NBA Off Topic Thread

[Majingir]

With only a dozen or so games left and the playoff pictures forming, I think it's safe to say the already unpopular play in games should be changed.

Ever since the format was introduced in the 2021 playoffs we've seen the following win total from 9-10 seed teams
East:
2021: 39 and 38 (per 82 games, neither made it)
2022: 43 and 43 (one made it)
2023: 41 and 40 (neither made it)
2024: 39 and 36 (neither made it)
2025 projected: 35 and 35

West:
2021: 43 and 38 (per 82 games, 1 made it)
2022: 36 and 34 (one made it)
2023: 42 and 40 (neither made it)
2024: 46 and 46 (neither made it)
2025 projected: 42 and 39

So only 3/16 non top 8 seeds have won their way in so far.

10 seed for sure shouldn't be part of this (6/10 9 seeds have been at or above .500 compared to 2/10 10 seeds). 2024 in the west was definitely an outlier.

We've seen a few ties for 8 and 9, and that's the only way they should have play in games.

[georgiafan]

I would drop the 10th seed then just having 8/9 play 7. However, we know leagues dropping games doesn't ever happen

[Master Live 013]

Boston Celtics sold to William Chisholm for reported $6.1 billion

[illwill10]

Quote: Originally Posted by georgiafan

I would drop the 10th seed then just having 8/9 play 7. However, we know leagues dropping games doesn't ever happen

That's how I always wanted it. The 9th and 10 seed in the East is likely to be 10 games under .500. I never liked the idea of the 10th seed having a chance. Cut out the 10th seed. Have the 8th and 9th seed face each other. Then have the winner face the 7th seed to decide who the 7th and 8th seed will be.

[VDusen04]

Quote: Originally Posted by georgiafan

He was what around 280 pounds and not all that tall? You don't see those type of big men anymore

Quote: Originally Posted by Majingir

6'9 280 Especially for those days it was rare. And for some reason the Raptors went with him at C and had Marcus Camby at PF.

I would have put him at 280 his rookie year but even then I think that might have been generous. I wouldn't be surprised if he pushed or eclipsed 400 pounds toward the end of his career.

I remember around the time the Pistons signed him, Mark West dropped this line.

Quote: Originally Posted by Mark West

“As Charles used to say, 'O could be an All-Star if he learned two words: I'm full.' ”

The wild thing was the fact that, despite his size, he someone could still look kind of nimble out there.

Either way, R.I.P., Big O.

[VDusen04]

Quote: Originally Posted by Blzer

I'm watching the All-Star Saturday Night event this morning (catching up on my DVR), and I'm just now hitting the slam dunk contest. Before it began, I was thinking of what we often discuss: ways to improve the dunk contest. The first thing that came to mind was to change the scoring, because way too many 50's get thrown around for no reason. Like if somebody did a standard one- or two-hander (no impact or anything), they'd be getting 42's from judges. Fast-forward to the dunk contest introduction, and I see the competition judging rules, and right at the top it says: 5 JUDGES - SCORE EACH DUNK FROM 40 TO 50 Are you ****ing kidding me? That's the mandate?? For one, I don't know if that's always been in place, but assuming that it has then no wonder we're having trouble with this thing. It is forced on them to do so. What's the point of the high scoring values if nothing below 40 can be issued? I don't know how well this went last night and we'll see, but this is among the problems with it. Other things would obviously include ways to incentivize them to make it on earlier attempts, have less presentation bits before the dunk itself (like putting on a cape or bringing out some celeb to hold the ball or introduce the dunk), get the best/most popular players out there, and have a money reward for winning. But for me, it all starts with the scoring. Make higher scores, specifically 50's, special again. And I'm not saying that we haven't seen worthy 50's in recent memory, but they get diluted with other ones that were given it and didn't deserve being close to it. Anyway, rant over. Let's see how this went last night.

Good post here.

I've come to the conclusion that there's a few things the NBA could do to help but there's also a couple things out of their control.

The things within their control:

1. Six competitors instead of four: I've always steadfastly believed you needed to be able to account for the fact that one or two dunkers might be total failures—missing dunks, lame ideas, no sense of showmanship, etc. As it stands now, if one or two dunkers struggle, you end up with a pair of finalists by default, who may be having good performances or they might just be average dunkers who didn't completely blow it.

Six competitors would increase the likelihood of viewers being able to see more great dunkers competing against one another instead it coming down to a situation where you're like, "Well, Mac McClung is great... but no one else is really doing much themselves."

2. Bigger names: I fought this one for a while. So many great dunk contest moments have come from players who either weren't big names or weren't big names yet: McClung, Miner, Rider, Sky Walker, Mason, Richardson, Dee Brown, etc. A number of those guys became names because of the dunk contest.

However, you really can't have amazing star dunkers out there like Zion Williamson, Ja Morant, and Anthony Edwards and have none of them compete in the dunk contest at least once. I don't think star power in itself is enough; if you're a star player but a mediocre dunker, meh. But Zion, Ja, and Ant are not only stars but they're elite dunkers. Just one of them appearing would create enough intrigue to propel the dunk contest for that particular year.

3. Continue limiting gimmicks: Altering formats or adding gimmicks year in and year out sullies the vibe and cheapens the event. Thankfully, I think we've come a long way from 2012 when we had full-fledged skits involving Diddy and Kevin Hart pretending to be a mailman. But format consistency has value.

Now, here's the one thing completely out of the league's control:

1. The internet: One thing we may never get back is the high level of novelty we used to get from the dunk contest. That was the place to look for new dunks, new dunk styles, new everything. When Vince Carter put his elbow in the rim in 2000, that was a new dunk to me and 99.9999 percent of every other viewer that night, because none of us had access to streaming video sites that'd end up revealing Roy Hinson pulling off that dunk during '86 dunk contest warmups. So many of us even thought Isaiah Rider was the first NBA player to go between-the-legs in a dunk contest even thought Orlando Woolridge did it 10 years prior.

That's because the public had very limited outlets for dunk expression: NBA games, SportsCenter, dunk contests, and your local park (and believe me, there wasn't much dunk novelty happening at my local park).

As we broke into the new millennium, And1 mixtapes were a sign of things to come. And once streaming video broke down the gates, it wasn't long before professional dunkers became a thing, allowing so many of us to see new dunks being performed by randos in a gym, dulling much of what we otherwise may have been really excited to see in NBA contests.

That being said, I'm not ready to wave the white flag on the contest just yet. As Mac McClung has shown, we're still open to be wowed and we're all still waiting and ready to be excited by someone's efforts, even if their dunks aren't brand new. There's something to be said about the players we know, representing the teams we know, performing amazing dunks, even if they're not completely novel.