RealGM

They are currently sitting 9th in the West at 27-19. Its truly sad how strong the West is, and how weak the East is. I can't believe they tried to make the argument about the East being good because the Pistons won in 04, and East in 06. Maybe that's because the West teams beat the crap out of the each other and the 2 or 3 good east team, have a free ride to the conference finals. Between Portland, Denver, Houston, and Golden State, 2 teams wont make the playoffs that record-wise would be 4-6 seeds in the East. They've done it against the stronger competition too. The lowers teams in the West would probably have even better records if they played mostly East teams all year. The Kings are below .500 and have no shot in the West, but would make it in the Eastern conference record wise, and probably have an even better record if they got to play East teams most of the time. I guess you can't make it a North vs South league can you?

the only justice for the disparity would come in the draft. If the playoffs started tomorrow, Portland would draft 13th and have a chance, albeit very small, at moving into the top 3.

Meanwhile, 5 eastern teams with worse records would draft later then portland.

Teams in the west fighting for the 7th and 8th spot would be more entertaining than watching some of the eastern teams playoff games.

Except Boston, Orlando, Cleveland and Pistons, the Eastern teams are crap.

Wizenheimer wrote:the only justice for the disparity would come in the draft. If the playoffs started tomorrow, Portland would draft 13th and have a chance, albeit very small, at moving into the top 3.

Meanwhile, 5 eastern teams with worse records would draft later then portland.

And then, of course, the rich grow richer.

Portland has literally nothing to lose regardless of how this season plays out.

I'm definitely aggravated by the strong Western Conference at times. There are 11 teams in the west that are playoff-caliber teams and probably only 3-4 legitimate teams in the east. Almost every night vs a western conference team is a tough matchup and it's definitely one of the best all-around conferences in the NBA in it's history. I guess our only condolence is that a bulk of the western conference's teams are getting old and should fall into mediocrity within 2-3 seasons not to mention the Blazers will continue to improve (especially with Oden in the mix).

If PDX was in the East we would be playing the majority of our games against crappy East teams. PDX would probably be 2nd in the conferece only behind Boston.

Goldbum wrote:If PDX was in the East we would be playing the majority of our games against crappy East teams. PDX would probably be 2nd in the conferece only behind Boston.

I'm not sure about that. The blazers for some odd reason have a losing record vs the eastern conference. It may have to do with the fact that they played the east when their confidence was low but it's debatable as to how well the Blazers would play in the east, which has quite a different style of play.

Maybe they should just change it to North vs. South.