I’m not a big fan of the whole play-in tournament the NBA has implemented. For the 2019-2020 season, the play-in tournament made sense because of how the season was put on hiatus in March of 2020. For the 2020- 2021 season, having a play-in tournament made some sense because of the condensed schedule. .
But when the 2020-2021 season concluded, the NBA should not have brought back the play-in tournament. Especially since the league resumed the standard 82 game regular season schedule. But here we are in April of 2022, and the NBA is still implementing the play-in tournament. Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t think you should reward mediocrity. If an NBA team finishes the regular season as the 9th or 10th seed in their conference, they are an average to below average team. You should not get rewarded for that. Rewarding mediocrity just breeds even more mediocrity.
Washington Wizards
Which brings me to my Washington Wizards. After a 10-3 start, the team has failed to win games consistently. Since this past November (where the team went 8-7), Washington has failed to have a month where they finished with a record that is better than .500. But because of the play-in tournament the NBA has implemented, they still had a chance of making the playoffs. Until March 31, where the Atlanta Hawks eliminated the Wizards from playoff contention.
Which is a good thing. The Wizards should not be rewarded for playing mediocre basketball.
I remember when I was in high school, you were not allowed to make the honor roll if you had two C’s on your report card. It didn’t matter if your overall grade point average was a 3.0 or higher.
A C student is a mediocre student. The honor roll just like the NBA playoffs should be for the good to exceptional teams/students.
Go back to how things were
Only the top 8 seeds make the playoffs. Lets go back to that format. As an NBA team, you have 82 regular season games to put together a record that gets you a top 8 seed . If you weren’t able to accomplish that after 82 games, then it is what it is.
