New NBA playoff structure idea - increase competition in the regular season

[Tr1boy]

Having listened to CLNS recent podcast, there was some interesting ideas by the analyst/host as to how to improve/make the regular season to playoffs more interesting.

One idea was to bring back 1st round byes.  You work your butt off to nail the best record, so that means you get to rest for the 1st round. 

Idea

- best teams in each conference get 1st round byes.  Makes the regular season a whole lot more interesting.  Just like how it is in football

- teams with 7th and 8th best records in each conference, at the end of the season need to play a one game playoff game to determine who stays in the playoffs and who goes home.  7th seed team gets home court advantage.   Whichever team loses and goes home, will get the same odds to win the lottery as the 9th team best team in conference.

Yes , some revenue will be lost in the 1st round due to the byes but the regular season will become that much more intense, which could generate more revenue overall.  Teams from 1-4th will likely not be able to afford to sit players in the last 5 games of the season.      Also teams from 6-10 will be playing that much harder to prevent dropping to 7th or try to climb to the 8th spot.

[Big333223]

I don't see how that would increase regular season competition. There's already incentive to get the best record to earn homecourt. I don't think a first round bye would be much more incentive.

Also, basketball is too different from football. The first round might last 2 weeks and that gives those #1 seeds a ton of time off.

[kozlodoev]

The reason why first round bye in football and the one-game playoff in baseball are big deals are because: (1) football is high-trauma sport (you play 1 game a week, for crying out loud), where the extra week's rest is, in fact, significant, and (2) playing an extra game has repercussions on the usage of your #1 starter. Neither of these is relevant to basketball.

[Tr1boy]

I don't see how that would increase regular season competition. There's already incentive to get the best record to earn homecourt. I don't think a first round bye would be much more incentive.

Also, basketball is too different from football. The first round might last 2 weeks and that gives those #1 seeds a ton of time off.

I think it would be.  You don't face the chance to get eliminated in the 1st round.  Rest players that might have bump and bruises.     It's an extra reward to getting the best record in your conference. And anyways, when has the 8th seed ever beat the 1st seed in the NBA?    1st round between 1st and 8th seed teams has always been snoozers imo

[Surferdad]

Anything that decreases revenues is a non starter.

[Tr1boy]

The reason why first round bye in football and the one-game playoff in baseball are big deals are because: (1) football is high-trauma sport (you play 1 game a week, for crying out loud), where the extra week's rest is, in fact, significant, and (2) playing an extra game has repercussions on the usage of your #1 starter. Neither of these is relevant to basketball.

The NBA used to have 1st round byes.   I thought it worked out well.  Again there is an extra incentive to play your best. The best teams, to try to get the bye. And the 5-6th teams to try to avoid dropping to 7th.  8th-10th teams to try to nail the 8th seed and make it in. Lottery odds for the draft for these teams become meaningless anyways

[Tr1boy]

Anything that decreases revenues is a non starter.

I don't care to be honest.  The regular season at times is a drag. You can't tell me , you don't think so.  And like I stated, because winning regular seasons means that much more, overall revenue could be better

What is worse are teams sitting players down with 5-7 games left to go.    It should be a fast run before the finish line before the sprint to the finish

[Surferdad]

Anything that decreases revenues is a non starter.

I don't care to be honest.  The regular season at times is a drag. You can't tell me , you don't think so.  And like I stated, because winning regular seasons means that much more, overall revenue could be better

What is worse are teams sitting players down with 5-7 games left to go.    It should be a fast run before the finish line before the sprint to the finish

Just giving you the likely reaction from ownership.