JULY 27: The NBA’s Board of Governors has approved the play-in tournament for 2021/22, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link). Sources tell Charania the format will remains the same and it’s scheduled to take place from April 12-15.
JULY 16: The NBA has reached an agreement with the players union to bring back the play-in tournament for 2021/22, tweets ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski. A formal vote from the league’s Board of Governors is expected soon.
Commissioner Adam Silver has long been a proponent of the format, which was introduced in 2020 after the restart in Orlando. The Trail Blazers defeated the Grizzlies in the first play-in game, while the Eastern Conference race wasn’t close enough for the play-in provision to kick in.
The play-in tournament was launched in full and revamped for the 2020/21 season, with the No. 7 team in each conference facing No. 8, while the ninth and 10th teams squared off. The winner of the 7/8 matchup automatically earned a playoff spot, while the loser faced the winner of the other game for the final opening.
In the East this year, the Celtics defeated the Wizards and the Pacers topped the Hornets, with Washington earning the eighth seed by beating Indiana. In the West, the Lakers beat the Warriors and the Grizzlies knocked off the Spurs. Memphis beat Golden State to earn its way into the postseason.
Excellent news. Happy Friday my HoopsRumors friends and companions.
Not a fan of the play-in, but I’m sure it’ll grow on me. And happy Friday to you as well
Queue LeBron crying
I love the play in. No complaints here.
Me too… the only thing I hate ’bout it is that the league needs to decide if the stats for the players are RS or PO… otherwise seems lost games in limbo & that is a bad look for me!
Exactly, they should be called playoff games so the stats can go someplace.
I don’t hate the play-in as much as I thought I would, but I wouldn’t exactly miss it if it were gone either.
To me, it just completely devalues the regular season. It didn’t happen, but there was a chance that the Spurs could have made up, and surpassed, a 9 game season deficit to the Lakers, just by winning 2 games and having the Lakers lose 2. That’s not logical. You play a full season to find the top 8 teams.
Why is it specifically the top EIGHT spots that are so sacred though? The 7 and 8 seeds are 10-138 all-time in the first round of the playoffs. An 8 seed isn’t even in the top half of its conference. Asking those teams to win just one of two play-in games instead of automatically handing them a playoff spot isn’t unreasonable. And it puts more pressure on them to fight their way into the top six, which (as this year showed) improves the quality of play down the stretch in the regular season.
Because that is when the SERIES match ups start. And eight is a root of two like 4, 16, 32, and 64. Which means no byes and every team plays the same number of opponents in the postseason. Plus, what makes the top SIX so sacred?
If they decided to cut the playoffs down to the top 4 in each conference, I wouldn’t be against it. But that’s never going to happen.
I would add that since the 7 & 8 seeds have such a poor record, then why should the 1 & 2 seeds get the added bonus of having their opponent be more tired when their series begins? The 8 seed will have to win 5 games out of 9 in order to move on. The 7 will have to win 5 out of 8. That is an unfair disadvantage for a team that is already at a disadvantage statistically to begin with.
So, be a better team during the regular season. Isn’t that kind of the point?
No specific number should be sacred. I’m just saying that the further down the standings you go, the less claim a team should have to an automatic playoff berth. If we were talking about the fourth seed needing a play-in to make the postseason, sure, that’s a devaluation of the regular season. I just don’t see it when middle-of-the-pack teams are the ones affected.
Re: the 1/8 and 2/7 matchups, I think you could make the case that those 1/2 seeds DESERVE a little extra edge for earning the top spots in the conference during the regular season. I think any edge they gain also may be offset by the fact that the play-in could create a less favorable matchup for those top seeds if, say, a hot 9 seed beats a slumping 8 seed to earn the last playoff spot.
To me, it just feels like piling on the lower seeds when they are already at a disadvantage regarding the buyout market and such. Buyout players are rarely, if ever, joining 7-10 seeds in order to help them improve. Top seeds rarely have to give up future assets to improve at the deadline whenever they can wait a few days for ring chasers to be bought out. Everything already seems to be favoring the top seeds, even before they become top seeds.
the 1-2 seed already get the extra edge in home court advantage. That is already a HUGE edge already. If they truly deserve an edge, just stop the playoffs at 6 teams and give the top 2 seeds a bye.
It’s obvious to me that most people are not agreeing with me, so i will just let this one go even though I still believe in my argument. Have a nice day.
exactly 8 teams is a lot anyways
Everyone seems to ignore the fact that the western conference would have had a natural play in game this year.
Can’t wait for more undeserving teams to make the playoffs.
Let’s just scrap the season and have a series of meaningless tournaments?
Why play 82 games to get a better record than the 10 seed if you can just win two games and call yourself a playoff team? Why not let the lottery teams see if they can play in? It’s a joke.
Must be a pretty funny joke if you still devote so much time and energy to the sport
@cap it’s the only basketball league we got. Still better than mlb’s dual wild card
Will get No arguments from me about how absurd the current MLB playoff system is
I think Silver and the NBA are killing it tho currently
Like a good chess player, they seem to always be 2 moves ahead
If you can’t beat the 10 seed in a play in game than how do you expect to beat a 1 seed and win it all?
@lilD
It’s not about whether the 10 seed can win it all or not, it’s about all the eyes being on games with manufactured do or die drama.
Exactly, in baseball its worse because they play an unbalanced 162 game schedule and then want to keep adding more playoffs instead of balancing the schedule and only letting it be the top 4 go in.
Why cant the NBA and MLB put more onus on the regular season games? Make them important!
lol pirates fan here who agrees the wildcard game is a total joke
Imagine playing 162 games and not even getting to use Gerrit Cole
The NBA needs to structure the schedule completely around Curry so the Warriors can win.
Does that mean schedule them to play the Rockets 82 times?
lmao
Understand it from a $$ perspective but as a fan…playoffs are already too long
I didn’t think I would like it upon first introduction but I think Silver hit another one outta the park here
People wanted to reorganize conferences a few years back because of all the mediocrity in the playoffs and now they just want to add more mediocrit
No “people” want this. The head idiots in charge of the NBA love to do the dumbest possible thing (bubble).
When .500 teams were making it in the East with regularity a few years back, plenty of fans did.
GSW got utterly EFFED by the play-in smh. Grizzlies won less games than they did, bottom line. Dumb idea if you are going to make the draft a lottery anyway.
Grizzlies were the better team, GS lost Teo games back to back, they didn’t deserve the post season.
Can’t wait for them to add a mid season tournament. They should also start shooting more 3s and play more one on one hero ball. They should also have a 5 point shot from mid court. The league has turned into a clown show for little kids and the international community is exposing them in the olympics.
If they would just call shooting fouls on desperation shots, that would be an improvement.
I don’t know what is scarier…a clown or drawing charge on Embiid during a fastbreak.