NBA Postseason Change Ideas

[Coach Ellis]

I like that idea. I wouldnt cap top 3 picks though otherwise you way as well use a rotating system (although that would require a 32yr investment)

Tanking is overblown anyway. Who cares? If we had gone that route this year Id be watching college prospects instead of following the NBA, no biggie.

Capping top three picks to one every three years just means that you can’t expect to get a top three pick if you and the team whose draft position you own decide to bottom out multiple years in a row. You’d still be eligible for a top 4, 5 or 6 pick based on a combination of the record of the team whose draft position you bet on as well as whether your own win-loss record puts you in the bottom, middle or top tier of picks.

But that’s still the difference in getting Kris Dunn instead of Ben Simmons two years after drafting Joel Embiid. Or the Celtics missing out on Jason Tatum because Brooklyn was bad enough to net them Jaylon Brown the year before. Lakers wouldn’t have been eligible for either Brandon Ingram or Lonzo Ball.

 

[SCS]

I’ve read a couple of anti-tanking ideas that have been floated over the years.

The best ideas would actually incentivize teams to contanstantly pursue improvement - even in the face of having to reload or rebuild.

My favorite concept makes it so no team is playing for their own draft position. Every team gets to bet on the future record of another team and then has their draft position tied directly to the win-loss record of that team. Two weeks before the start of the season (so after the draft, free agency, summer league and preseason) from worst record to best record, each team would pick the draft position of a team that they believe will be worse than them in the upcoming season.

Add some smoothing mechanisms to prevent major jumps or drops in the draft order, as well as limiting teams to one top 3 pick every three years; and a system like that should improve parity because your draft position is no longer based on your performance - it’s based on the performance of an opposing team.

You have no incentive to do poorly because it helps a competitor if that happens and they have no incentive to do poorly because it might help your team instead. Look at the Lakers and Nets this year. Neither of them is inclined to intentionally suck because it only helps the Cavs and 76ers if that happens. Neither team is particularly good, but they have no reason to do badly on purpose since they don’t keep the pick.

Plus, I think the drama of following the team whose draft position you do hold and actively rooting against them would add an intriguing wrinkle to the game.

Wouldn't 29 teams just pinpoint the team with the worst roster and predict a terrible record for them?

 

[Coach Ellis]

I like that idea. I wouldnt cap top 3 picks though otherwise you way as well use a rotating system (although that would require a 32yr investment)

Tanking is overblown anyway. Who cares? If we had gone that route this year Id be watching college prospects instead of following the NBA, no biggie.

Also, I disagree that tanking is overblown. We’ve seen over the last two months how tanking is having a direct impact in the Western Confence playoff race as well.

Another thought to help curb tanking would be to financially punish teams that go with a cheap roster to get a better draft pick and maximize profits. Any team who fails to reach 30 wins should lose a percentage of their revenue sharing (the more games below 30 wins, the more you lose) with that money being pooled together and split evenly between the teams that have 30 wins or more, but still miss the playoffs. Paying your opponents might influence more owners to try harder to win games - even when rebuilding.

That means that the Hawks, Knicks, Nets, Magic, Bulls, Suns, Kings, Grizzlies and Mavericks would lose millions of dollars that they’d then have to pay to the Lakers, Nuggets, Clippers, Pistons and Hornets.

 

[Coach Ellis]

Wouldn't 29 teams just pinpoint the team with the worst roster and predict a terrible record for them?

Nope. It’s a draft style selection process from the team with the worst record to the team with the best. Once a team is picked, nobody else can bet on their draft position. The next team would have to bet on the draft position from the remaining teams - and so on until every team has the draft position of a different team for the next season.

 

[colton]

OK, here's the genius idea that occurred to me today: have draft order set by the average of your past two years instead of just by the current year's record.

Think about it. It makes tanking a particular end of season game only half as effective. It eliminates the effectiveness of a single year tank. It makes it so that tanking to get the very top pick is much harder and more painful, especially when combined with expanding lottery to top 4 and not just top 3 and evening odds a little like is already planned. And best of all it does no other harm. In fact it probably helps what the draft is all about, in that it reduces the "noise" in teams' year to year records to really assist those that are consistently struggling over those that are more consistently good.

Please spread the word.

 

[yamers]

The playoff format is fine. I really dont understand the push to change it.

If anything, there should be a reshaping of divisions/conferences. I really like Locke's idea on this.

and whats lockes idea? link?

 

[Coach Ellis]

I like the idea of the top 16 overall teams making the playoffs. You play each team at least twice every year. (58 games) - Then every team in your conference a 3rd time (58 + 14 = 72 games) - and then you finish with playing 10 teams in the opposite conference (72 + 10 = 82 games). That’s a good way to smooth out the schedule and make it more fair for the 16 teams in the playoffs because the strength of schedule from team to team is far more even.

 

[8]

I am in favor of the format in which the Jazz win a freaking NBA title!