Malaise Has Overrun the NBA’s Regular Season; Here’s How to Fix It
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Treble Clef
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 10:23 am    Post subject:

Aeneas Hunter wrote:


Oh, good heavens. You're basing your perception on Bill Freaking Simmons. I have no idea why some of you still listen to his podcast. Simmons is a bombastic fool who ceased to be relevant about ten years ago when ESPN booted him.


Yeah I blame the talking heads for pushing this idea that load management and tanking are hurting the entertainment factor of the games. As a basketball fan, I like that there are more games on. I don’t tune in to watch a specific player. The games are interesting even if some players are out and some teams aren’t competing for championships.

We have been watching plenty of games without LeBron and/or AD. A lot of times, the opponents were missing their stars too. I know Leonard, Curry, Durant, Booker, Towns, Sabonis, Lillard, SGA, Zion, etc all missed Lakers games this year and I don’t think it made them any less watchable. It seems like a made up controversy so they have stuff to fill their own shows.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 11:59 am    Post subject:

JUST-MING wrote:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:
activeverb wrote:
In fact, if you made the NBA a 60 game season, I question whether TV ratings or interest in the individual games would change significantly.


I don't see why it would. In particular, the NBA is targeting $75B for its next media rights package. That's the proverbial elephant in the room. Whether the league actually gets to $75B remains to be seen, but they aren't getting there by cutting the inventory of games by 25%.


I think they need to partner with Meta and crack into VR. They could sell virtual tickets to games, create a virtual world using the hundreds of stadium cameras. I think Golden State already did something like this five years ago. They could start with Warriors games, then spread into other teams. I think that was a missed opportunity during COVID lockdowns.

They could get closer to that $75billion mark with that Meta partnership. Not with current TV deals.


That’s a good idea for the future. I would like to see numbers of viewers (all access types) versus age. It’s a small sample size but the people that I know around my kids ages (25-27) don’t watch the NBA from any source. They don’t watch TV, everything is streaming. Since ESPN+ began streaming NHL games for a very affordable monthly rate, my kids friends have become hockey fans. They watch at work, at the gym, at school. They will spend hundreds for a trip to Las Vegas to see the Knights play. When you consider the popularity of the NBA outside of America, affordable streaming makes sense for the future of the NBA.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:02 pm    Post subject:

slavavov wrote:
ArminNBA wrote:


Right, and that’s why the NBA and its owners would have to be convinced that any change that involves shortening the season would lead to a significant increase in ad revenue, which would mitigate the loss in ticket revenue. In my view, less games would equate more meaningful games, and the viewership and general interest would drastically increase.

Number one, if you shorten the season, everything would have to get more expensive, including ticket prices, the price for streaming services, maybe march prices, etc. Inflation is bad enough, and over the last 10-15 years, people have been spending less money on having fun, whether it's vacations, dining out, partying/drinking and the like because of increasing income inequality.

Number two, I doubt even a 60-game season would make games seem more significant. Once everyone gets used to it, maybe each game would seem about as "insignificant" as they do now.

In fact, when coupled with higher prices for tickets and watching games at home, maybe viewership and attendance would actually go down.

I'd be down to shorten to season to ~60 games if money weren't an issue, and then start the season only a little bit later so that there would (hopefully) be no more back-to-back games. That way, players' sleep schedules would be better, which would reduce the risk of injury. Their testosterone level go way down several weeks into the season, which supposedly increases their injury risk.

But unfortunately, the almighty dollar rules all in our society and messes things up.


As I wrote in the piece, I agree that shortening the season itself is not enough, which is why my proposal includes additional inducements to add game-to-game meaning and intensity.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:04 pm    Post subject:

I need games year round. 100 games a season sounds good to me. They get hurt, they get hurt!

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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:25 pm    Post subject:

Aeneas Hunter wrote:
ArminNBA wrote:
On Sunday's Bill Simmons podcast, Simmons, House, and Jacoby spent a good 10 minutes lamenting the state of the NBA and how regular season games have become meaningless. This is the most popular sports podcast in the world.


Oh, good heavens. You're basing your perception on Bill Freaking Simmons. I have no idea why some of you still listen to his podcast. Simmons is a bombastic fool who ceased to be relevant about ten years ago when ESPN booted him.

Anyway, the stuff you are saying about Adam Silver is incorrect. At the all-star break, Silver said that there is no plan to reduce the number of regular season games. The concern is not apathy on the part of fans. It's the number of back to back games and the rise of load management. The league and the union are looking at extending the season again to spread out the games more.


Aeneas Hunter wrote:
67 + 16 = 83. The league is NOT having active discussions on shortening the season.


I did not say I am "basing [my] perception" on Bill Simmons, as you claim. We can discuss in good faith and acknowledge that this conversation is happening far and wide without requiring me to provide dozens of citations. It's a constant conversation, from shows like NBA Today to the Lowe Post to the Windhorst Hoop Collective.

FYI, I think Simmons' basketball analysis is outrageously biased. I also think his historical acumen for the NBA is overstated and skewed. But has he, as you put it, "ceased to be relevant" for 10 years? Unfortunately not. He has millions of plays per episode of his show. He is an NBA Awards voter. He also has the ear of Adam Silver. If you recall, he was one of the earliest and loudest proponents for the play-in tournament, a concept once considered unfeasible, weird, and something that would never actually happen.

And no, the stuff I am saying about Adam Silver is not incorrect. He has consistently been open to shortening the season.

Quote:
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver didn't immediately reject the idea of shortening the regular season from 82 games. "I'm not against changing the format of the season," he told reporters ahead of Thursday's Game 1 of the 2022 NBA Finals.


Quote:
“It’s something we’ve been talking a lot about the last few years,” said Adam Silver. I’m not against potentially changing the format of the season. Even possibly shortening a bit.


Quote:
After first implementing changes aimed at shortening games and smoothing out the viewing experience, the NBA has proposed trimming the season from 82 games to 78 in 2021-22, adding an in-season tournament and adding win-or-go-home play-in games to the start of the postseason. The league also has floated changing its playoff format to reseed the final four teams by record to help ensure the best teams square off in the Finals.


However, this is not to say that you are wrong that "there is no plan" as of now to reduce games. Those are wisely chosen words, as there can be "no plan" specifically at this point, but that does not mean it isn't possible that the 82-game season is eventually shortened. And this is what Adam Silver said word-for-word during his 2023 NBA All-Star press conference on February 19, 2023 about shortening the regular season in answering the following question:

Quote:
"Is there a chance that you'll go to 72, 75, 78? Is that ever going to be on the table?"

"I'll never say never, ever. If you recall only two seasons ago coming out of the Bubble season, we played a 72-game season. Now, the footprint was slightly smaller, but it was an interesting experiment because it didn't change team behavior all that much in terms of the focus on load and players. To your point, it's not just gameplay, but teams deciding not to practice - teams deciding to do whatever they can to maintain players being in an optimal position to compete during games. It is an ongoing conversation with the players association."


I know you said there have been no discussions and what I am saying about Silver is incorrect, but these are his words on the matter.


Last edited by ArminNBA on Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:45 pm; edited 1 time in total
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:31 pm    Post subject:

activeverb wrote:
LakesGnrLake wrote:
I have a wild idea. Implement a points system like soccer. Two tournaments in the year. One League Champion. You have a midseason tournament and the winner is given bonus points to their total. At the end of the year the team with the most points is the League Champion. Then have a post season tournament with the top teams and the winner of the is the Finals Champion.

This gives teams that are hanging around the middle a reason to play in the middle of the year because winning the midseason tourney gives you better chances to win the League Championship. Top teams will be able to secure a top spot sooner and it makes being the best team in the league at the end of the year worth something. You are still given a post season tournament with the top teams.

Incentive winning these tournaments by giving the OWNERS financial incentive. Such as not having to pay luxury tax if you win a tournament.


The NBA is supposed to implement some kind of in-season tournament, possibly next season. I think it is a test run to see if American fans will care as much as European fans. I believe they are debating if and how the tournament should affect the playoffs, so they might well do something like you are suggesting.


Pre-Seaon playoff favorites show they don't care about the regular season. They will rest players and squeak into the playoffs that's all they care about. The regular season has pretty much lost any importance. The NBA needs to find a way to make the regular season matter. I don't think adding a bye week will change things either.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:34 pm    Post subject:

Treble Clef wrote:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:


Oh, good heavens. You're basing your perception on Bill Freaking Simmons. I have no idea why some of you still listen to his podcast. Simmons is a bombastic fool who ceased to be relevant about ten years ago when ESPN booted him.


Yeah I blame the talking heads for pushing this idea that load management and tanking are hurting the entertainment factor of the games. As a basketball fan, I like that there are more games on. I don’t tune in to watch a specific player. The games are interesting even if some players are out and some teams aren’t competing for championships.

We have been watching plenty of games without LeBron and/or AD. A lot of times, the opponents were missing their stars too. I know Leonard, Curry, Durant, Booker, Towns, Sabonis, Lillard, SGA, Zion, etc all missed Lakers games this year and I don’t think it made them any less watchable. It seems like a made up controversy so they have stuff to fill their own shows.


Me too. I watch all 82 Lakers games, pre and post game shows, as well as much of what's on national TV and NBA GameTime on NBA TV. I had League Pass for about 7 years, maybe one season less or more.

But as it stands, the NBA has 1,230 games total. Are you watching all 1,230? In a 32-team league with a 67-game schedule, the NBA would sell tickets for 1,072 games. That means the NBA loses 158 games, which may seem like a bummer, but I truly would be shocked if that would mean less games for you watch. At the end of the day, the motivation behind my proposal or any proposal like this isn't to take away basketball — these proposals are trying to ensure that the product on the floor would be significantly better for each game that you watch, with higher stakes and more intensity.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:46 pm    Post subject:

LakesGnrLake wrote:
Pre-Seaon playoff favorites show they don't care about the regular season. They will rest players and squeak into the playoffs that's all they care about. The regular season has pretty much lost any importance. The NBA needs to find a way to make the regular season matter.


I question whether the NBA "needs" to find a way to make the regular season matter. As I've noted, you can argue that the regular season hasn't mattered for 30 years and the NBA has done fine.

For most fans, I think the regular reason matters because of the pleasure they get from watching their teams play. It's more about the entertainment value of the seeing the game and the players rather about how a specific game will impact the season. I think people sometimes forget that aspect of it. Watching a game is a piece of entertainment for a day, like seeing a movie. That's why people still go to and watch games that will have no impact on a team's overall season success.

This whole "malaise" thing seems more like talking heads needing to fill time than an issue of fundamental importance to the NBA.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 12:55 pm    Post subject:

activeverb wrote:
LakesGnrLake wrote:
Pre-Seaon playoff favorites show they don't care about the regular season. They will rest players and squeak into the playoffs that's all they care about. The regular season has pretty much lost any importance. The NBA needs to find a way to make the regular season matter.


I question whether the NBA "needs" to find a way to make the regular season matter. As I've noted, you can argue that the regular season hasn't mattered for 30 years and the NBA has done fine.

For most fans, I think the regular reason matters because of the pleasure they get from watching their teams play. It's more about the entertainment value of the seeing the game and the players rather about how a specific game will impact the season. I think people sometimes forget that aspect of it. Watching a game is a piece of entertainment for a day, like seeing a movie. That's why people still go to and watch games that will have no impact on a team's overall season success.

This whole "malaise" thing seems more like talking heads needing to fill time than an issue of fundamental importance to the NBA.


Quote:
“You can’t [just] lose five-to-10 games,” Kobe Bryant said. “If you’re going to do it, you’ve almost got to go quality versus quantity. If you’re going to shorten the schedule, then you’ve got to shorten the schedule and look to enhance your TV numbers substantially…because now every regular-season game is worth a s**t.


Not to say that everything Kobe Bryant said was 100% correct, but the idea of malaise being a talking-heads driven narrative isn't entirely correct. We are hardcore fans who don't miss games. But broadly speaking, sentiment among fans is that the playoffs is when " the real season begins," and that's partially because players believe that too. And, by the way, this mentality is also in part due to the fact that fans clamor for championships, which is great, but there are some side effects, and I believe they could be addressed to enhance the quality of the league as a whole.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 1:03 pm    Post subject:

ArminNBA wrote:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:
ArminNBA wrote:
On Sunday's Bill Simmons podcast, Simmons, House, and Jacoby spent a good 10 minutes lamenting the state of the NBA and how regular season games have become meaningless. This is the most popular sports podcast in the world.


Oh, good heavens. You're basing your perception on Bill Freaking Simmons. I have no idea why some of you still listen to his podcast. Simmons is a bombastic fool who ceased to be relevant about ten years ago when ESPN booted him.

Anyway, the stuff you are saying about Adam Silver is incorrect. At the all-star break, Silver said that there is no plan to reduce the number of regular season games. The concern is not apathy on the part of fans. It's the number of back to back games and the rise of load management. The league and the union are looking at extending the season again to spread out the games more.


Aeneas Hunter wrote:
67 + 16 = 83. The league is NOT having active discussions on shortening the season.


I did not say I am "basing [my] perception" on Bill Simmons, as you claim. We can discuss in good faith and acknowledge that this conversation is happening far and wide without requiring me to provide dozens of citations. It's a constant conversation, from shows like NBA Today to the Lowe Post to the Windhorst Hoop Collective.

FYI, I think Simmons' basketball analysis is outrageously biased. I also think his historical acumen for the NBA is overstated and skewed. But has he, as you put it, "ceased to be relevant" for 10 years? Unfortunately not. He has millions of plays per episode of his show. He is an NBA Awards voter. He also has the ear of Adam Silver. If you recall, he was one of the earliest and loudest proponents for the play-in tournament, a concept once considered unfeasible, weird, and something that would never actually happen.

And no, the stuff I am saying about Adam Silver is not incorrect. He has consistently been open to shortening the season.

Quote:
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver didn't immediately reject the idea of shortening the regular season from 82 games. "I'm not against changing the format of the season," he told reporters ahead of Thursday's Game 1 of the 2022 NBA Finals.


Quote:
“It’s something we’ve been talking a lot about the last few years,” said Adam Silver. I’m not against potentially changing the format of the season. Even possibly shortening a bit.


Quote:
After first implementing changes aimed at shortening games and smoothing out the viewing experience, the NBA has proposed trimming the season from 82 games to 78 in 2021-22, adding an in-season tournament and adding win-or-go-home play-in games to the start of the postseason. The league also has floated changing its playoff format to reseed the final four teams by record to help ensure the best teams square off in the Finals.


However, this is not to say that you are wrong that "there is no plan" as of now to reduce games. Those are wisely chosen words, as there can be "no plan" specifically at this point, but that does not mean it isn't possible that the 82-game season is eventually shortened. And this is what Adam Silver said word-for-word during his 2023 NBA All-Star press conference on February 19, 2023 about shortening the regular season in answering the following question:

Quote:
"Is there a chance that you'll go to 72, 75, 78? Is that ever going to be on the table?"

"I'll never say never, ever. If you recall only two seasons ago coming out of the Bubble season, we played a 72-game season. Now, the footprint was slightly smaller, but it was an interesting experiment because it didn't change team behavior all that much in terms of the focus on load and players. To your point, it's not just gameplay, but teams deciding not to practice - teams deciding to do whatever they can to maintain players being in an optimal position to compete during games. It is an ongoing conversation with the players association."


I know you said there have been no discussions and what I am saying about Silver is incorrect, but these are his words on the matter.



Silver seems to be always throwing out trial balloons. When he speaks, it's hard to know what matters and what doesn't.

"Ongoing conversations" and "ongoing discussions" are his pet phrase. If you google name and these two raises, you'll get more than 18,000 hits.

If you stick the adverb "ongoing" with no timeframe on to discussions or conversations, it makes me matter how significant those discussions and conversations.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 1:07 pm    Post subject:

activeverb wrote:
ArminNBA wrote:
Aeneas Hunter wrote:
ArminNBA wrote:
On Sunday's Bill Simmons podcast, Simmons, House, and Jacoby spent a good 10 minutes lamenting the state of the NBA and how regular season games have become meaningless. This is the most popular sports podcast in the world.


Oh, good heavens. You're basing your perception on Bill Freaking Simmons. I have no idea why some of you still listen to his podcast. Simmons is a bombastic fool who ceased to be relevant about ten years ago when ESPN booted him.

Anyway, the stuff you are saying about Adam Silver is incorrect. At the all-star break, Silver said that there is no plan to reduce the number of regular season games. The concern is not apathy on the part of fans. It's the number of back to back games and the rise of load management. The league and the union are looking at extending the season again to spread out the games more.


Aeneas Hunter wrote:
67 + 16 = 83. The league is NOT having active discussions on shortening the season.


I did not say I am "basing [my] perception" on Bill Simmons, as you claim. We can discuss in good faith and acknowledge that this conversation is happening far and wide without requiring me to provide dozens of citations. It's a constant conversation, from shows like NBA Today to the Lowe Post to the Windhorst Hoop Collective.

FYI, I think Simmons' basketball analysis is outrageously biased. I also think his historical acumen for the NBA is overstated and skewed. But has he, as you put it, "ceased to be relevant" for 10 years? Unfortunately not. He has millions of plays per episode of his show. He is an NBA Awards voter. He also has the ear of Adam Silver. If you recall, he was one of the earliest and loudest proponents for the play-in tournament, a concept once considered unfeasible, weird, and something that would never actually happen.

And no, the stuff I am saying about Adam Silver is not incorrect. He has consistently been open to shortening the season.

Quote:
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver didn't immediately reject the idea of shortening the regular season from 82 games. "I'm not against changing the format of the season," he told reporters ahead of Thursday's Game 1 of the 2022 NBA Finals.


Quote:
“It’s something we’ve been talking a lot about the last few years,” said Adam Silver. I’m not against potentially changing the format of the season. Even possibly shortening a bit.


Quote:
After first implementing changes aimed at shortening games and smoothing out the viewing experience, the NBA has proposed trimming the season from 82 games to 78 in 2021-22, adding an in-season tournament and adding win-or-go-home play-in games to the start of the postseason. The league also has floated changing its playoff format to reseed the final four teams by record to help ensure the best teams square off in the Finals.


However, this is not to say that you are wrong that "there is no plan" as of now to reduce games. Those are wisely chosen words, as there can be "no plan" specifically at this point, but that does not mean it isn't possible that the 82-game season is eventually shortened. And this is what Adam Silver said word-for-word during his 2023 NBA All-Star press conference on February 19, 2023 about shortening the regular season in answering the following question:

Quote:
"Is there a chance that you'll go to 72, 75, 78? Is that ever going to be on the table?"

"I'll never say never, ever. If you recall only two seasons ago coming out of the Bubble season, we played a 72-game season. Now, the footprint was slightly smaller, but it was an interesting experiment because it didn't change team behavior all that much in terms of the focus on load and players. To your point, it's not just gameplay, but teams deciding not to practice - teams deciding to do whatever they can to maintain players being in an optimal position to compete during games. It is an ongoing conversation with the players association."


I know you said there have been no discussions and what I am saying about Silver is incorrect, but these are his words on the matter.



Silver seems to be always throwing out trial balloons. When he speaks, it's hard to know what matters and what doesn't.

"Ongoing conversations" and "ongoing discussions" are his pet phrase. If you google name and these two raises, you'll get more than 18,000 hits.

If you stick the adverb "ongoing" with no timeframe on to discussions or conversations, it makes me matter how significant those discussions and conversations.


Sure, and it's hard to say from our vantage point the significance of any of these discussions. But they are happening, and the idea of shortening the season has been gaining a ton of steam in recent years. At the least, I would not at all be surprised if the NBA shortens its season to 78 games in order to accommodate the midseason tournament, which we know Adam Silver wants to implement for the new TV deal.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 03, 2023 1:24 pm    Post subject:

ArminNBA wrote:
Not to say that everything Kobe Bryant said was 100% correct, but the idea of malaise being a talking-heads driven narrative isn't entirely correct. We are hardcore fans who don't miss games. But broadly speaking, sentiment among fans is that the playoffs is when " the real season begins," and that's partially because players believe that too. And, by the way, this mentality is also in part due to the fact that fans clamor for championships, which is great, but there are some side effects, and I believe they could be addressed to enhance the quality of the league as a whole.


Like I said, fans and players have been saying the season really starts with the playoffs for at least 30 years. (I mean, how old is the Kobe quote you referenced -- five years? a decade? more than a decade?) It's not a new thought or some urgent new issue. It's an evergreen topic that may be old as the league itself. And all the while that people have been saying that, the league has been doing great.

I think the NBA will always be looking for tweaks to make the season more interesting and create more revenue. But I would be very surprised if the NBA thinks this is a significant problem that they need to address anytime soon.
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PostPosted: Sat Mar 04, 2023 1:53 pm    Post subject:

activeverb wrote:


Complaints about the regular season being meaningless and too long are nothing new. I remember people saying this 20 years ago.


David Halberstam cited it in 1981 during the Magic/Westhead fiasco, I have his bit on disc. He was bemoaning the money the players made, their insolence towards authority and that the NBA season had too many games, among other gripes that have seemingly been around since time immemorial.

81 was what, 42 years ago.

I've been watching a stream of 1993/94 NBA highlights from SportsCenter epis that some dude on YT up'd in order of date. He put up the entire season, pretty much. The season sans Michael Jordan and, to me, it was a fun and interesting season w/ the same amount of excellent play as any other season. However, the fundamentals and unselfish passing sequences sometimes involving 3 or 4 dudes seem to have dwindled since then, not to mention the roles of 4s and 5s. The overall athleticism has gone up.

I watch 1994 and it looks like basketball to me. Today's game doesn't. Yes, I yell at clouds and demand to speak to the manager.
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PostPosted: Sat Mar 04, 2023 5:09 pm    Post subject:

ArminNBA wrote:
activeverb wrote:
LakesGnrLake wrote:
Pre-Seaon playoff favorites show they don't care about the regular season. They will rest players and squeak into the playoffs that's all they care about. The regular season has pretty much lost any importance. The NBA needs to find a way to make the regular season matter.


I question whether the NBA "needs" to find a way to make the regular season matter. As I've noted, you can argue that the regular season hasn't mattered for 30 years and the NBA has done fine.

For most fans, I think the regular reason matters because of the pleasure they get from watching their teams play. It's more about the entertainment value of the seeing the game and the players rather about how a specific game will impact the season. I think people sometimes forget that aspect of it. Watching a game is a piece of entertainment for a day, like seeing a movie. That's why people still go to and watch games that will have no impact on a team's overall season success.

This whole "malaise" thing seems more like talking heads needing to fill time than an issue of fundamental importance to the NBA.


Quote:
“You can’t [just] lose five-to-10 games,” Kobe Bryant said. “If you’re going to do it, you’ve almost got to go quality versus quantity. If you’re going to shorten the schedule, then you’ve got to shorten the schedule and look to enhance your TV numbers substantially…because now every regular-season game is worth a s**t.


Not to say that everything Kobe Bryant said was 100% correct, but the idea of malaise being a talking-heads driven narrative isn't entirely correct. We are hardcore fans who don't miss games. But broadly speaking, sentiment among fans is that the playoffs is when " the real season begins," and that's partially because players believe that too. And, by the way, this mentality is also in part due to the fact that fans clamor for championships, which is great, but there are some side effects, and I believe they could be addressed to enhance the quality of the league as a whole.


The championship or bust expectations have ruined the league. Of course players are gonna sit and manage themselves if they’re expected to make a championship run, and anything less is a somehow a failure.

Fans get mad at players not taking the regular season seriously while at the same time scoffing at regular season accomplishments. The playoffs and titles have skewed far too much in terms of value compared to the regular season is a big problem.

MVP used to be the ultimate individual award, but now Jokic who’s about to win 3 in a row, totally dismiss who he is as a player because he hasn’t won a title which is utterly ridiculous. If a soon-to-be 3 time mvp doesn’t get the respect from the masses as (IMO) the best player on earth…there’s no point in doing anything other than be ready for the playoffs if that’s the case.

The regular season cannot be seen as less (or significantly less) in value than the playoffs, it just can’t. If you want players to start taking it seriously again, fans need to also.

It’s just this era of society where if you aren’t first…you’re last. No one appreciates the journey anymore they just want results.
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