Hi fellow friends. I have some doubt. I was looking at the standing, and I saw that Utah won its division already, but looking at the standing I noticed they are still 4th in the west.. It's not supposed to be they're the 3rd seed because of the division ? If so we would be playing San Antonio in the first round...Not a good thing at all. I'm wrong or what? what do you think guys?
i think that seeds 1-4 are reserved for the 3 division winners and the best second place team. however, these seeds, 1-4, are assigned by records and not who won what division.
Whatever you were looking at is wrong. The Spurs are 3rd and gaining on 2nd. Division winners are only guaranteed to be no lower than 4th, which is where Utah will finish the season, behind Dallas, Phoenix and San Antonio. Hope that clears it up. If we pass them, Utah will still be the 4th seed because they are a division winner.
So what about the Raptors, Miami and chicago in the East? Chicago has better record than them, actually they are 3rd, 4th and 5th respectively.
Detroit and Cleveland have the two best records in the East and are 1st & 2nd. The Raps and Heat are division leaders so they are automatically 3rd & 4th. The Bulls are in the same division as the Pistons and Cavs are therefore pushed into 5th, even though they have the 3rd best record in the East. As it stands now, they would meet the 4th place Heat in the first round but will have the home court advantage because of the better record. houst-mac, yes we will get home court over Utah if we pass them, even though they are technically the 4th seed.
Yes I know, thats what I'm saying, why San Antonio is 3rd if Utah won the division. It's not supposed to be the same situation of Toronto, Miami and chicago? they are winning its division and are ahead of Chicago althought Chicago has better record.
Division winners are guaranteed to be no lower than 4th. Chicago is in a different division (the Central, behind the Pistons and Cavs) from Miami (Southeast) and Toronto (Atlantic). Since the Cavs get the #2 spot behind the Pistons because their record is better than the Bulls, the Bulls are pushed to 5th place in the East behind the other two division winners.
Which makes splitting the NBA into divisions virtually pointless and stupid. I liked it better when it was just the 2 conferences.
They changed it this year so that teams like Utah won't get an automatic 3rd seed, but still gets a top 4 seeding. (even though they might not get home court). The 3 division seeds plus the highest "wild card" gets reordered according to record. So if SA passes Phoenix, they will be 2, Phoenix 3, Utah 4th no matter what the Rockets record show.
It's purely a marketing issue. Having 6 division winners instead of 2 regular season conference winners creates 4 extra banners for the Jazz, Raptors, Suns and the Heat/Wizards winner to hang up. Blah blah blah. From a competitive standpoint, I agree 100%. Within the conferences, the NBA schedule is totally balanced, so why create artificial divisions when those teams don't even play each other more than other conference teams?
