NBA Cup Schedule

[WuTang_CMB]

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[Ackshun]

This thing gives me a headache.

[Thaddy]

The dumbest idea the league's had in a long time. The winner of the in season cup and the championship will never be the same team.

[tanuki1031]

At least they fixed the scheduling. The Nets had already secured a 2-1 record by the time we even played our first game, basically an elimination game, against the 1-0 Celtics. And that was just competing for a spot within our own bracket, with the other overall secondary qualification competitors already having 2-0 records.

The only reason we weren't mathematically eliminated after our first game was because the Celtics inexplicably lost to the Magic to keep our group of incompetence (Celtics, Nets, Magic, Raptors, Bulls) alive.

[Scase]

Does anyone actually care about this stuff?

[WuTang_CMB]

This thing would be better if the groups were all random with east and west together in groups

Then block off 2 weeks just for this tournament. Going back and forth is stupid and loses its purpose of trying to gain hype of the tournament as it goes on

[Scase]

This thing would be better if the groups were all random with east and west together in groups

Then block off 2 weeks just for this tournament. Going back and forth is stupid and loses its purpose of trying to gain hype of the tournament as it goes on

Especially getting eliminated yet still playing games.

[GP2]

It's appalling that there needs to be a monetary incentive to win early regular season games. Otherwise known as doing your job.

[wegotthabeet]

The dumbest idea the league's had in a long time. The winner of the in season cup and the championship will never be the same team.

It is dumb but the regular season is pretty dumb too and needs to be reinvented to some extent.

[Thaddy]

The dumbest idea the league's had in a long time. The winner of the in season cup and the championship will never be the same team.

It is dumb but the regular season is pretty dumb too and needs to be reinvented to some extent.

The tournament will end up being a toilet bowl. The actual contenders aren't going to be a part of the gimmick but it'll give younger teams a chance to give their prospects meaningful and competitive minutes.

[kalel123]

Any tournament that has teams run up the score on purpose is POS.

[Syd-TK3]

Wow we actually get to play our first game before we are already eliminated this year

[Scase]

Any tournament that has teams run up the score on purpose is POS.

Yeah man, the olympics are dumb.

[SFour]

play-in tournament was a good idea....this just seems pointless.

[raptorforlife88]

The problem for the NBA is that they're trying to take ideas from European football leagues, where tournaments like the League Cup are important and take place across the season because the NBA thinks it will inject some excitement before the playoffs happen.

The problem is that they've entirely misunderstood why this works elsewhere.

1) They're mixing regular season games with an in-season tournament in a way that just doesn't make much sense when you look at it instead of having them as games not part of the regular season sched.

2) A playoff style tournament is less meaningful when the much more meaningful one exists at the end of the year.

3) This is the most important thing, European soccer leagues highly value their regular seasons already and the team that is considered the best is the team that wins the most games in the regular season. Historically that's never been the case in any NA sports leagues. And the NBA in particular by perpetually emphasizing championships and the playoffs over everything else the has basically destroyed the importance of that. The league cup is meaningful but not the most meaningful thing.

In order to make the regular season more exciting in the NBA you would have to so drastically change the playoffs/regular season dichotomy that it would be entirely unrecognizable. Something like basically eliminating the playoff format as it exists and making the NBA in season tournament a season long thing that culminates in the finals while emphasizing the importance of a regular season champion. And that is so antithetical to North American sports that it is impossible and would probably be suicide.

I get that they have to figure out something, but they are fighting a hard battle.

[Corson27]

Does anyone actually care about this stuff?

Lakers threw up a banner last year.

[wegotthabeet]

The dumbest idea the league's had in a long time. The winner of the in season cup and the championship will never be the same team.

It is dumb but the regular season is pretty dumb too and needs to be reinvented to some extent.

The tournament will end up being a toilet bowl. The actual contenders aren't going to be a part of the gimmick but it'll give younger teams a chance to give their prospects meaningful and competitive minutes.

You think they’ll drop it?

[Jay240]

I don't mind it actually. They have to play 82 games anyways, so why not add something to them to give them meaning.

The reward for winning might need to be tweaked to offer something other than the cup and prize money.

A bump in playoff seeding to winner. Or in the cases of a "non-playoff" cup winner, award them the 10th seed to earn their way to the playoffs through the play-in.

[wegotthabeet]

The problem for the NBA is that they're trying to take ideas from European football leagues, where tournaments like the League Cup are important and take place across the season because the NBA thinks it will inject some excitement before the playoffs happen.

The problem is that they've entirely misunderstood why this works elsewhere.

1) They're mixing regular season games with an in-season tournament in a way that just doesn't make much sense when you look at it instead of having them as games not part of the regular season sched.

2) A playoff style tournament is less meaningful when the much more meaningful one exists at the end of the year.

3) This is the most important thing, European soccer leagues highly value their regular seasons already and the team that is considered the best is the team that wins the most games in the regular season. Historically that's never been the case in any NA sports leagues. And the NBA in particular by perpetually emphasizing championships and the playoffs over everything else the has basically destroyed the importance of that. The league cup is meaningful but not the most meaningful thing.

In order to make the regular season more exciting in the NBA you would have to so drastically change the playoffs/regular season dichotomy that it would be entirely unrecognizable. Something like basically eliminating the playoff format as it exists and making the NBA in season tournament a season long thing that culminates in the finals while emphasizing the importance of a regular season champion. And that is so antithetical to North American sports that it is impossible and would probably be suicide.

I get that they have to figure out something, but they are fighting a hard battle.

Great post.

The answer to me is having less teams make the playoffs, but also expand the play-in so that they basically replace the first round and keep teams engaged all year.

Something I thought of would be having the top 4 teams make the playoffs, while the next 16 teams make the play-in. The 16 team play in would then become a double elimination bracket tournament. The higher seed always hosting the play-in game. 4 teams would need to win 3 games and can only lose once to make the playoffs. Then the playoffs are just the 4 teams that already made it + the 4 play-in teams, 8 total.

[C Court]

This tournament is a way to juice NBA TV ratings in November when the NFL is dominant. I still think its pointless.