During Thursday's press conference discussing the current state of the NBA lockout, commissioner David Stern said that if the players' union accepts the league's current offer after meeting with player representatives early next week, a 72-game regular season could begin on December 15. With that, the playoff and Finals would each be pushed back one week, giving the regular season a bit more space to breathe.
But such a schedule would still be more jam-packed than the suffocating 1998-99 50-game season.
A normal 82-game season starts around the beginning of November and ends in mid-April, encompassing 5-1/2 months. That gives us just about 15 games per month per team. The lockout-shortened '98-99 season crammed 50 regular season games into almost exactly three months, for 16.7 games per month per team.
A 72-game schedule starting December 15 and ending after the third week in April would give us 72 games in 4.25 months, or 17 games per month per team.
If the players take the deal, expect plenty of back-to-backs, a few back-to-back-to-backs and little time for television that is not basketball.
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Woohoo!
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by Exhibit G on Nov 11, 2011 9:48 AM EST reply actions
Yeah, you say this like it’s a bad thing.
It kinda seems like a moot discussion at this point anyway.
@CRZ
by CRZ on Nov 11, 2011 10:42 AM EST reply actions
I suspect...
Stern said the Finals would start a week late, but he did not say (or I have not seen) when the regular season would end. We know that there is slack time in the playoff schedule, particularly the first round. I think they can recoup at least another week there, perhaps more. I don’t believe they would consider a MORE compressed schedule than the one in 1999. If they can expand the regular season to the end of April (which I think they must be planning to do), we’re down to 16 games per month… solidly between the normal frequency and the 1999 frequency.
In this world, you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant. Well, for years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. - Elwood P. Dowd
by Steve Perrin on Nov 11, 2011 1:46 PM EST reply actions
Just rewatched
Silver does indeed say “playoffs back a week, finals back a week.” Which seems wrong – surely they can more easily compress the playoffs a bit than to compress the regular season more. We’ll see. I can only say that I hope they are not planning to have a 199 style frequency.
In this world, you must be oh so smart or oh so pleasant. Well, for years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. - Elwood P. Dowd
by Steve Perrin on Nov 11, 2011 2:36 PM EST up reply actions
As a ticket holder
- even though we share with two others and LOVE to go to games, I’ll tell you, it’s exhausting (and expensive!) even in a regualr schedule when you’re forced to go to two or three games in a short period of a week or so.
I’d mush rather have a 60 + game season. Hell, we were looking forward to that a bit.
"Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake."
- Chessmaster Savielly Grigorievitch Tartakower
by lietothegirls on Nov 11, 2011 2:13 PM EST reply actions
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