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Hey dude, back off, I'm emotionally drunk dealing with the Spurs' loss as best I can...Quote:
Originally Posted by Blake
Besides, the idea wouldn't work anyways given that it would require two expansion franchises for the brackets to work (as pointed out by tesseractive)... I don't know why I thought there were 32 teams...
That said, I still believe something, anything, needs to be done to address league disparity.
I nver complained when spurs had homecourt for the finals, not gona complain now.
Deleted. Already said.
"Everything about baseball is stupid"? Okay, *ignores your opinions about baseball henceforth*.Quote:
Originally Posted by Seefourdc
It isn't more "punishing", it's easier. You're using a lazy media take to prop up the east as more than it really is just like they do. Why do you think the same team always gets to the Finals over and over and over again out of the east? Nets twice in a row, Pistons twice in a row, then Heat once, crappy Cavs got there, Celtics 2/3, crappy Magic once, now Heat 3x in a row.
Either the same team always gets there or a shitty team sneaks in past everyone. Let's look at the west, how often has a shitty team snuck into the Finals since Hakeem's Rockets in '94? Whoops, zero. And only once has the same team gotten there consequtive times since Shaq's 3peat Lakers. And tbh, they were fortunate their main competiton was either picking up a key injury or getting knocked out before they even had to face them.
how about 2 - 2 - 1 - 1 - neutral site.
Your example and logic is terrible and completely not thought out as well as misinformed. The Spurs or Lakers have represented the west in 12 out of the last 15 finals. Furthermore the Lakers went 3 straight years TWICE in the last 13 years and represented 7/13 total finals appearences over that time. (They went 3 times without Shaq!)Quote:
Originally Posted by Kidd K
What kind of parity exactly is there again in the West? Oh right... none. None is the correct answer.
Really there are only two teams competing in the West and a bunch of shitty teams otherwise. The Thunder basically replaced the Lakers as a yearly contender with Westbrook-Durant-Ibaka combo of stars now.
The East has more seriously competitive teams at this point in the Pacers-Bulls-Heat and the Celtics were a damn good team until Rondo injury/Ray Allen leaving and now the dismantling of the team this year.
I mean seriously... you played MEMPHIS in the conference finals this year. MEMPHIS?!?! That's a joke if I've ever heard one. The Spurs had NO competition this year to get to the finals and you want to sit here and tell me that the West is more competitive. They played the most busted ass team to get into the playoffs in years in the Lakers to start. Then they played GSW and somehow gave away 2 games to them. Then Memphis?! Has there ever been an easier road to the finals?!
Come on man... The Spurs were the only good team in the West after Westbrook went down. Please tell me more about how strong the West is right now...
I've brought up parity or lack therefore months ago and how this really helps the cHeat pad that record up. The lack of parity in this league could begin to be fixed by teams being put into the geographically correct conference. Memphis and New Orleans, one team that's very good and another that's up-and-coming, belong in the East.
Finals needs to go back to 2-2-1-1-1. It is the most fair and switching it makes zero sense.
As far as the OP goes. I agree that the regular season is too long. I would like to see the NBA go down to around 72 games. This will at least eliminate the crazy 4 in 5 nights and all that.
Conferences are fine and eventually it all comes down to chance. Nothing to be done there.
As said before, the new CBA which is still currently being implemented is meant to create more parity and give small market teams a better chance.
My example was perfectly relevant, as was my logic very sound. I can easily see that you're merely claiming that because you're wrong and disagree though. Common tactic by people with terrible takes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Seefourdc
I'm talking about the last decade, not going back further to cherry pick from the moment the Spurs and Lakers started to get to the Finals (speaking of shitty takes, thanks for providing an example of one). Spurs never got there back to back years, and the Lakers were the only team to manage it. Out east, it happened repeatedly and from different weak sources who mostly failed to win a title.
Another example of your extremely shitty take is that you're hilariously claiming that the east has more seriously competative teams. How many times have they won the title since Jordan retired again? What's that you say? Five? And the Heat have three of those? Yeah, the east is a fuckin joke and it has nothing to do with it being competative. They typically can't win once they get to the Finals because their teams are worse, not because it's phyiscal.
The Heat are winning now because they have a super team. They are the only standout team in the east.
Memphis statistically was almost the exact same on paper as the Pacers. A physical team with a great defense that fouls a lot but has a subpar offense.
Speaking of weak roads to the Finals, let's look at Miami's. vs Bucks, the worst team in the playoffs. vs Bulls. . .minus Derrick Rose, Luol Deng, Kirk Hinrich, and Joakim Noah playing severely injured. Then the Pacers who were statistically almost the exact same as the Grizzlies. Yeah, really tough road to the Finals the Heat had. :lmao
You're so jacked up about insisting the west sucks (no surprise you being a Rocket fan, wanting to diminish the Spurs), that you've completely blinded yourself to how shitty the east is and has been ever since Jordan retired. Another example of how the west is better, take a look at the east's record vs the west every single season. Notice how the west plays usually .570 against the east while east plays around .430 against the west. That's because the east is so amazing and the west is so weak though, I'm sure. You're blind as a fuckin bat kid.
I'm not talking about over the last 15 years when I'm talking about competition right now. Furthermore you can't really even call the West competitive over the last 15 years considering two teams have won almost all of the championships or represented them over that time. That doesn't mean the division is strong, it just means you have two teams that have all the talent.
Yes you are right the Heat's road wasn't that much tougher but at least they played one seriously quality team in the Pacers. Memphis was a joke. They really didn't have anyone who could shoot. Packing the paint is all it took to win. Memphis is an even worse offensive team than the Pacers... seriously? They didn't even know how they were going to score after the trade and should not have made it to a conference finals. The Pacers are a better team on both ends of the court period.
By the way I wasn't trying to diminish the Spurs, and you are foolish to suggest that. My point is that the Spurs and Lakers were the cream of the crop over the recent history. A long way above a really crappy division for a long time now. The West has at best had 3 good teams at any time. The East was weak but I think it's a stronger division right now.
Last who cares about division vs. division play as a barometer? Does it really matter that phoenix beats Orlando or any of the teams in the bottom 10 of the league perform well against the other? All that really matters is how the top 3 teams play against the other divisions top 3 when it comes to quality because that's generally all that's going to matter come playoff time.
After Westbrook went down there was one good team in the West THIS YEAR. The Spurs were a hell of a lot better than the rest which was obvious. In the East at least it was competitive for one game...
Gimmie a break, the east is garbage recently. The only team who was ever going to be a threat to the Heat lost their best player LAST YEAR (Rose), who also didn't play THIS year. . .and they also lost Deng and Hinrich, plus Rip barely played in that series and Noah played hurt. The Pacers are decent, but they are basically the same as the Grizzlies, a team the Spurs swept (despite half media taking the Grizzlies over them).
And no the Pacers are not better on both ends of the court. lmfao. Again with the shitty take devoid of facts. Grizzlies DRating: 0.5 worse than Pacers. Grizzlies oRating: 0.6 better than Pacers. Total: 0.1 better than Pacers. And that's with the Pacers padding those stats against the shitty eastern conference.
You should care about division vs division play, because you're arguing the east is more phyiscal/better than the west. You can't pidgeon hole and cherry pick stats to suit your argument, you need to use them all. Ignoring facts leads to a terrible take and a terrible point.
Why you ask? Your argument is that the east is physical and teams beat you up and it takes a toll and is tough to get through the playoffs. The best team in the east only plays one of the top 3 teams in the east (MAYBE) before getting to the Finals. So what, we're ignoring the first two softee rounds now? More cherry picking. Just stop.
Westbrook argument is fuckin garbage. Rose was also down all year and out for the playoffs last year. Heat never played the real Bulls the last two years. They are the 2nd best team in the east.
The fact that two teams dominated the NBA out of the west is proof that the west has been kicking the east's ass. Of course though, your take that the west has sucked is so awful and terrible, I can't believe I'm even seeing it.
You know, I'm going to end this pointless debate right now and show you the facts.
From 1999-2013:
West NBA titles: 10
West 65 game winners: 3
West 60 game winners:9
West 55 game winners: 30
West 50 game winners:34
West 45 game winners: 18
West .500 or worse teams making the playoffs: 0
West teams over .500 NOT making the playoffs: 11
East NBA titles: 5
East 65 game winners: 3
East 60 game winners: 5
East 55 game winners: 7
East 50 game winners: 19
East 45 game winners: 23
East .500 or worse teams making the playoffs: 21
East teams over .500 NOT making the playoffs: 1 (42-40)
Note: several times the east had teams 42-40 in the playoffs, so honestly, it was really close to looking a LOT worse than 41 if those teams just lost one game instead of won it. I didn't include 1999 (besides the title) since no team even got to 40 wins, but that year the west had 3 teams .700 of better while the east had 0.
So let's see, East: 15 teams with 55 or more wins in 15 years. West: 42. Nearly 3 times as many. Gee, I wonder which conference is and has been better and stronger? :lmao
Shit isn't rocket science. Your take on this subject is god awful and dead wrong. The east is perpetually weak and bad, while the reverse is the case in the west. The east was worse than it is now 10 years ago, but the trend has still not shifted. LeBron's Heat is good. . .because they banded together via free agency. The rest? Sucks or has been severely hurt by time the Heat even faced them in the playoffs. So recent history gives you no argument either.
That right there sums it up...Quote:
Originally Posted by Kidd K