NBA Season Part 2: Life In The Orlando Bubble

"We went to Kareem so much that it was an act of arrogance. This is what we do and we don't think you can stop it" - Pat Riley

 

NBA Rumors: Adam Silver Considering Reducing Number Of Teams In Orlando Bubble

Richard Mackson-USA TODAY Sports
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NBA Rumors: Resuming 2019-20 Season In Orlando May Not Happen Until
Published on05/28/2020
AUTHOR
Ron Gutterman

NBA commissioner Adam Silver is facing one of the most important decisions of his career. Figuring out if and how the 2019-20 season can continue is a massive undertaking, and Silver has been in charge from the beginning.

Some of the details appear to be figured out, like the bubble concept, but so much more still needs to be done. Among other factors, the league must determine how strict to be with the players who go to the bubble.

They want to keep everyone healthy but Silver is adamant about not wanting to lock players inside hotel rooms. Another point of contention is the format of a return, as they could simply return with the 16 playoff teams as it currently stands, or they could go a little more creative with it.

Either way, there is a sense Silver is beginning to realize that not bringing back all 30 teams may be the most sensible option, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN:

Privately, Silver has been considering the idea that there are plenty of sensible reasons to pare down the roster of teams in Orlando.

“Over the weekend, you’re getting a sense the league is starting to realize: Less is more,” one high-ranking Eastern Conference executive told ESPN.

This is likely because bringing back 30 teams will be far more difficult when it comes to managing everyone’s health and competitive factors. And while risking it for teams that will be at the bubble for more than a month may be worth it, it may not be for a team that won’t even get a playoff game.

There have been a number of options for the return to play. Some have been simple and require that only 16 teams come to the bubble, whereas others have 20 or even more teams making their way to Orlando in order to do a new form of playoffs or play-in tournaments.

Given that what’s going on is already strange and unprecedented, perhaps it’s best to keep the changes to the league itself at a minimum. It will already be tough to navigate playing all the games in a single location without fans, so learning a new playoff format as well could add complications.

All of these things are a part of what makes this such a difficult decision for Silver. But it seems as though we’re nearing a finalized plan.

 

As I mentioned before, I'd be happy if they just came back with the 16 teams that are in the playoffs as of the last games played. It might be the simplest and best plan. You reward the teams that have played well enough to get there and you avoid a gimmick laden tournament/reseeding issue that has never been tried before. We have all expected a normal Western Conference winner/Eastern Conference winner matchup in the Finals and to screw with that would be just weird IMO. If they want to change it to best record regardless of conference then they should do it with a full season to play. It's strange to impose that in a postponed season with 15 or so games left to play.

Also limiting the number of teams to 16 makes sense in terms of the safety of the players and the do-ability of the bubble concept. They could play some warm up games within those 16 to get ready and then go to straight to playoffs. Personally I'm not into bringing in an extra 6 to 8 teams to monkey around with trying to get in at this late of a date. The Eastern teams at the bottom are all pretty bad and the Western teams such as Portland should have played better than they did this season if they wanted to make it.

 

Hate the idea of a play in tournament, hate the idea of 20 teams, hate the idea of no conference seeding, hate it. I get that this will be an unorthodox playoffs/end to the season, but that doesn’t mean they have to go wacky with it. Take the teams that were the top 8 in their conference and play the playoffs, if you didn’t make it in, too bad, you weren’t gonna win a title as a 7th or 8th seed anyway. If they’re worried about injury from instant playoffs, well, then you’ve got to play a number of “regular season” games as a warmup and also let some of these bubble teams have a shot at getting to the top 8 I guess. But I do not want to watch a playoffs of the top 20 teams in the league playing out of conference, no thanks.

 

I agree. Regular format for sure.

 

If they do this weird 20 team World Cup scenario, the asterisk next to the winner should be in a bigger font than the name itself.

 

One scenario I would be OK with, take the 8th, 9th, and 10th place teams from each conference. Have 9 and 10 play a game to see who plays 8 for the last playoff spot. Meanwhile the other 14 teams can play a couple glorified scrimmages against each other for a couple games to knock of a little bit of the rust (it'll obviously take more than that at this point, but whatever). That way the teams that are firmly entrenched in the playoff picture and have played the the best ball the entire season aren't really effected. And they give their precious Zion a shot.

And I agree with abeer. Lillard is way more fun to watch than Zion at this point. I mean, does nobody remember this?