Is anyone here still hanging on to the arrogance that the Western Conference is so great and the Eastern Conference is so weak? I sure hope not. In inter-conference play, the East has won 148/274 games, 54%. The East has 3 top-echelon teams: the Celts, Cavs & Magic. The West has one: the Lakers. The East has one team that can be described as worthless: the Wizards. The West has 4: the Grizzlies, Thunder, Kings and Clippers. So we can now drop the nonsense that East teams get to pad their records against multiple garbage teams while every West game is tough. The only argument left is the 8th seeded team in the West will likely have a better record than the 8th seeded East team. That is a very weak argument. Times have changed. Season to date, the East has been slightly stronger than the West. Whether it evens out by season's end is to be determined.
The 8th seed in the West may have a better record than the 4th seed in the East by the end of the season. Not going to argue who is the better Conference because it would depend on which way you looked at it, but lets just say in terms of making the playoffs you can be on a huge slump in the East and still have a chance at making the playoffs.
I wouldn't consider the cavs or magic upper echelon. They are two teams the play well, but have big flaws in the system. They are the exact opposite of the rockets. They know how to play the game and close them out. The west continues to play the same core the last few years. The WC teams seem very complacent. Its teams like the rockets who should be winning but can't get it together. What we are seeing is some very weak WC teams where as in the past, we only had a couple bottom feeders. Now we are looking at 7 teams who are playing with little competition.
I think the argument is that there are more good western conference teams. Meaning, the Lakers can realistically lose to 7-8 other teams in the west and it isn't considered a huge fluke. It would be considered a big upset if the Pistons or the Heat beat the Celtics. Yes, if you throw all the teams from each conference together and average things out, the east is better. I'd say the quality of playoff caliber teams is much tougher in the west though, which still makes the west a grind. The 1st seed in the east will have a considerably weaker path to the conference finals (almost a guarantee they'll get there) than its western conference counter part.
look at the West- you have 1 dominant team, 8 strong teams and 6 weak teams separated by 9 games (Minnesota trails Utah by 9 games) in the East, you have 3 dominant teams, three strong teams, and 8 average teams that are all hovering around .500 or under teams like NY, Charlotte, NJ and Toronto. you call being 5 to 7 games under .500 a good team comparable to the Western Conference, which looks like another team with 45-50 wins won't make the playoffs? meanwhile a 35-42 win team will make it from the East?
At least the East is top heavy now. It's nice knowing the Western Conference Finals aren't essentially the real NBA Finals anymore. All the same, i'll still have a problem with a sub .500 East team making the playoffs while a 45-50 win West team misses. Too bad there's nothing you can do about that though.
East 3 top teams 3 good teams 8 mediocre teams 1 worthless team West 1 top team 8 good teams 2 mediocre teams 4 worthless teams True, the East has more top teams and fewer worthless teams. BUT, the West is still dominating the middle pack. The West is filled with good teams while the East is filled with mediocre teams. Overall top to bottom, the two conferences are about even. But when it comes to the playoffs, the West bracket is a lot more competitive. It is going to be dog fights from the 1st round, all the way to the conference finals.
I agree with everything you posted. But.. It is a dog fight from March to the Conference Finals. Rockets were number 1 at one point then fell to 5 with homecourt.
The East has won 3 of the last 5 titles. Horry saved the Pistons from winning a 2nd title that would have made it 4 out of 5. You haven't been able to say the WCF was the championship round in over 5 years.
I should have rephrased what I said. It's not that I necessarily believe the "WC Finals is the 'real' Finals" quote, its just people have been saying that for years. Even in the last five years. You make a good point but it's definitely not 'over 5 years' since then you're getting into the Shaq/Kobe Lakers and the Spurs first two titles. You can argue Dallas in 2006 and LA in 2004 were two of the biggest meltdowns/chokejobs in modern Finals history. Not many thought the Heat or Pistons were going to win either of those series which gets back to what I was saying about people abusing that quote. It goes along with what the OP was saying about arrogance and how pretty much up until the Celtics took care of business last year, that was the only series I can recall where the majority of people thought the East team would win going into the series.
Last year was the first year since Michael left that it actually felt like the NBA Finals....like 'damn, I need to get home, the NBA Finals is starting in an hour' kind of feeling.
A3PO, your argument is flawed on multiple fronts. 1) counting the number of worthless teams is not really an accurate indicator of the strength of a conference by any means. We should focus on the good teams. 2) The 8th seeded team is likely to have better record than the 5th seeded team in the East, not the 8th. This shows that for teams that do matter--ie those who'll make the playoffs, the western conference is still much stronger.
Has anyone this season been saying the WC is much stronger than the EC? I haven't seen a lot of that this season.
Worthless huh? Consider that the "good" teams in the West have 4 patsies to pad their records against. At the top, the East has 3 teams with 10 or less losses. The West has only one. Some of you guys just won't wake up. I figured as much. The one thread you have to stand on is the 7th/8th seeds in the West have better records than the East. Why don't you apply the same logic to the top seeds? Who wins there quite easily?
Yeah, but the East top teams have 8 bellow average teams to pad THEIR records. You still haven't answered that part. And all the good teams in the West have to play each other A LOT. What a way to pad their records.
The East is superior at the top AND the bottom, which contradicts your point about padding records. The West is better in the middle. When you compare the totality of top, the middle and bottom, the East comes out ahead and this is proven by their winning percentage against West teams. The numbers prove it.
Why is this discussion still here? I like you're posts A3PO, but this is a totally subjective matter that depends on how one judges a "better conference". If you look up old searches, you will find that the I have railed on the East for years...and rightfully so. The last DECADE has been pathetic top to bottom. The East is more competitive top to bottom than they have ever been over the last 10 years. The whole issue is total records showing true accuracy. This is the first year that it will be the case with most teams in both conferences. That's all that matters to me: honesty and transparency. There were so many fake 50 win teams in the East in the past. I'll tell you this. This is probably the first year I'm glad the Rockets are in the West in a decade. The Rockets have a better shot vs the Blazers or Nuggets or Hornets without homecourt than they do against any possible East #3 seed (Cleveland, Boston, Orlando)...just my opinion. Atlanta's demise is sucky though. They have tremendous talent but are more inconsistent than the Rockets. Their hardcore fans probably have as much frustration as we do this year.
A_3PO, why are you taking the issue personally? You're the defender of the east or something? In past seasons I've posted several times about the disparity of quality between the conferences, and for good reason. It was enraging. Year after year the Rockets had to scratch and claw tooth and nail to make the playoffs or to get homecourt, whereas in the East you could have a losing record and still make eighth, seventh seed? Good for Miami, Boston, and Detroit winning titles. In all seriousness, I'm happy for them. Detroit dismantling the Lakers was just wonderful. The simple fact was, you could be a low-quality team in the east and still make the playoffs or make home court advantage, and in the West you could scratch and claw and fight, have a record good enough for HOME COURT in the east, and STILL not make the playoffs! It's enough to drive any fan nuts. Those threads in the past were perfectly justified, and any Rockets fan should have been pissed about the situation. I'm really glad to see things evening out this season. That 54% win statistic is a surprise, good to see that. It looks like two major things have changed this season: 1) There are three dominant teams in the east 2) There are six crap teams in the west that are 14 games under 500 or more. I'm happy that we're seeing more equity in the league and that we can really look forward to the finals being competitive. However, your disparaging of the 'middle' teams in the west is unwarranted. The west 1-9 is an amazing collection of teams. The dropoff after 9 is remarkable and west teams get to pad their records with those (just as the east has been in accruing that 54%), but playing 9 truly competitive playoff quality teams with stars at multiple positions all the time ain't so easy. There is no question that every single playoff spot in the west is highly contested and there will be a very good team at the end of the regular season that will not make the playoffs. The fans of that team will feel very justified in feeling pissed that the Bucks, Knicks, or some other-ran will be in the playoffs with a sub 500 record while their team sits it out. The Jazz are 9th right now- if healthy they would kick the ass of almost every eastern playoff team, and give trouble to the top 3.
