I don't see how travel time is much of an issue. In MLB you could have San Diego playing NY in the first round of the playoffs. An argument might be made that basketball is more grueling than baseball but you could address that by making sure there is a travel day between games. I like the idea and like Kenny Smith's idea of doing top 16 seeds not top 8 from each conference. Also if we want more upsets we could go back to 5 game first rounds. That could also give more time for travel.
Exactly, exactly, exactly. If you really love sports, then you want to see the best play the best. The current division/conference system gets in the way of that. Especially this stupid crap about division winners and conference seeding. Rolleyes. In the world of internet and jet travel, regional differences become less and less meaningful. All teams league-wide should play each other an equal number of times, as far as is possible; playoff rankings should be the top 16 in the league, and each series should go 2-3-2. In this format we have a greater likelihood of the best playing the best. If you are a Rockets fan, you have wanted this system for a while. If we had this system in place since 2000, we would have been in the playoffs 8-10 times.
What he said is top 8 from east/west makes the playoff. So 7th seed from east can still have 40-42 and 9th seed from west can have 42-40 yet still not in the playoffs.
Yeah, with this particular George Karl's system (reseeding after each round) i think there'd be less upsets in general.
No doubt. Crappy posts on a BBS do not entitle you to crack on an established writer, especially a member of the Clutchfans community. By the way, to anyone thinking this system would have rewarded Rockets teams seeded 9 or 10 in the western conference, they are talking about still taking the top 8 from each.
Impractical, due to travel and distances as noted above, and would need even matchups in the regular season with teams from both conferences to make any sense anyway. That and who cares what George Karl thinks.
So.........have some back-to-backs with 3 or 4 days off between them, staggering the days each series starts....? I know, I know, it won't work.
Noted. If you were referring to me, I was saying the Rockets would have made playoffs in a system that goes even further than what coach Karl is proposing. Should just go full euro style, regular season all teams play all other teams in the league equally as possible. This system provides the highest probability of the best playing the best. If you love sports, this is what you want to see. All this conference/division crap gets i the way of that. The only reasons to keep this system are sentimentality and meaningless regional differences.
this. less teams and shorten the first round back to a best of 5. that's where you get the upsets. the reason that march madness and the NFL are the most exciting playoffs is because of the one and done factor. they'll never do that with the NBA but by shortening the series it adds a lot of drama.
I wish they would do the top 16 and organize it like Karl's talking about it. You look at the Western conference and you have four teams teams with a chance of going to at least the conference finals (OKC, Spurs, Memphis, Clippers). Then you look at the East, where it will likely be Indiana in the conference finals (an Indiana team that would only be the 5th seed out West). It be so much better this way. But it won't happen, because while the West has the better teams, the East has the bigger markets and the bigger purse.
