Around the League: The Offseason

[Superbone]

No. Well, I have an account but I don't use it.

You should. I'm @careystephen (first name & middle name) if anyone wants to chat on there. Bob and I are both pretty active. I talk about a lot of random shit though not just Suns/NBA stuff. I also do a lot of movie & Tv talk and sometimes stuff about my kids.

Please explain to me how it works. When you say "chat" and movie and TV "talk", what do you mean? My understanding of twitter is that they are just limited bursts of text that you send out to the world.

[carey]

Please explain to me how it works. When you say "chat" and movie and TV "talk", what do you mean? My understanding of twitter is that they are just limited bursts of text that you send out to the world.

Yup, that's what it is. But you can direct what you say 142 characters at a time. So usually it's just a few musings on stuff. Sometimes I'll do a twitter review of something and that's usually 2 or 3 tweets about it. I.e. "Such and such was mediocre. Slow pacing, bad acting. You can see they had a limited budget. 2/5." Stuff like that. It's good for a single dad like me that doesn't get out a whole lot. If I didn't have twitter & this site I'd probably have very little socialization daily.

[Superbone]

OK, got it. Thanks.

[carey]

https://twitter.com/WojYahooNBA/status/619960166843166720 Ol' Bud is moving to the Pacers. Guess they needed a backup for PG, though I bet he'll be playing a decent amount of PF this year with West & Hibbert gone.

[Superbone]

Interesting. Something to talk about on Monday. Chase's brother is an intern that is working with my team this summer. Very good basketball player too. We play at lunch everyday and he was the first guy to dunk in our games in my history there (probably 13 years).

[INFORMER]

Zach Lavine is looking next in SL so far

Yeah, I really wanted the Suns to get him.

[In2ition]

Me too. I love the Wiggins, Lavine, and Towns trio.

[carey]

https://twitter.com/daldridgetnt/status/620058204219641856 https://twitter.com/WojYahooNBA/status/620061322059722752 Also the Bobcats signed Aaron Harrison.
https://twitter.com/WojYahooNBA/status/620060236867436544

[Ring_Wanted]

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/adam-silve ... 48596.html

Don't know if posted or discussed before, but Silver is making playoff seeding not depend on divisions.

Divisions know only matter to determine schedules.

It's a step in the right direction, I believe.

[ShelC]

Aaron Harrison looked good in the games I saw in Orlando. Real good size, nice composure.

[SDC]

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/adam-silve ... 48596.html

Don't know if posted or discussed before, but Silver is making playoff seeding not depend on divisions.

Divisions know only matter to determine schedules.

It's a step in the right direction, I believe.

NBA commissioner Adam Silver said at the Board of Governors meeting that playoff seeding will be based solely on the records of the top eight teams in the Western and Eastern Conference starting as early as next season.

still doesnt do it for me. how about getting only the 16 teams with the best records in the league? i'd rather see OKC over brooklyn.

[Mori Chu]

They don't want to do that because then the weaker conference teams get angry. It also makes it much more likely that the league would become very stacked in the West. Also it is draining to fly that much for a first-round series, and it messes up a lot of old playoff rivalries. I don't want them to make the change to top-16 in the playoffs.

[Shabazz]

They don't want to do that because then the weaker conference teams get angry. It also makes it much more likely that the league would become very stacked in the West. Also it is draining to fly that much for a first-round series, and it messes up a lot of old playoff rivalries. I don't want them to make the change to top-16 in the playoffs.

The league has been stacked in the West for the last 20+ years.

[Cap]

I was thinking each division should be guaranteed a spot in the playoffs. If one division has five of the bottom seven teams in the conference, the division champ would get the 8 seed. It would be very rarely different from the system announced this week.

[Indy]

They don't want to do that because then the weaker conference teams get angry. It also makes it much more likely that the league would become very stacked in the West. Also it is draining to fly that much for a first-round series, and it messes up a lot of old playoff rivalries. I don't want them to make the change to top-16 in the playoffs.

The travel is a bogus argument. Like Memphis to Portland is a short regional flight, but Minny to Chicago, or Cleveland or philly or even NY isn't. They are all flying on private jets.

But I agree that I don't want the top 16 teams either. I would actually prefer to go the other way and have more divisional games and actually have 4 brackets like they do for ncaa.

[The Bobster]

You couldn't really compare East and West won-lost record unless they get rid of the unbalanced schedule, which would mean a lot more travel for the players, so you can probably forget it.

[Shabazz]

You couldn't really compare East and West won-lost record unless they get rid of the unbalanced schedule, which would mean a lot more travel for the players, so you can probably forget it.

I never understood this argument. It makes sense to have unbalanced schedules during the regular season when teams play more games and more frequently because that's when the intense travel demands would compound. The regular season is when conferences make the most sense.

Additionally, if a team (say, the Suns) wins 48 games against a West-heavy schedule, isn't that an even greater accomplishment than winning 48 games against a balanced schedule and thus more deserving of being rewarded with a playoff spot?

[Ring_Wanted]

I've wanted the best 16 at the playoffs for a long time now, but first the schedule would need to be indeed balanced out. I don't see traveling today as a problem, though. I don't really care about old rivalries either.

[carey]

I am probably alone here in liking a recent proposal I saw but... it was about adding 5 Europe based teams to the NBA bringing the total to 35 teams. Then you play each team in the league home & away including one Euro tour each season. It would mean decreasing the total amount of games played by a dozen or so. It would dilute the talent pool in the league a bit but you might get more Euro players interested in coming to the NBA. I think overall it would be very interesting. What effect would having true Euro teams in the league have?

[Indy]

You couldn't really compare East and West won-lost record unless they get rid of the unbalanced schedule, which would mean a lot more travel for the players, so you can probably forget it.

Why do you need balanced schedules. You don't have it in football and that seems to work out fine.