I wrote this recent article: A vaccine for the NBA’s rest ‘outbreak’, addressing the growing issue of NBA teams sitting their stars out of games during the regular season. The article did not carry brackets, so here is the article with the a brackets included to give you a visual picture of my proposals:
For pro sports leagues, the final weeks of the regular season usually ratchet up the intensity on the field and the social media buzz off it. 30 Baseball teams battle for 10 precious playoff spots, with division titles at a premium to avoid the one-game wild card playoff. 32 NFL teams scratch and claw for one of the 12 golden tickets to the post-season, where the top two squads in each conference earn a bye to rest their battle-worn bodies for an extra week.
And then there’s the NBA, where the hottest topic this past month is about what’s NOT on the court. There is growing concern and frustration over the number of teams choosing to have their key players sit out multiple games to get rest for the playoffs. Fans are forking over hundreds of dollars to watch superstars like LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, and Kevin Love. Pick the wrong night, though, and you are stuck seeing a heavy dose of Kay Felder, James Jones, and Larry Sanders. ESPN and Turner Sports can’t be too happy either, considering that they are paying a combined $2.66 billion per year in NBA television rights over the next decade.
The simple solution would be for the players to play. But NBA teams want to put themselves in the best position for a successful playoff run with healthy, rested players. Ideally, the NBA could counter that by shortening their 82-game regular season by 6 to 12 games. While that sounds great, there is one simple reason why it will never happen: NBA teams are owned by billionaires. Billionaires are billionaires because they are great at making money. And you don’t make money by eliminating games.
Resting players in other sports is not a problem because teams are usually motivated to do whatever is necessary to win. That’s not true in the NBA. With 16 of 30 teams making the playoffs (53% of teams qualify, as opposed to 33% of MLB and 38% of the NFL), good teams rarely have to fight for a ticket to the playoff dance. Higher seeds do earn home court advantage and/or slightly easier opponents. But in the uniform 8-team conference playoff structure currently in use, those advantages apparently don’t provide enough motivation. The Cavaliers sat LeBron and Kyrie on Monday at Miami with the top seed on the line.
To combat this resting issue, I propose that the NBA revamp its playoff structure to better reward winning—and punish losing—during the regular season. Here are a few proposals for NBA Commissioner Adam Silver to mull over…
I. TWEAKING THE HOME COURT ADVANTAGE
This is the simplest solution. Keep the current eight-team set-up…
but allow top two seeds to host games 1, 2, 4, 6, and 7. An extra home game gives more motivation to earn a 1 or 2-seed or avoid a 7 or 8-seed.
ANTI-REST VACCINE EFFECTIVENESS GRADE: C
II. SIX-TEAM PLAYOFF BRACKET
The NBA used a variation of this set-up from 1977 to 1984. Not only would this make post-season spots more precious—only 40% would now qualify—but the top two seeds would also earn first round byes.
ANTI-REST VACCINE EFFECTIVENESS GRADE: B+
Unfortunately, those billionaires will never let this happen. Four less playoff teams mean four less playoff series. Over the last 10 years, the average total of those four series (1 vs. 8 and 2 vs. 7 in each conference) was 20.8 games. Remember, less games = less money.
So how can we keep the motivation (to play players, win games, and earn better seeds) generated by this set-up while not forcing the billionaires to start clipping coupons? Just ask the boys of summer.
In 2012, baseball added a second wild card team (to both the American and National Leagues) to their playoff format. Prior to that, the lone wild card team earned the same invitation to a best-of-five divisional series as the three division winners. The advantage of being a division winner, as opposed to a wild card was minimal. When adding the second wild card, MLB also created the genius concept of putting those wild cards into a one-game elimination match-up to qualify for the next round. That greatly enhanced the value of earning division title. That inspired me to this bracket masterpiece:
3. THE WEIGHTED 8-TEAM BRACKET
This set-up puts seed positioning at a premium. The double bye that top two seeds earn gives them a two-week period to heal up. The bye of the 3rd and 4th seeds allows them to avoid the death trap of the one game elimination. The 5th and 6th seeds have the value of home court for that sudden death game.
There are two negatives to this structure. The top two seeds might feel that the two week layoff could also lead to rust. And this set-up only recoups four of those 20.8 lost first round games. Possibly making that opening round a quick best of three series would offset some of the lost revenue. Those would be two very minor tradeoffs for the opportunity to eradicate this ‘resting’ epidemic from the NBA universe.
ANTI-REST VACCINE EFFECTIVENESS GRADE: A