Westbrook or Davis in the playoffs? Why not possibly both?
One of my favorite NBA ideas of all time was the creation of what Bill Simmons once called the "Entertaining as Hell Tournament". Simmons' idea was simple, but awesome: instead of giving the 8 best seeded teams in each conference their playoffs spots (like it's done today), only the 7 best seeded teams in each conference would guarantee their place in the postseason. The remaining 16 teams would play in a single-game, March Madness-style tournament, with the two finalists of the EAHT earning playoff berths (as the two 8th seeds), plus the tournament champion would get the chance to pick in which "side" of the playoffs bracket (Eastern or Western conference) he would like to join.
I love this idea because, despite some logistic problems and the NBA stubbornness to think outside the box, it brings so much good things to the table.
First of all, it would be ridiculously fun. Every team would go at the games with everything they got, since every match will be a playoff game. A talented-but-troubled team could ride a few great games from a star player and favorable matchups all the way to the playoffs, looking awesome in the process, and gaining some positive media attention - imagine, say, the Kings going to the playoffs by winning three straight games with Boogie averaging a 36-14-6, after such an unhappy season. Wouldn't it be awesome?
Besides, for the EAHT idea to work, the NBA could chop off the last 10 games of the season to make way for the tournament. That's usually the most boring and less interesting part of the season, so now the league can replace these mostly meaningless games with April Madness, while the best teams get a week off to rest their players and prepare for their 1st round series.
Second, it would discourage tanking. It would still exist, of course, but now every team has a real chance of going to the playoffs by season's end. Teams can't give up mid-season and tear down their roster without significantly damaging their playoffs chances, and their relationship with their fans in the process. And if, say, LeBron goes down with an season-ending injury in January, any team would see an opportunity in the East to make the Finals, and many teams on the West that would not sniff the playoffs in the current format (think Nuggets or even Kings) may think about a go-for-it in-season trade knowing they would have a chance to join the East as a #8 seed and do some damage there. The NBA could even guarantee the two 8th seeds some ping-pong lottery balls on a more balanced odds lottery - no sure-fire playoffs team would risk losing to play in the EAHT for a lottery opportunity knowing that a bad game could end their season, and the average teams would have a chance to make the playoffs AND still maintain a chance at a high pick, increasing their incentives to be competitive.
Third, it would reward good teams by the season's end. A good team that lost many games earlier thanks to an unfortunate injury (think Thunder or Pacers) now have a bigger chance of making the playoffs with their stars healthy (and even stop teams from rushing back injured players, since the damage of lost games is now smaller). The same for teams that make go-for-it midseason trades, or hit their stride latter in the season. Think Utah, a team that since the All-Star Game (and the Kanter trade) is 16-8 with the league's best defense and fifth-best net rating. Utah deserves a playoff spot, and could compete in the East with some luck. They deserve to be rewarded for this, and it's not their fault they play in the West (they have the same record as the Eastern #8 seed, Boston, despite a tougher schedule). It would also reward the strongest conferences, since the West now has a chance to have 9 teams in the playoffs.
And last but not least (but maybe more subjective), you give young NBA players high-stakes, high-pressure games every season. This could be a valuable experience for young players and coaches, and something that players that spent their formative years in bad, rebuilding teams don't get the chance to experience until latter in their careers. Could be important in terms of player development. And, of course, it would be incredibly fun, too. Did I mention that already? I didn't, did I?
So that's the Entertaining as Hell Tournament that Bill Simmons once created, and my #1 NBA idea that should happen even though it never will.
And it got me thinking... how would such a tournament work in the NBA today? Like, if Adam Silver decided today he wanted this tournament for the 2015 NBA season, how would it turn out?
(Quick note: this column was written on April 8th, but wasn't published until one day latter. Hence the not-so-up-to-date standings or statistics)
So let's start by assuming that the gap in quality between both conferences is a motivation, and therefore there won't be any discrimination between teams that play in the West or in the East, such as their current seed. The tournament seeding will be by record only, and then by the same tie breaking procedures the NBA uses (head-to-head matchup, then conference record). So that's how the seeding would turn out using NBA's standings as of today (04/08):
With Boston ahead of Utah because of a 2-0 edge in the season series.
There is one small problem with this seeding because some teams played a different number of games than others. Oklahoma City played one more game than New Orleans, for instance. This one is mostly irrelevant because the Pelicans hold the tiebreaker here, but could hold implications for the #4-#7 seeds. Miami has one more loss in one more game than Utah and Boston, but holds the tiebreaker over both (3-1 season series with Boston, more conference wins than Utah). I'm ignoring this and using the records as they are today because it's easier than to create complicated rules for this kind of scenario. If you were to simply dismiss Miami's last game (a win against the Hornets), then they would drop to #7 with Indiana climbing to #6 because of their 3-1 season record against Miami. Maybe it's a fair solution, maybe it's not. You can come up with your own if you want. I'm sticking with the current standings.
So this is how our Entertaining as Hell Tournament shaped out. Just a remind: every matchup will be a one-game series, with the higher seed holding home-court advantage (as a reward for their better record during the season, of course), and the tournament will start right away (so teams with injured players wouldn't have them back).
A lot of interconference games to start this tournament - only Thunder vs Wolves and Hornets vs Pistons don't follow the norm. Still, we have a very interesting rivalry game between Celtics and Lakers in the first round (yet another reason to have this tournament), and at least five (Lakers, Kings, Magic 76ers, Pistons) underdogs have a streaking player capable of swinging the result of a single game.
The only thing that's left to do here is to determine who would win the EAHT, and who would qualify to the playoffs in this format. Of course, we will never know the answer to that - the NCAA is there to remind us of how stupid it is trying to predict the result of single-game eliminations in basketball. The only way we can know the answer is having the damn tournament to find out. Still, we can have some fun with it. So I asked a couple of friends - including Vinicius Veiga, from Spiballnet, and the great Denis Botana, from Bola Presa (hands down the best Brazilian NBA blog) - to help me decide the winner of every matchup of the Entertaining as Hell Tournament, until we have our champion and two 8th seeds.
But please, remember this is just a fun exercise based on the real hypothetical (yes, I know this is contradictory, just go with it) matchups. I don't hate your team just because I had them being upset or not earning a playoff spot. Don't take this too seriously, first because it ruins the fun of it, and second because it's stupid trying to pretend we know what would happened if these teams played a one-game series against each other. Just have fun.
Before we start, just a couple thoughts. I see at least eight different teams in this tournament with a real chance of a playoff berth, a number that could stretch to 11 depending on how you feel about Magic (can't see them winning three straight away from home against their very tough bracket), Pistons and Nuggets. The left side of the bracket is much stronger than the right side, where the best seeded teams are flawed and amid some very bad sequences, some of them dealing with multiple injuries, what opens up possibilities for the weaker teams and prevent us from having the Pelicans and the Jazz (probably the two best teams in the EAHT) both in the playoffs. That's life, I guess. Although it's a bad sign I'm mad at my own hypothetical bracket before we even start.
Sweet Sixteen
On second thought, we need a different name for the rounds, right? Since I'm sure there is a law that makes it obligatory to have repeating first letters, we can call it Super Sixt... ok, sounds awful. Special Sixteen? Oh, I got it - Slaughter Sixteen! I mean, we have the Knicks and the Lakers playing in it!
Still awful? Ok, I give up.
#1 Pelicans over #16 Knicks
Yes, right, like this one WASN'T the most obvious pick in the tournament. The Knicks are by far the worst team in the tournament, with the worst net rating in the league.
#2 Thunder over #15 Timberwolves
The Thunder are a mess right now, but the Wolves have been a mess since day one. Not totally their fault, and it's much better for them to get a high draft pick than a #10 spot in the West. So that's not a bad thing. Only if you want to win in April Madness. There are not 15 NBA players I'd rather have in my team for the future than Andrew Wiggins, but the rookie phenom won't save the Wolves here, specially away from home and with so many injuries.
#14 Sixers over #3 Suns
Our first upset! This IS a March Madness-style tournament, after all. I know the Suns are the better team here, but they have been AWFUL recently (-5.6 net rating over their last 10 games with the league's second-worst offense), and the Sixers do have a Top11 defense. Nerlens Noel has been very hot over his last 23 games (14-10 with 2.1 steals and 2.1 blocks), and the Sixers have been really bothered by all this tanking talk all season. They will enter the tournament to prove doubters (and maybe even their own GM) wrong. I expect an ugly, low-scoring game, and I think the Sixers can pull off an upset like this. I would pick the Suns in a 7 game series, sure, but since this is a one game series, I think this is a major upset candidate.
#4 Celtics over #13 Lakers
Even if it's in a bad season and for EAHT, the Celtics and the Lakers are still NBA's greatest rivalry, and the Garden would be incredibly loud for this game. The Celtics have embraced their playoff chase this season, they have two great defenders (Smart and Bradley) to throw at the Lakers' only dangerous player (Clarkson), and... they are playing a team that isolated Jordan Hill 85 times this season, for Bird's sake!
#5 Jazz over #12 Magic
The Jazz may be the tournament best team right now. They have the NBA's best defense since the All-Star Break, the 5th best Net Rating, and two of the season's five best rim protectors (Gobert and Favors. And yes, they traded the worst - Enes Kanter - soon after the ASG). I like Orlando's backcourt, but they have the fifth worst offense in the league, Nikola Vucevic would be eaten alive by Gobert, and there is no way then can score consistently against this great defense. A tough draw for the Magic.
#11 Kings over #6 Heat
Fully healthy, I think the Heat might have been a title contender with a fantastic starting lineup (on paper, anyway). But that's not the case, and as Spolestra can't find real, healthy players to use, the Heat have been truly awful over the last couple weeks. Sacramento has rallied a little under George Karl, and DeMarcus Cousins would be the best player in this game. Rudy Gay - coming off a strong season - would also be a factor. Besides, it would be Cousins' - one of the league's 10 best players - first true "high stakes", near-playoff game. He would be unstoppable. Like, 40-20 unstoppable against Miami's thin front court.
#7 Pacers over #10 Nuggets
The Nuggets just want to go to the offseason, find themselves a good coach, reload in a good draft, and that's it. The Pacers have Paul George back, George Hill is playing great, and they have done whatever they can to keep competitive in this season despite a very bad roster. They are hungrier, and they know they have the better team here if they can have at least 50% of Paul George in the game. As for the Nuggets... One, two, three, ONE MORE GAME!
#9 Pistons over #8 Hornets
Both teams are bad, but I don't think the Hornets could survive Al Jefferson's injury and still be able to score. Meanwhile, the Pistons have been surprisingly decent since Greg Monroe's injury, with Drummond averaging a 17-15 since Monroe went down. I love Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, but the Hornets don't have anyone to bang with Drummond on the block or stop him on pick and rolls. It's still a toss-up - I actually think the Hornets have a more talented team - but it's a bad matchup without Al, and the Pistons have been better recently.
So we have New Orleans, Oklahoma City, Philadelphia, Boston, Utah, Sacramento, Indiana and Detroit advancing to the next round.
Elite Eight
Don't worry, I will not try to come up with a better name for this round. I stopped at Entertaining Eight.
#1 Pelicans over #9 Pistons
Anthony Davis continues his coming-out party against a team without any player capable of slowing him down. Drummond can't stop Davis on the perimeter (and would rob Detroit of it's only shot blocker), and Davis has become a MUCH better passer as the season goes along, using the extra attention he commands to find open teammates and keep the offense moving. Last time they played, Davis had a 39-13 with 8 blocks, and that was with Monroe healthy. The Pelicans are simply the better team here, with the best player and home-court advantage.
#2 Thunder over #7 Pacers
This is another major upset candidate, given now poorly OKC has been playing of late. I might have gone with Indiana... if I knew exactly how healthy Paul George is. A healthy Paul George could swing this match, but he only played once and in limited minutes this season. Can he play at 50%? 60%? I don't know, and this bothers me. Indiana also cooled down a bit recently - a 6-game losing streak following their 7-game winning streak, before a 4-3 stretch - and would need more from Paul George than I'm ready to expect if they are going to top Westbrook and the Thunder in one of NBA's most hostile arenas. It would be an ugly, close game, but I think OKC comes out on top despite everything.
#5 Jazz over #4 Celtics
The Celtics are ok, an above-average squad (+0.5 Net Rating) since acquiring Isaiah Thomas, and Brad Stevens is one of the best coaches in the NBA (despite not getting enough credit). They are frisky, and can be surprisingly good when they are clicking. But the Jazz are simply better right now. Their offense is irregular, but the defense is suffocating. I like this Boston team, but they are a liiiiiittle too irregular for my taste, while Utah has been a lot more consistent this past month and a half. In a life-or-death game, this consistency - combined with a higher floor - is important to me.
#11 Kings over #14 Sixers
Another argument to the "Boogie Cousins is freaking good!" camp. The Sixers are happy they proved their value, and don't have the talent to go further in this tournament following their first upset. Meanwhile, Boogie is going to rip through the Sixers Top11 defense like a tornado because that's what he does most of the time. Part of me wonders if Boogie is sightly underrated because he never played for a good team or in spotlight games. This tournament could be the best thing that happened to him.
So the Kings go to Oklahoma City to face the Thunder, while the Pelicans face the mighty Jazz at their own grounds. I like it.
Final Four
Fabulous Four! Freaking Four! Effing Four! More options to chose from now (Fantastic Four is copyrighted, unfortunately).
#1 Pelicans over #5 Jazz
I honestly believe Utah is the better team, and in a longer series, I probably would ride with the Jazz. But in a single elimination game, played in front of an insane New Orleans crowd, I think the Pelicans have a higher potential. They have the best player in the tournament, and for a small-sample series, the Utah point guard problem scares me a little. I like Exum, but he's not ready yet, and Davis can block Trey Burke's layups all game long. Can they find enough offense to win this game? They might have to depend a little too much on Hayward for this. And if the PG thing becomes a problem for Utah, the Pelicans can stretch the floor by playing Davis and Ryan Anderson, confident that the Jazz can't make them pay defensively, while robbing the Jazz of their biggest strength (rim protection). For a single match played in New Orleans, I think the Pelicans survive because of Davis, bigger flexibility and a favorable matchup, plus that home field advantage. But it's close, and I'm still pissed that the two best teams in the tournament faced each other before the Final.
#11 Kings over #2 Thunder
The Kings have improved under George Karl, and are playing even better of late. But honestly, the main issue here is how the Thunder are currently playing. They don't have Durant or Ibaka, and their defense has been genuinely atrocious (5th worst since the All Star Game, and 2nd worst since Ibaka went down). And maybe more problematic, after playing like 50 games in 6th gear with the intensity of a mother trying to rescue his newborn baby from a house on fire, Russell Westbrook is finally starting to wear down. For his last 11 games, he's averaging 5 turnovers a game, and shooting 35%. OKC have the league's seventh worst net rating in the league over that span, with the worst defense. That's very bad. I still think Westbrook could win this game by himself, but he slowed down to some degree over the last couple games (I don't blame him. No matter how much of a physical freak you are, no one is supposed to play with Russell's intensity of the season for 50+ games), and Cousins would once again feast on Enes Kanter all night. I'm going with the upset here, mostly because of how bad the Thunder has been recently.
(Denis adds: "I'll pick the Kings, too, unless Steven Adams can get Boogie to punch him in the face and be ejected")
So our two 8th seeds are the Pelicans and the Kings. But there is one last step...
The Final
#1 Pelicans over #11 Kings
The Pelicans are the better team, and they play at home. They also beat Sacramento twice over the last 11 games by combined 20 points.
And so, our two final playoff teams are the Pelicans and the Kings. The Pelicans would probably choose to play in the East, facing a very good Atlanta team in a bit of turmoil (Scott and Paul Millsap are injured, Sefolosha and Antic were arrested and no one know their status for the near future) with some hope to make a deep playoff run (their goal all along and what caused them to trade their last three 1st round draft picks - Nerlens Noel, Elfrid Payton and one to be defined in 2016). They would not be favorites, but would have a better chance at a deep ruin than if they played in the West. Meanwhile, the Kings are just happy to be there - they had a hellish season (most of it is their own fault, but still), changed coaches twice, and made a lot of stupid stuff under the objetive of going to the postseason. And now they did, thanks to a very favorable bracket - facing the injury-plagued Miami first, then the bad Sixers, and then another injury-plagued team that's playing it's worse basketball of the season. And that's life in the NBA - you need a little luck at the right time, and that's it.
And so comes to an end our Entertaining as Hell Tournament. Not only it was pretty fun, but Davis and Boogie (two Top10 players trapped in mediocre teams) had a chance to shine on the big stage and won their first career playoff berths. The Eastern Conference Playoffs also got a lot more interesting now. Davis takes home our Shareef Abdur-Rahim EAHT MVP Trophy (major props if you got that reference), too.
So we just had an incredibly entertaining 10 days of tournament, and now we are getting ready for our first round series, Kings-Warriors and Pelicans-Hawks, among others. The main contenders had a break to rest their players and plan for their matchups. Boogie and Davis took their teams to the playoffs, but not by much - OKC and Jazz came really close to grabbing those last spots, two deserving teams. And in the end, made basketball more fun. That's the main objective of the game, after all.
So this hypothetical tournament is done, and now I ask: wouldn't it be awesome if it were a real thing? Wouldn't you watch as many games as you could (ok, at least starting in the Elite Eight), made "April Madness!" caps locked references on twitter, and felt incredibly satisfied as a build up to the playoffs? I'm pretty I would.
Special thanks to Carlos Leite for designing the tournament bracket!
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