Political Basketball 2

Looking back on the 2007-2008 season we saw some amazing basketball teams surge into contendership. Boston has had an amazing season going 66/16 and dominating the east, this in contrast to their 0/16 start last season. It helps when you have a great starting line up of Kevin Garnet, Ray Allen, and Paul Pierce with a great supporting cast (mainly Rajon Rondo, James Posey, the rookie Glen "Big Baby" Davis, and then throwing Sam Cassell in the mix later on). Since the beginning of the season they were picked to claim the Eastern Conference championship but have not shown that same caliber in the playoffs. They were the only team to go seven games in the first round (chalk one up for the Hawks giving a great performance), and it looks like they will be going seven games this series against Cleveland as well. Now there are other teams in the East that have done well but when you compare the East to the West there are no comparisons. At the beginning of the playoffs there was a 29 game disparity between first place and eighth place (a seven game difference between first and second). In the West however spots 1-6 weren't claimed until the final games of the regular season, a seven point disparity between first and eighth, and no more than a three game difference between first through sixth. The West is the toughest it's ever been and we all expected amazing playoff bouts.
As we look at the playoffs we see teams four through eight going out in the first round. Lakers swept the Nuggets, Spurs took Phoenix in five, New Orleans killed Dallas in five, and the Jazz took Houston in six. Coming into the second round we see New Orleans blowing out San Antonio at all three games in NO only to see San Antonio claiming every one of their homecourt games. The Lakers-Jazz series has show home court victories in all five games so far with an expect Jazz win in SLC tonight. So we expect to see both NO/SA and LA/Utah series going the full seven games, and the Western Conference Finals is expected to take all seven as well.
So is all this due to amazing basketball? Yes and no. The West is tough and every team still in has a legitimate claim to the title but in my mind the games haven't been what I expected them to be. I expected a 6-7 game series with most games coming down to the wire but we've seen more blowouts in these playoffs than ever, and these are high quality teams that shouldn't be getting blown out. This all goes along with my theory of political basketball.
For many years the sport has been catering to the fans and the $$$$$ they pay. Look at the switch from a best of five first round series to a best of seven, guaranteeing more income. Every series longer than four games only guarantees added revenue for the NBA and it's affiliates (TV and radio stations that broadcast the games). Are the teams responsible for this or is it the organization? Logic would easily point to the organization rather than a combined team effort. Think about it...which franchise would give up the opportunity to claim the Championship Title? Having a Title helps maintain fan base and also increase revenue for that team. No one is going to give that up so the teams are not going to prolong the series when they know they can easily take it. However, NBA officials aren't under the ownership of the individual franchises.
Look at the Spurs-Hornets game from last night. Even just going to NBA.com and looking at the highlights will give any objectively based viewer an glimpse of what I mean (http://youtube.com/watch?v=rkjTzZDOon0) . The many offensive calls charged against NO are questionable and a great theatrical show from SA, Bowen being the lead actor. SA is great for flopping and playing dirty and getting the officials to go for it. Just watch the highlights (of interesting note is to compare and contrast the game highlights from NBA's top 5 plays of that night, all in hornets favor http://youtube.com/watch?v=36hsD0Og5Y4). For my comments on the Lakers-Jazz game 5 just go to my earlier post. Can we get a non-biased ref to come in and fairly call the game? What if we hired independent officials (maybe from the European league) to come in and officiate our playoff games? Unfortunately there's not much we can do about this as fans. Why? Because we want to see our teams win and if it takes seven games then we'll pay for it.