NBA In-Season Tournament: First impressions and opportunities for improvement
I liked the first-ever NBA In-Season Tournament. On the fresh change of pace, and how it could evolve going forward
The inaugural NBA In-Season Tournament has concluded with the Los Angeles Lakers defeating the Indiana Pacers in Saturday’s Final. Though quite polarizing, the NBA brought buzz and flair to its latest experiment, while adding a layer of excitement to November/December games.
The flashy, wacky courts with City jerseys for those games. Designated nights for IST games. Point differential, which broke some unwritten rules of basketball in late-game blowouts. Presenting an opportunity for young teams and players to elevate their games and acquire big-game experience early — with Tyrese Haliburton emerging as a bonafide star, and the Pacers becoming a wildcard young team.
It won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but it had a solid approval rating — I won’t get into the ratings discussion, as the ever-evolving TV-viewing/media dynamic is far too nuanced for this specific article. Despite the result of the Grizzlies (0-4 in IST play), I genuinely enjoyed the concept of the In-Season Tournament. Anything unique that adds more incentive and excitement to the regular season gets a “thumbs up” from me.
Nonetheless, as expected with the first go-around, there are more opportunities to be built upon and explored with the In-Season Tournament.
Group Play
Starting with Group play, it became difficult to track who was in a specific group off the top of memory. There was probably some algorithm used to account for team quality, star power, among other factors. It might be easier to follow to have 6 divisions together for group play.
Knockout Round/Semifinals/Finals scheduling
Once the stage was set for the final 8 teams, its areas for improvement came to brighter lights.
Having the 1st quarterfinal game on a team’s homecourt was the right call. The Indiana Pacers and Boston Celtics game felt like a playoff game with the atmosphere and the energy from players and fans alike. The Kings/Pelicans game also had a playoff vibe to it.
Once it moved to Las Vegas, the same buzz wasn’t there in the arena — a flaw of a neutral site game. From there, it drew more questions and ideas.
Should there be a week gap between the knockout round and semifinals/Finals to allow for fans of those teams to travel to support their teams live?
A scheduling quirk saw the Eastern conference IST game start in the middle of the afternoon to allow optimal time between the East and West games. Could they alleviate that issue with an East game closer to the home teams, before a Vegas championship game? (Nashville comes to mind here as a “neutral site East game”).
Overall, this is probably the biggest area of growth to account for, to allow for the best viewing experience for these games — especially for fans of these teams to travel to the neutral site to add more in-game excitement.
I will add with scheduling, teams not in the IST get a decent break — only playing 2 games between the Saturday before the tournament and the day after concludes. Even then, IST teams only play every other day. That’s the only substantial break between the start of the season and All-Star break. With scheduling being a huge critique for the league, a small break around the 20-game mark is refreshing for teams.
Incentives
The $500,000 cash prize was more hyped than I expected. Seeing players be open about how they’d spend their winnings was cool — savings for their children, vacations, new cars, etc. In addition, the younger players on rookie or 2-way contracts — or veterans on minimum deals — get a significantly nice payday.
Don’t we all love a Christmas bonus?
Is there anything more that could be added to spice up the IST? Perhaps.
Playoff implications was a big topic among potential additions. Automatic play-in bids with the IST winner getting the 2 home games in the play-in was an idea. For teams 1-6 though, it’s up for debate. Do you want teams that finished with the 1st or 2nd seed losing homecourt advantages for the sake of an IST winner? It’s tricky, because you don’t want to devalue the overwhelming chunk of the regular season with standings.
A potential idea to add postseason incentive while not diminishing the regular season would be to implement a points system similar to the Premier League and the NHL. IST games could be worth more points than a typical regular season game — 2 points for group play wins, 3 for knockout win, 5 for semifinal win, and 10 for winning it all. From there, they could build upon its points model to add more opportunities to accumulate points — divisional games or “rivalry week” games come to mind.
The NBA may decide extra incentive is unnecessary. They could decide to simply increase the cash prize pool for the coaching staff. Nonetheless, the cash prize is a really good prize that doesn’t mess with the flow and significance of the regular season. However, there will be more conversations about how the IST could be even more competitive in conjunction with the regular season.
Grizzlies thoughts and presentation
The Grizzlies didn’t get the output it wanted from the IST games, dropping all 4 “group play” games — including fumbling a late-game 10-point lead within its 0-6 start.
However, team members still liked the output of the tournament.
“I didn’t know what it was going to be like, but I think it’s been a success. Seeing guys compete and have something to play for in November/December kind of changes things. Kudos to the Pacers. You see a young team with a lot of young guys getting the opportunity to play national televised games and getting the chance to play for money is good for sure.” - Desmond Bane
“It’s been fun watching those games,” John Konchar said, while crediting the Pacers for the run they made.
The Grizzlies’ presentation of IST home games was good. The city jerseys didn’t meet the sky-high expectations of past years — arguably dubbing the best city uniforms leaguewide since 2019-2020 seasons — but they were still solid. The court was super clean, not as outlandish as others.
I wish there was more of a “big game” feel to the 2 home games — towels, sweet giveaways, “opening night” esque entertainment. The 4:00 Black Friday game was a rough start time, too.
Nonetheless, it was still enjoyable to get a different viewing experience with the grey and black courts — with the knowledge of the IST implications beyond these games.
Credit to the NBA for its innovation and desire to add more meaning to an 82-game regular season. The In-Season Tournament isn’t for everyone, but it’s fair to suggest Adam Silver and the league have built a solid base to allow it to grow to its idealized vision.
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