games they often rest top players, or you them as test events for young players.

The league apparently believes that the regular season needs to be tweaked to ensure that the competition is not lost during the regular season. It may not be a trophy, but it is clear the league us looking for a way to reward regular season accomplishment above merely as a stepping stone to a playoff at the end of the season.

Not in favour of the changes. I think it'd drastically change the nature of the game to the point that we'd be unable to compare the great teams of the past to current ones, taking out a large chunk of NBA debate.

That's a problem? Not being able to compare past teams to the current?  And you are completely wrong about European sports. Every major sport except football has playoffs. Even a few leagues in football have it like Belgium.....

[Surferdad]

The league apparently believes that the regular season needs to be tweaked to ensure that the competition is not lost during the regular season. It may not be a trophy, but it is clear the league us looking for a way to reward regular season accomplishment above merely as a stepping stone to a playoff at the end of the season.

Not in favour of the changes. I think it'd drastically change the nature of the game to the point that we'd be unable to compare the great teams of the past to current ones, taking out a large chunk of NBA debate.

I agree.  Respect for history and ability to compare is why a lot of people follow the NBA.  I am not in favor of any changes to number of games and not a fan of re-seeding which would be the final nail in the coffin for conferences.

[Celtics4ever]

Because when we give awards for everything, awards cease to matter.

[Somebody]

Because when we give awards for everything, awards cease to matter.

To be fair football makes their "regular season" a huge trophy, and they have cup competitions as well. But yeah the history and system of American sports really isn't regular season friendly, I'm not in favour of the proposed changes

[KGs Knee]

Because when we give awards for everything, awards cease to matter.

To be fair football makes their "regular season" a huge trophy, and they have cup competitions as well. But yeah the history and system of American sports really isn't regular season friendly, I'm not in favour of the proposed changes

If NBA fans desire a league where winning a playoff tournament is important you're not going to be able to have a league where the regular season is vitally important when over half the teams make the playoffs. But you can't just drastically reduce the number of teams that make the playoffs, as now none of these teams have anything to play for and would lose a lot of money.  You have to give something meaningful to incentivize the teams that know they can't win the regular season.  This is where the benefit of having multiple, smaller national leagues roughly equivalent to each other massively helps European soccer succeed with the league structure they do.  You can be anywhere from 4th to 6th best and still make the 'playoffs' (either the CL or whatever they call the lesser version of it these days).

The reality is that most European soccer teams have zero chance of ever winning a league title and all they really have to play for is the chance to make one of the playoff 'leagues' (and the money/pride that comes with it), or avoid relegation.  So in a certain sense, it's not really that different than North American sports leagues, just that their conferences are called leagues and are completely separate from each other (somewhat how football and baseball used to be prior to the AFL-NFL merger / Super Bowl era and MLB inter-league play).

So maybe that is the answer, have the NBA go to a system where teams from the Eastern and Western conferences don't play each other and the winner of each conference (based solely on the regular-season) faces the other for the championship, just like football and baseball used to be many years ago.  To make up for the lost money from playoff games, all other teams from both conferences can play in a single tournament of their own for a lesser trophy (possibly stealing from the home-away aggregate score format of early rounds of the CL).

Personally, I don't see a need to make such radical changes, and I don't think there is an overwhelming appetite for it among fans of NA sports leagues.

[Yoki_IsTheName]

This could work if there's an incentive, not just a trophy.

Maybe the regular season trophy winners get a compensatory draft pick in between the 1st and the 2nd round pick for next year's draft, that can be fully tradeable?

If there's something up for grabs, and it's something that can actually improve the stature of any team winning it moving forward, it could work.

[nickagneta]

This isn't European soccer. The NBA doesn't have a regular season attendence problem. Just leave it like it is.

[tazzmaniac]

This isn't European soccer. The NBA doesn't have a regular season attendence problem. Just leave it like it is.

Yes.  Sometimes do nothing is the correct choice.  Now if they want to have a midseason tournament and it gets rid of the awful allstar games I could go for that.   

[Yoki_IsTheName]

This isn't European soccer. The NBA doesn't have a regular season attendence problem. Just leave it like it is.

I don't think it's about the attendance, Master Nick, I think it's so teams would care more about the regular season.

As I mentioned, just giving what could look like a meaningless trophy wouldn't work. But if there's an incentive for teams to be the best team in the regular season, then we could avoid things like load management on players, teams on the top tanking to rig their seedings, etc. But there has to be an incentive, it can't just be a trophy because even if the NBA recognizes it as something prestigious, teams wont.

I suggested that the trophy winning team would not only win a trophy, but be awarded an extra draft pick in the upcoming system, right in between the 1st and the 2nd rounds, that can be fully tradeable. That could be valuable for teams to play for, especially the ones on the top that would want to keep improving their already good squads.