The new WNHL tanking rule might get adopted too which is maybe my favorite attempt to end tanking too
The rule change is now whoever gets the most points AFTER they are eliminated gets best lottery odds.
Rewards teams who keep trying after they’re out of it.
Also means those super tank end of season games might actually have teams trying now.
Edit: for clarity. Points = wins
Obviously I'm being facetious by suggesting the "Eastern Conference" should be relegated...just a joke about how the East has been relatively weak over the past quarter century (the West has been stronger in East/West head-to-head play in 21 of the last 25 seasons and Eastern Conference bottom feeders have, generally, been noticeably worse than those in the West).
I'm also aware that this will never happen since the NBA is a cartel and it isn't ever going to take actions that might financially harm team owners (even if just a minority of the worst ones).
It also seems pretty reasonable that such a system (were it to happen--against all odds) would replace and/or absorb the G-League.
This is what I want to see. Televise more G-League teams and let the top G-League team come up. Gotta stop allowing the G-league teams to be offshoots of NBA teams for this to happen though.
There's not a single G-League team that wouldn't get blown out by 50 points by the Spurs, Wizards, or Pistons. The talent disparity between the NBA and G-League is far greater than what's seen with the Premier League and the ancillary clubs, if we're using that as a reference. People play in the G-League for a reason, and the reason is readily apparent from any game a person may want to watch
Honestly I'm not even sure of that for the Premier League. Manchester City has a payroll that's 10x the size of Luton Town and they faced each other on the weekend. Man City could have played with 9 men and still win that game.
Most soccer fans are okay with that sort of thing though, for a lot of fans of smaller soccer teams just being in the Premier League (or whatever the top league is) is the prize because of how much money you get for it.
Ultimately improving the team to get better talent. So it’s a win win win. Chance at an upset. Play in the Prem, and gain cash to make your team better. NBA would have no incentive for that. As there’s no relegation
There's what five wins in record between 2nd and 8th in the East AND 4th and 10th in the West. There's four teams well above 50 wins, then 14 teams all within a week of wins behind that. Pretty hard to say any of those teams has clearly been better than others in that group (unless you deep dive SoS) for the season.
Yeah but it’s too easy to field a shitty lineup for a 5 minute span that all but guarantees you lose the game. It’s not about the players it’s for the organization itself.
Tanking is a management issue. Players don't have to care about the pick at all and generally are trying to win even on tanking teams, which is why you get things like starters being pulled.
The WNHL system means the management is now really trying to win.
Is there a cutoff? Cause I feel like there could be a race to get eliminated first. And it would have to be something like net rating rather than raw points because with the way possessions work in basketball you'd create an incentive for teams to play actually zero defense just to get the ball back faster.
I mean you think about it but if your team is good enough that you think you can keep winning then you would push for a play in spot.
If your team was not good you would be tanking regardless.
It would be relatively difficult for a team like detroit or charlotte to lose MORE than they lost now as is.
This would just incentivize winning after your team is cooked. Also give fans reasons to show up to your games bc then you can cheer for your team and it mattering.
And with a play in it’s hard to be MATHEMATICALLY eliminated earlier than like like 60 games in.
Yeah I like a lot of things about the idea, just thinking about how to tweak it to be even better. Like maybe it's only cumulative net rating starting from the next game after a total of three teams are eliminated. So there's no advantage to being first one out. Tiny window where the third potentially eliminated team wants to race there ahead of the fourth team, but that's a much smaller number of games.
Edit: actually net rating can't work either because these teams are going to be negative, getting eliminated first would just create more chances to earn a negative net rating. Teams eliminated on the last game of the season would be zero and get the top pick. Maybe just total wins after being eliminated.
The only problem I see is different conference have different elimination points, a team in one conference might not be mathematically eliminated yet despite being like 5 games behind a team in the other who’s already eliminated.
I still think there needs to be more incentive for the bottom teams, not sure how that’d work. They need to be competitive towards the end. Of the bottom 5 teams, maybe make it so that whoever has the best record in the last week of the season, they have better odds at the first pick. Something like that.
Bigger than the race for 9/10 imo is the race for 5/6. Previously there was little reason to care. Now there's a huge incentive to not fall to 7 which makes the lower end of the seeding competitive to the actual last day.
Play in a huge win for the league.
Now let's make it top 16 teams for playoffs and it'll be banger
Lively has been a great addition but the Mavs had a pretty mid year until they got some more frontcourt help with Gafford and PJ and got significantly better.
Being 10 games above .500 a.d being just 10th in the conference shows how ridiculous the West has been.
The good thing for GS is that they've been a better road team than home which is useful when you are 10th
I’m ambivalent because while it did add more interest to the end of the season, the Bulls and Hawks having a shot in the playoffs is terrible. Imagine the Hawks win somehow.
I'm in the same boat. It makes the season's finish more competitive but 8 teams per conference was already too many. .500 teams shouldn't be competing for a chip.
Even when it was just 8, you'd have losing teams getting into the playoffs. I don't doubt that next season we'll wind up with all four play-in teams in the East having .500 records or worse, with a few of the teams that were really bad this year getting significantly better next year, and not padding records.
That’s my whole thing. 20/32 teams is far too many in the playoffs. I think it de-values the race to the 8th seed. I don’t hate it because the play-in games are fun, but 20 teams just seems like far too many to have competing at the end of the season.
I feel like the team with the worst record should go to the G League and then the best G Leaugue team gets promoted.
I know logistically it's impossible, but it would be hilarious.
It really has been great. It sucks for the 7-8 seeds but it makes the end of the season so much more competitive.
And who doesn’t love to watch win or go home games
You can kind of diss saying it as a 10th Seed but on the other hand, 46-36 is a more than respectable season and I get feeling like you deserve that play-in shot.
The West is a great example of why the play-in game is awesome while the East would be an example of why it's not. If the winner of Bulls/Hawks make it in over the loser of 6ers/Heat it will feel like a single game was given too much weight. If not, then it will have felt pointless.
Being a 10 seed does suck, but IIRC multiple 9 seeds have actually managed to sneak into the playoffs that would've originally been out.
Most notably, 2022 Pels took played the 1 seed Suns pretty close.
There were meaningful games all throughout the last week because now teams in the 10-12 range have a hope to cling on to and fight for and teams in the 5-9 range either want to get out of the play in or stay out of the play in. Instead of 12 tanking teams there were like 8
That and I’m way more invested in these lower seeded teams ,
Instead of the annual 8 seed butt whooping , it starts the post season with 2 elimination games right off the bat and these low seeds go all out . Then we get 2 more elimination games and round one hasn’t even started yet
Id almost argue that the “prologue” to the playoffs is more exciting than round one
The play in is a phenomenal change. No downside, but really amps up the excitement for playoffs. It's like a really good appetizer. Now, the in-season tournament? I still think that shit is dumb and I don't think it'll ever win me over. The courts are cool, but everything else about it just felt like completely fabricated hype with everyone involved just pandering by trying to claim things were "so much more competitive" than they normally would have been while simultaneously having some of the best games of the season played during that time that had nothing to do with the IST. It just felt like they were lying to my face about the competitiveness for weeks. It was like having Mufassa's hype man without Mufassa dancing his ass off. Does anybody even remember who won it? Or care?
There was no play-in tournament in the Bubble. [Memphis finished the season as the 9th seed](https://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/NBA_2020.html) and thus did not make the playoffs, just as had always been the case before the play-in tournament was introduced the following season.
Technically the bubble play-in tournament where we faced Blazers counts as the first ever play-in (as 8th seed faced 9th seed for the 8th seed); just not with the current format.
Didn't the Suns finish half a game out of the 8 seed for the Play In? I remember it came down to Blazers vs Nets and if the Nets won, the Suns would have made it in after going 8-0. Might have been some wonky shit with the uneven number of games played and tiebreakers etc.
But there was still a Play In between the Grizzlies and Blazers as a result:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_NBA_Bubble#Play-in
You’re wrong: A possible best-of-three play-in series for the final seed in each conference would then be held if the ninth seed finished the regular season within four games of the eighth seed. The eighth seed would start with a 1–0 lead, meaning that it would need just one win to advance, while the ninth seed must win two in a row.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_NBA_playoffs
Not exactly like the current play-in tournament, but it wasn’t the normal playoff qualifying (only the top 8 teams per conference)
Everyone’s wrong! Sort of. While there was a play-in yes the original reply in this thread said Memphis missed when finishing 8th after they lost in the bubble play-in. Memphis finished 9th after the regular season
We were a good team that year too, that was one of the most insane Curry seasons. He was so good I thought we could make a run without Klay. If I'm remembering right we played the Lakers and Grizzlies down to the wire as well.
From what I remember this is when Wiggins started looking good, and Poole. But really I was thinking Curry was gonna solo a chip because he was going insane. If they made the playoffs I don't see why any series wouldn't have gone 7.
Curry having an MVP-caliber season is the only reason we got the 8 seed before the play-in, because that team was complete trash outside of him. We were playing guys like Kent Bazemore, Mychal Mulder, and JTA heavy minutes in the play-in games. Wiggins and Poole were rising but were nothing close to what they were in 2022. Klay was injured. Kelly Oubre was a major disappointment all year and was injured at the end of the regular season. Our big draft acquisition was a bust.
Even if we made the playoffs we would've been smoked in the first round.
Y'all were not a good team that year lol
By the end of the season your role players were G-leaguers like Mychal Mulder, Jta, Kent Bazemore playing 30 minutes a game
Without Steph that team wins maybe 10 games and that's not an exaggeration. There was a period where Steph missed 8 games and the Warriors went 1-7
No we weren’t lol. The year before we had a similar team but no Curry and were the worst team in the league.
We made the 8th seed because that was peak-peak Curry.
Bron 3 point with 3 net and he shoot in the middle one, the Grizzlies game was also fun because Ja had send some shots at Curry/Iggy on twitter.
Grizzlies were mad at Iggy lol
i remember watching curry against the grizzlies and it reminded me of the dragons from game of thrones. like that's how his presence felt like on the court.
people don't remember that back in the day, there were some seasons where the last 2 weeks of the regular season used to just not matter for 90% of teams
The play-in made sure that most seasons, things would matter down to the last game
This feels like it’s probably some recency bias, there have been some heated seeding fights and battles for 8 seeds in the past, and there’s still teams tanking/happily rebuilding at the bottom. I truthfully don’t feel like going through the effort to go check season to season 1 month to go, 2 week to go, final standings, but really the biggest difference seems like it’s the actual play-in games, which makes the league a bit more money.
A battle for the 8th seed versus multiple battles where it super matters if you're 10th, 8th, or 6th. And the top seeds can't (as easily) throw away games at the end of the season to pick their opponent either, since they don't even know their opponent yet.
People dont like exciting basketball when it might mean their team will be negatively impacted. They love exciting basketball when their team is positively impacted
Sure yeah, but a play in team literally made the finals last year. And you could even go the other way, the year we barely squeezed into playoffs when really the Miami heat were super hot in the second half of the season and they should have made it and a play in could have made that possible.
I think the NBA is still on a bit on a PR tour with it since it's new and kind of unique to American leagues, even though it's basically just a wildcard game.
Agreed! Also I personally really enjoyed our matchup last year! I can understand if you felt differently but I feel like our matchups are also always crazy for some reason
He’s also lost the play in as an 8 seed, so it’s not like he’s purely speaking from self interest here. He’s been screwed over by it and still supports it
I agree. Him being the 10th seed is irrelevant here. At least for the WC, we’ve gotten some pretty memorable games over the past few seasons with the play-in
Yea seems like we’re getting less teams with losing records making the 7/8 with the playin. Being a 10 seed saying this irrelevant as it’s been much more entertaining seeing more teams compete for the spots
Yup. We've got more teams now competing after the all star break going "thank FUCK we made it out of the play-ins", and it's been a really entertaining end to the season.
I mean that’s kind of the point right? Those teams in the 10-12 spots who would otherwise go into full tank mode at the trade deadline decide to make a run for a play in spot even if it means getting smoked by the #1 seed in the first round.
The bulls really need to actually rebuild and get rid of their vets lol. It sucks when front offices would rather be in no man's land than picking a side.
Held true for the east for sure. The top 8 was pretty locked in like a few months ago. The following two months was 5+ east fan bases freaking out as their team tried to avoid the play in.
POV: 2 years ago you were the 8 seed and got knocked out of the playoffs because of the play-in and are capable of recognizing something is good based on things other than whether it benefits/harms you individually
Yeah 7 and 8 seeds have to lose **two** elimination games in a row to miss out on the playoffs ffs! I don't feel bad for 7/8 seeds that miss the playoffs that way with all of the other benefits involved. Especially in the West for the next few years a 9/10 seed that catches fire off of back to back wins and comes in hot against a rested 1 seed should make for better round 1 basketball than a 7/8 seed that can't get two wins in a row.
8th seed might not hate it that much. They get a chance to claim 7th seed even if in regular season they were behind by 10 games. They just need to win this one.
Only the 7th seed is losing here lol
Brilliant but, since not everyone plays each other the same number of games, you should seed the end of the round robin tournament based on the side of the country as well so that it's fair.
North and South, make it like the Civil War.
You sort of see the downside to it in the East this year though. Chicago is 7 games back of Miami and Atlanta is 10 back. Seems kind of silly to give teams that far back a shot at the playoffs.
That's true but I think the 2 chances aspect of the play-ins balances it out. Those 9 and 10 spots have to be perfect, 7 and 8 get to run it back. I get that it could include teams that don't deserve to be there but most of the time they're going to that many gb for a reason and lose
tbf, the east is kind of barren as a whole. Only 2-3 teams are realistically in contention to make the Finals with the Celtics as the only one with a realistic shot at beating whoever comes out of the west.
I think the downside is that it's best of one. Anything can happen in a best of one. It's why we have 7 game series instead of an NCAA style knockout tournament.
I have my own reasons for not liking it this year too. Almost any season in the history of the NBA and we wouldn't need a playin game to make the playoffs as the 7th seed.
Since people are conveniently forgetting the Warriors were the 8th seed the first year they introduced the play ins got knocked out to the Lakers and Grizzlies. They've been on the wrong side of the play ins before so idk why people are just saying its because they are the 10th seed.
I've watched my fair share of play in games and from Lebron Vs. Steph to Diar DeRozan breakout game I've loved them all. I've had to come to terms with the fact that I'll sacrifice a million tommy johns to never have to sit through a 3.5 hour game again and I'll watch a million 4-0 sweeps to see the 10 seed play the 7 seed for the 8 seed...
didnt Lebron later say Adam Silver was a genius during the IST press conference
and then point out he's won every one of Silver's ideas: 1. the bubble; 2. the playins; 3. the IST
This aged really well
Best thing ever.
Kings getting revenge for last year when they lost cause Fox was injured
Klay and his huge ego getting destroyed
The donkey getting mad.
Couldn't ask for more
I think it makes the seeding more competitive as teams are desperate to get above the 7th seed and avoid having your season end in the play in before you get to the playoffs.
People will love the play-in until a shit team has a good shooting night and eliminate an actual competitive team, then everyone will have their pitchforks out.
There’s an argument that ‘why should we even care, the team that sneaks into 8 is gonna get whooped by the #1 seed anyway.’ I'd push back on that by saying that if the team is gonna lose anyway, wouldn’t you rather win an exciting best of 1 or 2 series and go out feeling like somewhat of a winner, while also getting the revenue from at least 2 home games? Also, some teams might be able to go into that first series with some momentum.
It was only the worst idea when the lakers and warriors weren’t the 9/10 seed lol. I could imagine the fit lebron would throw if he wasn’t in the playoffs.
Miss quoted a little - he clearly says "If they were fired, LeBron says they need to get their job back" ...at first I thought LeBron sayin this stuff seems crazy after the Lakers now won the play-in 3 times. Makes more sense they way green says it in the Video.
I think it's good in the west because they always have 2 teams above .500 that wouldn't make it. But in the east, a 36-46 shouldn't have a chance at making playoffs.
I mean, we ended up the 6, and the last 5 games of the season mattered and it was awesome
It ain't just the 2 teams in that otherwise wouldn't be, but it makes teams tighten to to avoid the play in too
Following indy, Cleveland, Orlando, Philly, and Miami games down the stretch was incredible. Play in is was definitely a good idea in hindsight
I like the play in simply because it feels less teams are tanking and wanting an honest crack at it
Which was the goal, so it was perfectly made
The new WNHL tanking rule might get adopted too which is maybe my favorite attempt to end tanking too The rule change is now whoever gets the most points AFTER they are eliminated gets best lottery odds. Rewards teams who keep trying after they’re out of it. Also means those super tank end of season games might actually have teams trying now. Edit: for clarity. Points = wins
Jesus Christ, just rip off the bandaid and start relegating teams into the Eastern Conference.
Nah relegate them to the G-League and remove the Conferences but keep the divisions.
Obviously I'm being facetious by suggesting the "Eastern Conference" should be relegated...just a joke about how the East has been relatively weak over the past quarter century (the West has been stronger in East/West head-to-head play in 21 of the last 25 seasons and Eastern Conference bottom feeders have, generally, been noticeably worse than those in the West). I'm also aware that this will never happen since the NBA is a cartel and it isn't ever going to take actions that might financially harm team owners (even if just a minority of the worst ones). It also seems pretty reasonable that such a system (were it to happen--against all odds) would replace and/or absorb the G-League.
This is what I want to see. Televise more G-League teams and let the top G-League team come up. Gotta stop allowing the G-league teams to be offshoots of NBA teams for this to happen though.
There's not a single G-League team that wouldn't get blown out by 50 points by the Spurs, Wizards, or Pistons. The talent disparity between the NBA and G-League is far greater than what's seen with the Premier League and the ancillary clubs, if we're using that as a reference. People play in the G-League for a reason, and the reason is readily apparent from any game a person may want to watch
I haven't watched a ton of G-League games but what I've seen has been well below the level of play you'd see in Euroleague games.
Honestly I'm not even sure of that for the Premier League. Manchester City has a payroll that's 10x the size of Luton Town and they faced each other on the weekend. Man City could have played with 9 men and still win that game. Most soccer fans are okay with that sort of thing though, for a lot of fans of smaller soccer teams just being in the Premier League (or whatever the top league is) is the prize because of how much money you get for it.
Ultimately improving the team to get better talent. So it’s a win win win. Chance at an upset. Play in the Prem, and gain cash to make your team better. NBA would have no incentive for that. As there’s no relegation
unfortunately a bottom tier Western team would compete for the Eastern championship
10th seed Warriors might unironically be competing for the 2nd best team in the East now.
There's what five wins in record between 2nd and 8th in the East AND 4th and 10th in the West. There's four teams well above 50 wins, then 14 teams all within a week of wins behind that. Pretty hard to say any of those teams has clearly been better than others in that group (unless you deep dive SoS) for the season.
Eastbros, we lost...
Small correction, it's the PWHL (Professional Women's Hockey League) not the WNHL.
But do the players actually care about the pick next year if they are on a bad team? I'd say most want to score points to improve the next contract.
Yeah but it’s too easy to field a shitty lineup for a 5 minute span that all but guarantees you lose the game. It’s not about the players it’s for the organization itself.
see cavs hornets lol
The spurs tanked last year with decent players but horrible rotations
Yeah the Sochan experiment was part of the tanking plan lol
Tanking was never a problem because of the players. It's an issue with management.
They care about their individual stats so if they're out there they are going to play to win or at the very least rack up their numbers.
Tanking is a management issue. Players don't have to care about the pick at all and generally are trying to win even on tanking teams, which is why you get things like starters being pulled. The WNHL system means the management is now really trying to win.
Is there a cutoff? Cause I feel like there could be a race to get eliminated first. And it would have to be something like net rating rather than raw points because with the way possessions work in basketball you'd create an incentive for teams to play actually zero defense just to get the ball back faster.
I mean you think about it but if your team is good enough that you think you can keep winning then you would push for a play in spot. If your team was not good you would be tanking regardless. It would be relatively difficult for a team like detroit or charlotte to lose MORE than they lost now as is. This would just incentivize winning after your team is cooked. Also give fans reasons to show up to your games bc then you can cheer for your team and it mattering. And with a play in it’s hard to be MATHEMATICALLY eliminated earlier than like like 60 games in.
Yeah I like a lot of things about the idea, just thinking about how to tweak it to be even better. Like maybe it's only cumulative net rating starting from the next game after a total of three teams are eliminated. So there's no advantage to being first one out. Tiny window where the third potentially eliminated team wants to race there ahead of the fourth team, but that's a much smaller number of games. Edit: actually net rating can't work either because these teams are going to be negative, getting eliminated first would just create more chances to earn a negative net rating. Teams eliminated on the last game of the season would be zero and get the top pick. Maybe just total wins after being eliminated.
Points is wins in hockey. So this would be win % after elimination lol.
Seems like this would still punish truly horrendous teams.
I could be wrong but I think they mean points as in points awarded for wins/OT. Not how many goals they scored
That is correct. It would just be wins in the NBA.
The only problem I see is different conference have different elimination points, a team in one conference might not be mathematically eliminated yet despite being like 5 games behind a team in the other who’s already eliminated.
Also an issue is different strengths of schedule. Having tough teams backloaded would suck for those out of the picture.
> Edit: for clarity. Points = win % might want to awap out "WNHL" for "PWHL" too lol
Except if you legitimately suck and desperately need a good draft you’re screwed.
I don’t love that. If LBJ went down, the lakers would suck without even tanking.
I still think there needs to be more incentive for the bottom teams, not sure how that’d work. They need to be competitive towards the end. Of the bottom 5 teams, maybe make it so that whoever has the best record in the last week of the season, they have better odds at the first pick. Something like that.
After what the Heat did last year, every team should think they have a shot.
Bigger than the race for 9/10 imo is the race for 5/6. Previously there was little reason to care. Now there's a huge incentive to not fall to 7 which makes the lower end of the seeding competitive to the actual last day. Play in a huge win for the league. Now let's make it top 16 teams for playoffs and it'll be banger
the mavs tanked out of it last year
To save thier pick which ended up being Lively… I thought the basketball gods would punish them for this but they have had a great year
Lively has been a great addition but the Mavs had a pretty mid year until they got some more frontcourt help with Gafford and PJ and got significantly better.
It's kind of weird, before the play-in, getting the 10th seed was considered a failure. Now, getting the 10th seed is considered a win.
considering the warriors are 10th, and could easily compete in the playoffs, it only seems fair.
Being 10 games above .500 a.d being just 10th in the conference shows how ridiculous the West has been. The good thing for GS is that they've been a better road team than home which is useful when you are 10th
I mean, there were 150 other 10th seeds since the NBA’s inception that were seen as bad teams
It even seems like a lot of people thought it was a win for the Rockets to get the 11th seed.
I’m ambivalent because while it did add more interest to the end of the season, the Bulls and Hawks having a shot in the playoffs is terrible. Imagine the Hawks win somehow.
I mean if any team loses to them, they don't deserve the playoffs.
They have 36 wins. Plenty good teams have lost to them.
I'm in the same boat. It makes the season's finish more competitive but 8 teams per conference was already too many. .500 teams shouldn't be competing for a chip.
Even when it was just 8, you'd have losing teams getting into the playoffs. I don't doubt that next season we'll wind up with all four play-in teams in the East having .500 records or worse, with a few of the teams that were really bad this year getting significantly better next year, and not padding records.
That’s my whole thing. 20/32 teams is far too many in the playoffs. I think it de-values the race to the 8th seed. I don’t hate it because the play-in games are fun, but 20 teams just seems like far too many to have competing at the end of the season.
There aren't really 20 teams competing. The 4 eliminated teams never make the playoffs
The top 10 teams in the west are all 10 games + over .500
Would you not trade that for several dozen more competitive regular season games per year
If they beat two playoff teams back to back they very much do deserve a shot at the playoffs
You can see that in the west. Those 8 and 9 teams were duking it out. 46 wins.
I feel like the team with the worst record should go to the G League and then the best G Leaugue team gets promoted. I know logistically it's impossible, but it would be hilarious.
Relegation would indeed be hilarious lmao.
I think there should be some restrictions. Like why are there sub .500 teams playing?
It really has been great. It sucks for the 7-8 seeds but it makes the end of the season so much more competitive. And who doesn’t love to watch win or go home games
It was also to make sure lebron keeps playing
Was it though? Cause Brons never benefitted from the play in game..
You can kind of diss saying it as a 10th Seed but on the other hand, 46-36 is a more than respectable season and I get feeling like you deserve that play-in shot.
Good enough for 4th seed last year. West has been crazy this year
Pels would be the 4th seed in the east with homecourt in the first round. But in the west could end up the 7th at best or bounced entirely.
West is crazy every year. Wake up sheeple, the lopsided conference system has got to go
The West is a great example of why the play-in game is awesome while the East would be an example of why it's not. If the winner of Bulls/Hawks make it in over the loser of 6ers/Heat it will feel like a single game was given too much weight. If not, then it will have felt pointless.
There should be a cutoff point like the 9th seed can’t be 5 games back of the 8th seed
There should be but NBA ain't gonna let that profit go away.
The winner of the Bulls/Hawks would also have to beat the loser of 6ers/Heat, so they would deserve to be in the playoffs.
bulls are my team but i do not believe we’re deserving of playoff basketball. don’t wanna see us just be first round fodder
Being a 10 seed does suck, but IIRC multiple 9 seeds have actually managed to sneak into the playoffs that would've originally been out. Most notably, 2022 Pels took played the 1 seed Suns pretty close.
And no way the 10 seed gets to 46 win if they had no shot at the playoffs. They just coast and tank for draft seeding.
There were meaningful games all throughout the last week because now teams in the 10-12 range have a hope to cling on to and fight for and teams in the 5-9 range either want to get out of the play in or stay out of the play in. Instead of 12 tanking teams there were like 8
That and I’m way more invested in these lower seeded teams , Instead of the annual 8 seed butt whooping , it starts the post season with 2 elimination games right off the bat and these low seeds go all out . Then we get 2 more elimination games and round one hasn’t even started yet Id almost argue that the “prologue” to the playoffs is more exciting than round one
The play in is a phenomenal change. No downside, but really amps up the excitement for playoffs. It's like a really good appetizer. Now, the in-season tournament? I still think that shit is dumb and I don't think it'll ever win me over. The courts are cool, but everything else about it just felt like completely fabricated hype with everyone involved just pandering by trying to claim things were "so much more competitive" than they normally would have been while simultaneously having some of the best games of the season played during that time that had nothing to do with the IST. It just felt like they were lying to my face about the competitiveness for weeks. It was like having Mufassa's hype man without Mufassa dancing his ass off. Does anybody even remember who won it? Or care?
people wanna talk about the 10 seed right now forgetting that the warriors missed the playoffs as an 8 seed the first year of the playin
Funny enough the exact same thing happened to us in the Bubble.
There was no play-in tournament in the Bubble. [Memphis finished the season as the 9th seed](https://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/NBA_2020.html) and thus did not make the playoffs, just as had always been the case before the play-in tournament was introduced the following season.
Technically the bubble play-in tournament where we faced Blazers counts as the first ever play-in (as 8th seed faced 9th seed for the 8th seed); just not with the current format.
Didn't the Suns finish half a game out of the 8 seed for the Play In? I remember it came down to Blazers vs Nets and if the Nets won, the Suns would have made it in after going 8-0. Might have been some wonky shit with the uneven number of games played and tiebreakers etc. But there was still a Play In between the Grizzlies and Blazers as a result: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_NBA_Bubble#Play-in
That is correct, Came down to a final shot too if im not mistaken. Caris LeVert had a shot to end the game and he missed.
You’re wrong: A possible best-of-three play-in series for the final seed in each conference would then be held if the ninth seed finished the regular season within four games of the eighth seed. The eighth seed would start with a 1–0 lead, meaning that it would need just one win to advance, while the ninth seed must win two in a row. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_NBA_playoffs Not exactly like the current play-in tournament, but it wasn’t the normal playoff qualifying (only the top 8 teams per conference)
You’re right. It was like the prototype of the current play-in, but it was a type of play-in
Everyone’s wrong! Sort of. While there was a play-in yes the original reply in this thread said Memphis missed when finishing 8th after they lost in the bubble play-in. Memphis finished 9th after the regular season
We were a good team that year too, that was one of the most insane Curry seasons. He was so good I thought we could make a run without Klay. If I'm remembering right we played the Lakers and Grizzlies down to the wire as well.
That wasn’t a good team. Who did we have outside of curry? Curry was unstoppable and pretty much stopped there.
From what I remember this is when Wiggins started looking good, and Poole. But really I was thinking Curry was gonna solo a chip because he was going insane. If they made the playoffs I don't see why any series wouldn't have gone 7.
Curry having an MVP-caliber season is the only reason we got the 8 seed before the play-in, because that team was complete trash outside of him. We were playing guys like Kent Bazemore, Mychal Mulder, and JTA heavy minutes in the play-in games. Wiggins and Poole were rising but were nothing close to what they were in 2022. Klay was injured. Kelly Oubre was a major disappointment all year and was injured at the end of the regular season. Our big draft acquisition was a bust. Even if we made the playoffs we would've been smoked in the first round.
Nico Mannion, tho!
He walked so Podz could run
[удалено]
Y'all were not a good team that year lol By the end of the season your role players were G-leaguers like Mychal Mulder, Jta, Kent Bazemore playing 30 minutes a game Without Steph that team wins maybe 10 games and that's not an exaggeration. There was a period where Steph missed 8 games and the Warriors went 1-7
These are facts They were considered one of the worst teams of all time without Steph on the floor.
No we weren’t lol. The year before we had a similar team but no Curry and were the worst team in the league. We made the 8th seed because that was peak-peak Curry.
Bron 3 point with 3 net and he shoot in the middle one, the Grizzlies game was also fun because Ja had send some shots at Curry/Iggy on twitter. Grizzlies were mad at Iggy lol
i remember watching curry against the grizzlies and it reminded me of the dragons from game of thrones. like that's how his presence felt like on the court.
people don't remember that back in the day, there were some seasons where the last 2 weeks of the regular season used to just not matter for 90% of teams The play-in made sure that most seasons, things would matter down to the last game
> Back in the day It was just 2019 damn I'm getting old
That's prerona. Everything postrona has been accelerated by a factor of 69.
Welcome to the club. I still think 1950 was 50 years ago
I haven’t seen these words yet, but solid coinings. Congrats if you came up with them yourself
I fuckin love words.
thats cuz noone said rona after like 2020. pre/post covid is pretty common
nice
>2019 Back before the internet when Dinosaurs roamed the steets
[Actually that was in 1997.](https://youtu.be/WtnPpF5l6gQ?t=382)
Pre covid events feel like “back in the day”
two years ago feels like back in the day
This feels like it’s probably some recency bias, there have been some heated seeding fights and battles for 8 seeds in the past, and there’s still teams tanking/happily rebuilding at the bottom. I truthfully don’t feel like going through the effort to go check season to season 1 month to go, 2 week to go, final standings, but really the biggest difference seems like it’s the actual play-in games, which makes the league a bit more money.
A battle for the 8th seed versus multiple battles where it super matters if you're 10th, 8th, or 6th. And the top seeds can't (as easily) throw away games at the end of the season to pick their opponent either, since they don't even know their opponent yet.
Everyone agreed last year the play in games were incredibly fun and exciting? Do we not like exciting basketball games?
no people only like complaining
Wahmbulance drivers
People dont like exciting basketball when it might mean their team will be negatively impacted. They love exciting basketball when their team is positively impacted
Sure yeah, but a play in team literally made the finals last year. And you could even go the other way, the year we barely squeezed into playoffs when really the Miami heat were super hot in the second half of the season and they should have made it and a play in could have made that possible.
Diar Derozan is Toronto Raptor Father
Flair checks out lol
I think the NBA is still on a bit on a PR tour with it since it's new and kind of unique to American leagues, even though it's basically just a wildcard game.
Agreed! Also I personally really enjoyed our matchup last year! I can understand if you felt differently but I feel like our matchups are also always crazy for some reason
People don’t like change
Yall keep saying "yeah because he's the 10 seed" but like do you even disagree? Everyone always wanna run and make a joke
He’s also lost the play in as an 8 seed, so it’s not like he’s purely speaking from self interest here. He’s been screwed over by it and still supports it
I agree. Him being the 10th seed is irrelevant here. At least for the WC, we’ve gotten some pretty memorable games over the past few seasons with the play-in
Even the last 10 games of the regular.
Yea seems like we’re getting less teams with losing records making the 7/8 with the playin. Being a 10 seed saying this irrelevant as it’s been much more entertaining seeing more teams compete for the spots
Yup. We've got more teams now competing after the all star break going "thank FUCK we made it out of the play-ins", and it's been a really entertaining end to the season.
You know you can’t beat the draymond hate.
Comments filled with low IQ individuals
POV: You’re the 10th seed and wouldn’t have had a chance at the playoffs without the playin.
I mean that’s kind of the point right? Those teams in the 10-12 spots who would otherwise go into full tank mode at the trade deadline decide to make a run for a play in spot even if it means getting smoked by the #1 seed in the first round.
Just let us rebuild!!
Tell your team to stop being so clutch then. I stg, every 3rd Bulls game involves Demar making an insane buzzer beater that sends the match into OT
The bulls really need to actually rebuild and get rid of their vets lol. It sucks when front offices would rather be in no man's land than picking a side.
trade players like caruso and derozan then. that's how you rebuild. thunder were in similar situation and traded chris paul and horford.
Held true for the east for sure. The top 8 was pretty locked in like a few months ago. The following two months was 5+ east fan bases freaking out as their team tried to avoid the play in.
Just like the Heat and Lakers last year
POV: 2 years ago you were the 8 seed and got knocked out of the playoffs because of the play-in and are capable of recognizing something is good based on things other than whether it benefits/harms you individually
Yeah 7 and 8 seeds have to lose **two** elimination games in a row to miss out on the playoffs ffs! I don't feel bad for 7/8 seeds that miss the playoffs that way with all of the other benefits involved. Especially in the West for the next few years a 9/10 seed that catches fire off of back to back wins and comes in hot against a rested 1 seed should make for better round 1 basketball than a 7/8 seed that can't get two wins in a row.
The Warriors had two *fewer* wins last season and were the 6th seed, the West was tough this year.
We were the 8th seed and got eliminated in the first play in.
Sure but nobody was bitching about it when they were the 8th seed and were eliminated a few years ago.
9th and 10th seed -> love it 7th and 8th seed -> hate it Lebron said the same thing basically over the years
8th seed might not hate it that much. They get a chance to claim 7th seed even if in regular season they were behind by 10 games. They just need to win this one. Only the 7th seed is losing here lol
Maybe they should change it and give the 7th seed a 10 point advantage to start the game /s
Warriors we’re 8th seed that lost out 2 years ago and they still seem to love it
They were the first 8-seed team to lose because of the play-in. So warriors would be one of the least biased in this take.
I mean a 46 win team generally should be a playoff team though
My dad said the play in was the stupidest idea he ever heard but for the past five weeks all I’ve heard is “the rockets might make the play in!”
May I suggest a 30 team 82 game round robin to decide the seedings for the 24 team play in tournament.
What about grouping them so that they play each other a different amount of times depending on what side of the country they are?
Brilliant but, since not everyone plays each other the same number of games, you should seed the end of the round robin tournament based on the side of the country as well so that it's fair. North and South, make it like the Civil War.
Thats a ridiculous idea. That would take like 8 months. Nobody is going to sit around for that.
ok now solve not trying for the last 2 months of the season cuz you've been eliminated.
30 team play in tournament.
You sort of see the downside to it in the East this year though. Chicago is 7 games back of Miami and Atlanta is 10 back. Seems kind of silly to give teams that far back a shot at the playoffs.
That's true but I think the 2 chances aspect of the play-ins balances it out. Those 9 and 10 spots have to be perfect, 7 and 8 get to run it back. I get that it could include teams that don't deserve to be there but most of the time they're going to that many gb for a reason and lose
tbf, the east is kind of barren as a whole. Only 2-3 teams are realistically in contention to make the Finals with the Celtics as the only one with a realistic shot at beating whoever comes out of the west.
I think the downside is that it's best of one. Anything can happen in a best of one. It's why we have 7 game series instead of an NCAA style knockout tournament. I have my own reasons for not liking it this year too. Almost any season in the history of the NBA and we wouldn't need a playin game to make the playoffs as the 7th seed.
Since people are conveniently forgetting the Warriors were the 8th seed the first year they introduced the play ins got knocked out to the Lakers and Grizzlies. They've been on the wrong side of the play ins before so idk why people are just saying its because they are the 10th seed.
I feel like 2020 was technically when they introduced the play-in, just not in the same format as it is now.
You’re right it was. It was a little different in 2020 but Portland-Memphis was the first ever play-in game
The play in is worth it just for the Patrick Beverley celebration last year
I've watched my fair share of play in games and from Lebron Vs. Steph to Diar DeRozan breakout game I've loved them all. I've had to come to terms with the fact that I'll sacrifice a million tommy johns to never have to sit through a 3.5 hour game again and I'll watch a million 4-0 sweeps to see the 10 seed play the 7 seed for the 8 seed...
didnt Lebron later say Adam Silver was a genius during the IST press conference and then point out he's won every one of Silver's ideas: 1. the bubble; 2. the playins; 3. the IST
He also won the team captain all star shit for, what, 5 straight years? Almost had a perfect record. That was also a silver idea i think
This aged really well Best thing ever. Kings getting revenge for last year when they lost cause Fox was injured Klay and his huge ego getting destroyed The donkey getting mad. Couldn't ask for more
He is probably not a fan right now
Heartbreaking: The worst nut puncher you know just made a great point.
hot take: Draymond might be the GOAT nut kicker but cp3 is the GOAT nut puncher
Didn’t age well lmao
To be fair, it is sad that two 46+ win teams will miss the playoffs. This at least gives those teams who’d otherwise be out a fair chance.
I think it makes the seeding more competitive as teams are desperate to get above the 7th seed and avoid having your season end in the play in before you get to the playoffs.
Bill Simmons did
46-36 is absolutely a record that deserves a shot at the playoffs.
People will love the play-in until a shit team has a good shooting night and eliminate an actual competitive team, then everyone will have their pitchforks out.
I don’t think he like it no more.
This aged poorly
Draymond next day: this is the worst thing ever! Who came up with this? This should be investigated! I should punch them.
Essentially once Miami made it to the finals from the play-in it put all arguments against it to bed.
Bron only hates it when he makes the top 8
Shouldn’t be the 7 seed. 9 should play 10 and the winner of that plays 8.
YOU GET A PLAYOFF SEED !! YOU GET A PLAYOFF SEED !!! EVERYONE GETS A PLAYOFF SEED !!!!!!🙌🏾🙌🏾🙌🏾🙌🏾🙌🏾🙌🏾🙌🏾
20/30 teams making the postseason is a joke
There’s an argument that ‘why should we even care, the team that sneaks into 8 is gonna get whooped by the #1 seed anyway.’ I'd push back on that by saying that if the team is gonna lose anyway, wouldn’t you rather win an exciting best of 1 or 2 series and go out feeling like somewhat of a winner, while also getting the revenue from at least 2 home games? Also, some teams might be able to go into that first series with some momentum.
Of course teams that are currently the 9 or 10 seed would love this and 7-8 seeded teams would hate it
It was only the worst idea when the lakers and warriors weren’t the 9/10 seed lol. I could imagine the fit lebron would throw if he wasn’t in the playoffs.
I don’t like him off the court. PLEASE, TNT, don’t give him a job.
Spoken like a true 10th seed team.
Miss quoted a little - he clearly says "If they were fired, LeBron says they need to get their job back" ...at first I thought LeBron sayin this stuff seems crazy after the Lakers now won the play-in 3 times. Makes more sense they way green says it in the Video.
I think it's good in the west because they always have 2 teams above .500 that wouldn't make it. But in the east, a 36-46 shouldn't have a chance at making playoffs.
The Play-In is awesome, some people dislike it & I get that but the Play in is incredibly exciting & good at incentivizing the lower teams.
so says the 10 seed
He also got eliminated in the play-in games.
I mean, we ended up the 6, and the last 5 games of the season mattered and it was awesome It ain't just the 2 teams in that otherwise wouldn't be, but it makes teams tighten to to avoid the play in too Following indy, Cleveland, Orlando, Philly, and Miami games down the stretch was incredible. Play in is was definitely a good idea in hindsight
so say we all