“Ultimately we want to see your best teams in the playoffs. And there is an unbalance and a certain unfairness. There is a proposal (from one of the broadcasters)… where the division winners would all automatically go into the playoffs and then you'd seed the next 10 best teams. I think that's the kind of proposal we need to look at. There are travel issues of course, but in this day in age every team of course has their own plane, travels charter. I don't think the discussion should end there. And as I've said, my first year I was studying a lot of these issues and year 2 is time to take action. It's something I'm going to look at closely with the competition committee. I do think it's an area where we need to make a change.”
It's an idea that has merit, but I still feel it's unnecessary, just because there's a fairly big imbalance right now. The aforementioned article goes on to note:
Under the proposal he mentions, this season's playoffs would currently have Toronto, Cleveland, Atlanta, Portland, Golden State, and Memphis as the division winners locked for the playoffs. Then the next 10 best teams would be Houston, the Clippers, Dallas, San Antonio, Washington, Chicago, Phoenix, Milwaukee, New Orleans, and Oklahoma City in the playoffs. It would chop off Charlotte and Miami from the current playoff teams.
That sounds like a great idea for the teams getting into the playoffs, but how do you sell that to Michael Jordan, Micky Arison, and the other owners in the Eastern Conference? You're not only denying them a spot in the playoffs but they're losing out on playoff revenue. The simple solution is telling them to get better so they don't have to worry about dropping out of the playoff picture, but that's easier said than done.
It's a fair point, but then, you could say the same to the Western teams that are on the outside looking in right now. The West is very competitive at the moment. Want to make the Playoffs? Then get better, and win more than those others teams! It's the same argument.
I like David Aldridge's take on the matter:
When can we all stop whining about conference imbalance?
You know, Mary Wilson was, and is, a great singer. But she wasn't Diana Ross. Merv Griffin was a thoughtful and well-rounded television talk show host (and became a multi-millionaire later in life after creating the game shows "Jeopardy" and "Wheel of Fortune"). But he wasn't the talk show host or cultural icon that Johnny Carson was.
Life can be tough. And it's tough in the Western Conference -- at least, for the bottom four spots in the West, which have consistently produced better teams over the last decade than their counterparts in the East.
People keep wanting to make this about fairness. But life isn't fair. We don't all get participation ribbons.
Patrick Ewing is a Hall of Famer. So is Charles Barkley. So are Karl Malone and John Stockton. Yet none of them have a ring, because Michael Jordan and the Bulls wouldn't allow it. That's not "fair." Any or all of them, had they been born 10 years earlier or later, may have led their teams to multiple championships. But they weren't.
The NFL routinely puts teams with worse records than others into the playoffs. Was it "fair" that the 7-8-1 Carolina Panthers made the postseason this year, while the 10-6 Philadelphia Eagles didn't? Yet you hear no gnashing of teeth about how the NFL postseason needs restructuring.
The Suns had the playoffs on their racket last season. In the final week of the regular season, they played at Dallas, and then hosted the Grizzlies. If they'd won those eminently winnable games, they'd have almost certainly been in the postseason. But Phoenix lost 'em both and finished a game behind the Mavs and two behind Memphis. Sorry: not holding a telethon for them.
The world doesn't owe those teams unfortunate enough to be in the 8-10 hole in the West anything, any more than it owes New York Knicks and Los Angeles Lakers fan a contender. Are we scarred as a nation if an under .500 eighth seed in the east gets knocked out in four games in the first round? If you want to ensure being in the playoffs, put a team together that qualifies for the playoffs.
This isn't about fairness. This is about managing your team correctly.
He goes on to throw out a viable solution if changes are to be made, but I think he's right; too much is made out of the situation. Sometimes, it works out better than others. As it stands, a grand total of two teams would be in the Playoffs instead, under the proposed format. When 14 of the 16 teams are supposedly there fair and square, it's not exactly a catastrophe.
It's like the Draft Lottery. I do think it's worthwhile evaluating the situation, and considering alternatives and improvements, but I don't think either system is anywhere near as broken as they're made out to be.
