NBA should consider realignment and changing the schedule

[bdm860]

I think it's funny that there's so much talk of imbalance, when a similar thing happened in the '80s—in that entire decade, the Western Conference had only two representatives in the Finals: the Lakers and the Rockets—and no one seemed to care.

And that Houston team in the '81 Finals had a losing record 40-42! Something I don't think is talked about enough.

[johnnygreen]

I'm on the fence on benefiting from being in a bad division. Sometimes those types of divisional rivalry games can be very difficult due to familiarity between the teams. At the same time, playing so many games against potentially bad teams, can possibly hurt you come playoff time because your not use to playing against elite competition.

[nickagneta]

Power shifts from conference to conference every decade or so. I see no reason to change anything with the NBA alignment, schedule or playoff seeding. The draft, free agency and good GMs will have the power back in the East in time.

[angryguy77]

I'd rather see a 50 game season than mess with the divisions.

[jay]

If they add two teams, I would like to see an NFL model for division. Say they add a team in Seattle as well as a team in the middle of the country like St Louis or Kansas City. (Now that the NFL left STL, I could see them getting a team. Another option is Omaha, they have no major pro teams, a good number of Fortune 500 companies, plus Creighton basketball has really good attendance)

Seattle
Utah
Portland
Denver

Sac
GS
LAL
LAC

Phoenix
SA
Houston
Dallas

Memphis
OKC
Minny
Omaha or STL

NO
ATL
Orlando
Miami

Chicago
Milwaukee
Detroit
Indiana

Boston
NY
Brooklyn
Philly

Cleveland
Toronto
Washington
Charlotte


You could shift Phoenix west, move Sacto up, move Denver over,and move OKC back in with Texas teams.

6 games vs division = 18
4 games vs rest of conference = 48
1 games vs other conference = 16

[jay]

You don't want to saturate the games within a division. IMO one of the main reason rivalries are dying is because there are too many games not too few. It also imbalances the league, it feels counterproductive, you are actively trying to punish good management in favour of representation from all parts of the USA.

If you simplified this to the only change being NO and Milwaukee switch conferences, plus the shake up of divisions then I can see merit but you'd need to analyse how it would affect travel time for each team. Milwaukee would obviously hate this...

There are too many teams on the East vs. the West so some teams are going to have problems.  At least I've given Milwaukee, Minnesota.  I think eventually they are going to add 2 teams, probably Seattle and let's just say St. Louis.  I think they would then go to 4, 8 team divisions or 8, 4 team divisions, which would actually clean up some of those travel issues a great deal.

So assume Seattle and St. Louis get added

You can keep East and West here if you want

East
1 - Bos, NY, Bkn, Phi, Was, Tor, Cle, Det
2 - Mia, Orl, Atl, NO, Cha, SA, Hou, Dal

West
3 - Ind, Chi, Mil, Min, Mem, StL, OKC, Den
4 - LAL, LAC, GS, Sac, Por, Sea, Pho, Uta

Then play the other conference 2 times - 32 games
Other division 3 times - 24 games
Own Division 4 times - 28 games

So that is an 84 game schedule.  I realize it adds 2, but I think with the cut down on travel it might work out ok.  Denver is the only team really out of place, but not much you can do there.

Now if you went for 4 team divisions, I think you would change some of that up.

East
1 - Bos, NY, Bkn, Phi
2 - Mia, Orl, Atl, NO
3 - Ind, Chi, Mil, Tor
4 - Cha, Was, Cle, Det

West
5 - OKC, Dal, Hou, SA
6 - Mem, StL, Den, Min
7 - LAL, LAC, GS, Sac
8 - Por, Sea, Pho, Uta

2 games each against other conference - 32 games
3 games each against other divisions - 36 games
5 games each against own division - 15 games

So 83 game schedule - adds 1, though could just do 4 games against own division and drop 2 games. 

The divisions aren't quite as clean that way as more than just Denver is out of place, but I think that would be a workable solution as well.  Again that is with the addition of Seattle and St. Louis.

This is basically the same idea I had. In yours, go with 4 games each against own division and make a 78 game schedule?

[ETNCeltics]

Hate it. The imbalance between conferences won't last forever. You just don't expect the teams in NY and Chicago to be so inept for so long.

[Mike Pemulis]

I don't like it outside of Memphis and one other team. It would eliminate or reduce certain rivalries (sort of like what happened with the ACC). The Lakers dominated the lonely west for the entire 1980s. These things shift. Here's a quote from the always reliable website Reddit:

"From 1980 to 1989, the Houston Rockets were the only other West team to not only make the Finals, but the only West team to beat the Lakers in a playoff series- 1981 and 1986.
Save for that, they never lost a West playoff series and reached the Finals each year.
When you look at some of the teams you had in the West that were capable of playing good at times for spurts- Gervin's Spurs, Mark Aguirre's Mavericks, Alex English's Nuggets, the Trail Blazers, Walter Davis' Suns and the 1989 Suns team of KJ/Hornacek/Eddie Johnson, the Utah Jazz of Mailman and Stockton."
 

[GreenEnvy]

I don’t see the issue. The best team is in the West, big deal. Was it an issue when the Bulls rattled off two three-peats in the 90’s? Or when that was followed by the best wing and the best big pairing up for a three-peat (then adding two more HoF’ers that had everyone shaking in their boots)?

MLB has the three-best teams right now in the AL, and all three would be favored over any NL team. Are they considering playoff changes? No.

NBA just doesn’t have a firm grasp of reality and often try to fix “problems” that aren’t really issues.

The lottery works. Sure teams tank, but unlike other sports, it doesn’t guarantee them the top pick. You don’t think football teams tank? Or NHL/MLB teams trade off their best players or rest them down the stretch when they are well out of playoff races?

Did people cry (well, other than Celtics fans) when Duncan landed in San Antonio? Sometimes tanking teams win, sometimes truly bad teams get unlucky.

I think he NBA has an inferiority complex with the NFL (and maybe MLB) and is constantly trying to perfect something that isn’t perfectible. No league is perfect. Every league has dynasties and imbalances. But these things regulate themselves over time.

This is Silver panicking because GSW made a mockery of his salary cap. Stern wouldn’t have cared.

[boscel33]

winning a division should guarantee a top seed.  you play the schedule given to you, no one knows what's going to happen.  there are times when schedules are set and fans think, wow, this is an easy schedule, but then the season starts, and it becomes a lot tougher due to injuries or players coming out of no where.  we lost gordon hayward 5 minutes into the season and i guarantee that had an affect on the rest of the season.  what happens if kd or sc were to go down for the year in golden state?  all of a sudden, the teams in that division and conference probably win a few extra matches.

[Celtics4ever]

No , they should not change it, it's tradition and I think the EAST WEST is better than the BEST, this is not the NCAA.

[Moranis]

I think it's funny that there's so much talk of imbalance, when a similar thing happened in the '80s—in that entire decade, the Western Conference had only two representatives in the Finals: the Lakers and the Rockets—and no one seemed to care.

These things have ebbs and flows, and things always shift eventually—"on their own," so to speak. It seems to me, for example, that over the next couple of seasons, free agents from Western teams will see the relative weakness of the East and decide that the East offers a better path to success.

to be fair on the Celtics, Sixers, and Pistons made the Finals from the East in the 80's also. 

These were the finals
80 - Lakers over Sixers
81 - Celtics over Rockets
82 - Lakers over Sixers
83 - Sixers over Lakers
84 - Celtics over Lakers
85 - Lakers over Celtics
86 - Celtics over Rockets
87 - Lakers over Celtics
88 - Lakers over Pistons
89 - Pistons over Lakers

The Pistons beat the Blazers in the 90 Finals and then began Chicago's dominance.

So from the 1980 Finals through the 1993 Finals, the East had exactly 4 teams win the conference and they were all basically in spurts.  Sixers 3 of the first 4 (C's the other), then the C's 4 straight times, followed by 3 straight by the Pistons, and then the Bulls first 3-peat.  The West obviously wasn't much different as after the Blazers in 90, it went Lakers again, then Blazers again before the Suns in 93, then the Rockets twice more, Sonics, and the Jazz twice, leading into the Spurs and Lakers dominance of the late 90's early 00's. 

The League has always been about dominance at the top, what makes the league different right now is the shear volume of better teams in the West then the East.  That really hasn't happened at any time in the sport as historically each conference has had a dominant team, a couple other great teams, and then a handful of good teams.  Right now that just isn't really the case.  The West has significantly more top level teams and good teams.  If you moved 4 of the 12 good teams in the West to the East, at least 3 of them would be heavily favored to make the playoffs.  I think that is the real problem.  Now as I've said in 3 years, I think the East will swing back around since most of those teams in the West have older stars and there are far more younger elite level talents in the East right now, but then again those players might not develop or might venture West as well.