They finally changed the playoff seeding thing. The giving up one full time out to become a 20 in the last minute is kinda dumb. http://www.nba.com/news/rulechanges_060802.html NEW YORK, August 2, 2006 – The National Basketball Association has enacted several significant rules changes that will go into effect for the upcoming 2006-07 season: Playoff Seeding: # The first four seeds in each conference will continue to be given to the three division winners and the team with the next best regular season record, but these four teams will now be seeded in order of their regular season records. Among other things, this change will ensure that the two teams with the best records in the conference will not meet earlier than the Conference Finals. Shortening Timeouts: # If a team has two 60 second timeouts left in the last two minutes of regulation or in overtime, one of the two timeouts will be shortened to a 20 second timeout. # Instead of having three 60 second timeouts in overtime, teams will have two 60's and one 20 second timeout. Teams will no longer be permitted to carry over a 20 second timeout from regulation into overtime. Increase in Playoff Roster Size: # Playoff roster size will be expanded from 13 to 15 players, with each team designating 12 active players and up to three inactive players prior to each game. “Our owners are intent on making the playoff seeding more fair for all teams going forward and in quickening the pace of the end of games,” said Stu Jackson, NBA Executive Vice President, Basketball Operations. “The Board also thought it made sense to allow teams to utilize the same 15-man roster in the playoffs that they use during the regular season.” The rules changes were recommended by the Rules and Competition Committee at its annual meeting in June, and approved this week by a vote of the Board of Governors.
This is GREAT news for the Rockets. If the team is healthy this pretty much guarantees T-Mac and Yao finally get to the 2nd round.
how does this rule change guarantee a 2nd round visit? We still have to beat a team in the 1st round to advance.
This rule change means the Rockets would no longer have to face Spurs, Mavs, or Suns in the first round Suns, Spurs, Nuggets, Mavs will probably get the top 4 seeds. BUT now the Rockets would play Nuggets in round one instead of say Dallas. If some fans here really think a healthy Houston team can't beat say a Nuggets or Jazz team in round one then pessimism has gotten absurd.
means at 5th place we will have a better record than our 4th plae opponent will that give us home court advantage? Rocket River Rockets don't Dodge anyone
It should because it didn't say anything about them changing the rule that was already in place that if a lower seeded team had a better record than the division winer it faced, then it would have home court advantage. So yes we should have home court most likely in round one over Jazz or Nuggets. A healthy T-Mac and Yao should make it to round to pretty easily.
well that going on the assumption that those teams are the top 3 in the conference...and the rockets are 5th... what if the rockets end up 6th because the clippers have a better record than us? then we play the 3rd seed who could be the suns spurs or mavs, right? basically this doesnt affect a team unless they are in position for the 5th or 6th seed, which could possibly play the 3rd division winner depending on record of the top 4 teams...
Wow. I didn't think the NBA was going to come around so quickly on the playoff seeding flaw. Kudos to them!
Seems pretty interesting. Hopefully we get 5th seed or better in the West and the rest plays out like stated earlier in this thread. Then T-Mac and the Rockets finally go to 2nd round! Let's hope for the best.
at least teams from 5-8 will not intentionlly lose games to face an easier opponent, which JVG will never do anyway.
good changes but i dont agree with the timeout rule. sure it may speed up games at the end but its in the final seconds of a close game where execution is critical and having a full timeout you can strategize over a number of things:set play, defensive rotations, fouls etc.....having that full become a 20 will hurt the coaches' ability to help prepare his players for any situation. face it not all nba players are cerebrel so what may seem common place to us (like calling your last timeout after the second free throw) may not be to them who get caught up in the heat of the moment. I figure the league may rescind this rule. i rather have a full timeout used at a end of a game then in middle when like a player dives for a loose ball and then is forced to use a full since it would become a twenty sec later on anyway.
We will be good if we get 4 or 5. Is it rare though for a team to have two full timeouts in the last 2 minutes of the game?
No its not rare at all. most coaches probably will try to save at least two timeouts for the last two mins if they start the fourth with 3 timeouts.
Okay, so what happens if a team has 3 full timeouts in the last two minutes? Trim it back to 1 full and 2 twenties, or two fulls and one 20?
I wonder if the 'stress' on how fouls etc will be called the rules now says you cannot impede the offensive player on the parameter at all. . cannot stand in his way even if you are there 1st etc but down low . . Not Blood No Foul Rocket River
i wouldnt call these changes as rule changes. more like playoff format and game format changes. i really really wish the league would do something about all the players driving blindly into traffic, throwing a blind shot and getting a call to save their asses.
