I don't understand the purpose of this.
The purpose is to get people excited about midseason basketball. Many fans don't watch any games or care about their teams until the end of the season when the playoffs approach. By then, many teams will be out of contention or obviously outmatched.
But this doesn't change any of that.
Maybe not. We'll see if anyone cares about a midseason tournament. I'll be curious to see how seriously the players take it. Like will the middle third franchises rest some players and use it to develop some guys? Since the games won't count, and they have little hope of winning, will it be treated like summer league games?
All the tournament games still count as regular season games so there's no change in incentive to rest guys. The only one that doesn't count as a regular season game is the tournament championship and they win a half million bucks if they win so they're trying to incentivize the players to play.
It does for me.
I think you'll see a non-zero change in the group stage but it will ramp quickly up. No one gives two fucka about FA cup early stages but top premier league soccer teams consider it just slightly less important than winning the league. I don't think it gets there or that the NBA was aiming for it but hey, don't underestimate the ability of owners to use marketing for fans and incentives for teams to make it important.
The NBL in Australia tried this a couple of seasons ago and nobody gave a shit. It was quickly abandoned.
It's certainly not going to do anything to entice the "why watch the game when I can catch highlights on Twitter" crowd, and as with the proper championship most teams will have zero chance.
The other difference is that winning the Premier League just means finishing on top at the end of the season. The NBA already has playoffs.
I have to agree. NBA doesn't really need it that much.
This is really cool. I like seeing US leagues experimenting and trying to incorporate ideas from around the world. It'd be really cool if this tournament was invitational, so teams had to qualify based on something, or they get grouped according to some standard. But the current format is still a great idea
Wonder if this was a play to eliminate some load management and keep the stars playing.
500k each for the winners all the way down to 50k for the 8th place team will no doubt bring out some good competition. That's some pretty nice dough even for the max contract guys. Who doesn't want an extra 50k of pocket change? Especially going forward when the 5th place team sees other guys getting hundreds of thousands more than them, that'll no doubt bring out the competitive spirit in a lot of guys.
East Group B is looking to be a bloodbath, same with West Group A.
I wonder if scheduling will cause any weird issues like playing a team 5 times or an intraconference team only twice. I suppose you could have games later in the season against team A or team B depending on who of your group went on to the knockout stage.
When you have contractual incentives that can trigger for millions of dollars that largely are based off your health, I don't see a lot of guys caring too much about this. In fact I can see the better teams purposely losing early in the knockout rounds to just not have to worry about it and focus on what really matters.
Dumbest thing is the two-way guys, the guys who absolutely would need that money the most, only get half of the winnings lol
So I don't see teams purposely losing, since it's not like they play more games unless they play in the final. At which point the different between 100k then 200k and 500k is not nothing. Even if some players or teams could care less about the tournament, I can't see them treating it less than a regular season game at the very least.
On your second point, yeah that's incredibly stupid. If the guys play in the games they should get paid for playing in the games. You're playing in an NBA game against NBA teams in an NBA tournament with payouts to players based on how far you go.
I don't have much to say about the tournament, mostly because I friggin love basketball and I'm just as excited about it in December as I am in April!
But did anyone else find it weird that in there s article, in the list of groups all teams were referred to ONLY by their city, except for LA? They got some LA fans at the AP?
West Group A — Memphis, Phoenix, the Los Angeles Lakers, Utah and Portland.
West Group B — Denver, the Los Angeles Clippers, New Orleans, Dallas and Houston.
West Group C — Sacramento, Golden State, Minnesota, Oklahoma City and San Antonio.
East Group A — Philadelphia, Cleveland, Atlanta, Indiana and Detroit.
East Group B — Milwaukee, New York, Miami, Washington and Charlotte.
East Group C — Boston, Brooklyn, Toronto, Chicago and Orlando.
EDIT: Duh, I totally ignored the Clippers, which is extra special because they're literally in the next group down 🤦♂️
That’s because there are two teams in LA, the Lakers and the Clippers. Technically NY has two teams but the nets go by their borough Brooklyn.
You're absolutely right, I totally missed that!
They have to distinguish between the Clippers and Lakers somehow.
You're totally right. Like everyone else, I was informing the Clippers!
No worries. I bet most LA basketball fans forget the Clippers exist too
The incentives are limited. I think a significant addition to the cap space and a playin tournament guarantee (if not in the playoffs) would make the games more competitive. Otherwise this is just rebranded regular season basketball.
| East - Atlantic |
|---|
| Boston Celtics |
| Brooklyn Nets |
| New York Knicks |
| Philadelphia Sixers |
| Toronto Raptors |
| East - Central |
|---|
| Chicago Bulls |
| Cleveland Cavaliers |
| Detroit Pistons |
| Indiana Pacers |
| Milwaukee Bucks |
| East - Southeast |
|---|
| Atlanta Hawks |
| Charlotte Hornets |
| Miami Heat |
| Orlando Magic |
| Washington Wizards |
| West - Northwest |
|---|
| Denver Nuggets |
| Minnesota Timberwolves |
| Oklahoma City Thunder |
| Portland Trailblazers |
| Utah Jazz |
| West - Pacific |
|---|
| Golden State Warriors |
| Los Angeles Clippers |
| Los Angeles Lakers |
| Phoenix Suns |
| Sacramento Kings |
| West - Southwest |
|---|
| Dallas Mavericks |
| Houston Rockets |
| Memphis Grizzlies |
| New Orleans Pelicans |
| San Antonio Spurs |