22 Ways To Make The NBA Perfect

The staff over at the Ringer put together an article CALLED 22 INCREASINGLY UNHINGED WAYS to fix the NBA. We love the NBA. Uh it is my favorite league of all of the major sports leagues, but we have to admit that there are some flaws within our league. And I wonder if the team over at the Ringer has all the answers of how we can make this a perfect league. Now, they do say increasingly enhanced, right? So, these first couple shouldn't be that crazy, but by by the time we get to to idea number 22, I'm expecting to have to think for 30 minutes on whether or not I like this. So, the first one is, wait, these are actually good ideas. This from Rob Mahoney that says, "Get rid of pick protections." Heard this quite some time. Um, and I'm sure this just comes from the fact that pick protections have become crazier as years go on. We've got picks that are like best swaps, worst swaps between four different teams. If it lands 1 through five, it's here. If it's 6 through 11, it's here. If it's 12 through 13, it's just it it it becomes crazy, right? And these these organizations be trying to trick their fan bases when they trade away their best players. Say, "Hey, we got three picks." when the reality is they they they don't. They may got one pick and then two swaps that will never convey, but the the article or the the tweet that Sham's put out there make it seem like you got three first round picks, but you don't. So, I probably wouldn't get rid of pick protections. I probably would just simplify how you can protect them. either you you give up a first rounder like completely or it's like lottery protector or number one protected or something like like that where it's only a couple different ways you can protect a pick instead of doing it where yeah we going to keep it if it's one through six and if it's if it's seven through eight you get it but if it's nine through 13 it's us again like that's that's that's crazy not a bad uh idea Rob number two abolish the cap aprons yeah I mean if there's one potentially positive thing about the aprons and I don't even know if the aprons should get full credit for this is that we do live in the most parody that we've ever really had, right? Um teams will win a championship and because the aprons and because everybody gets paid after the championship traditionally, right? You you increase your market value once you were really important in a game six of NBA finals, teams come off a championship say, "Damn, we can't really afford to keep this team." Right? I mean, I think about just OKC who won just not this year's championship, but the year before that they won a championship. They were super young and boom, now Aaron Wiggas is gone. Isaiah Joe's gone. Now Ludor is gone. And while those guys, at least the first two, may not have contributed a ton come postseason in their championship run, they had to get rid of them because they were afraid of these aprons, right? Um, a team like the Denver Nuggets who come off a championship and just a year after that has to or two years after have to trade Michael Porter Jr. and get a player in Cam Johnson and then they they they make some interesting decisions on who to pay and when to pay them and just like that because the aprons their team looks completely different just a few years ago. And while there another positive could be for like a content creator like myself, you do get it where like the Boston Celtics traded Jaylen Brown because they wanted more flexibility to avoid April. Like that's kind of fun as a content creator because I can say, "Hey, here's a video where Jaylen Brown got traded that gets half a million views." But it does change team building to the place where you can't really say for certain if somebody's going to be on your team for five years or two years or one year. And it also does change get rid of kind of like rivalries. Now the NBA is not a place that has a ton of them, but the ones that we had in in in history was like, "Oh, these two teams have had the exact same starting lineup for three years. They've seen each other in the first round conference finals and the second round of those three years." And but they they keep going headtohead. Now look at last year's team versus this year's team. Like damn, that team made to the conference finals. They traded everybody, you know? So the aprons really do do hurt that. So I'm I'm in favor of this idea. Um number three, lose Oh, lose the conferences. Cool. The Eastern Western Conferences have existed in the NBA since the start of the 7071 season. It's tradition. I'm not reading all this. I don't like the idea of getting rid of the conferences, man. Especially now, like when it was where the Western Conference was so dominant like for 10 years straight, you like, "Yeah, man. That East don't stand a chance. It's really just LeBron coming out of the East every single year. Maybe if we divvied it up and made it conference list, then maybe the both sides of the bracket could be interesting." But now, at least going into this season, I think both sides of the bracket is gonna be insane. And I think the battle for the top 10 seeds, top eight seeds in both conferences is going to be leaked. So I don't want to get rid of the conferences at all. I think this is the wrong time for that one. Next one. Make the four worst teams play for the number one pick. I can't say I agree with this one. I think it is pretty a pretty fun idea to have some type of some type of tournament while the the real teams the the championship caliber teams are playing in the playoffs. Then we got the worst offs on the other side for the first pick. But this just crazily incentivizes tanking to the the third degree where like I'm gonna try my very best to lose as many games as possible so I can get into that battle for the first overall pick, you know. And this is again we we talk about the changing of the lottery odd system. This could be the year where we get no tanking. I put in that quotation marks. No no tanking, no true tanking. And this rule right here will bring back tanking to to the highest level. So, I can't I can't really say I like this too much because then what's stopping the Washington Wizards who again got AJ Devonte, so it doesn't matter. What's stopping the Washington Wizards for having one of the top the bottom four records in the regular season and then like the last week of the season, oh my goodness, Trey Young and Anthony Davis are healthy now and then they go into that four team tournament and dominate because they got two allstar they got two all-star players that didn't play this season but they're ready for this tournament. So, yeah, I I don't I don't really like that idea. Um, number five, Ben intentional foul in the hacker shack. Sure. It's not one of those things that's too much of a problem. If you ask me in the NBA, you do get the times where you do get, you know, the Mitchell Robinsons of the world and the NBA finals, you're like, "Golly, we at the free throw line again." And that kind of changes the viewing experience for us at home. But it's not something that's ran as often as maybe it was 10, 15 years ago. So, I'm okay if we just we keep it. Ban intentionally fouling though. So, that Oh, so he's they're talking about like completely, you know, we played the foul game at the end of the games. H I as you know 30 seconds of basketball time can turn into 20 minutes of real life time because of intentionally fouling and free throws and stuff. And obviously the viewing experience of that can be trash. But how cool is it when intentionally fouling works? You're down by two, you intentionally foul and that person splits them at the free throw line and now you're down by three with ball and now you hit a three-pointer to go to overtime. Pretty cool stuff. Now, if you get rid of intentionally fouling and there's 13 seconds left, the team with the ball basically just won the game because they could just as long as they get it up half court, what are you what are you going to do? You going they're not going to pass it. You're not going to force them to take a shot till 13 seconds left. So, I I'm N we're good. We're good. We're good. Um shorten the games, the season, and the load. I don't love the idea of shortening the NBA season whatsoever. I understand why it would be beneficial. I mean, if you look at it right here, the picture that they're using is Terres Hallebertton. Tyresce Hallebertton was coming off that what calf injury and then went into the playoffs and knew the risk and he went in there in game seven. He tore Achilles and you see this from Damen Lillard, too, who was dealing with some type of hamstring. I think it was may have been hamstring injury. He he rushed his way back and then he also tore Achilles and they would say, "Hey, the wear and tear on our guys is causing us to have this increased level of injury, which I'm not a doctor. I'm not one of the people that keeps track of this, but that makes sense to me." The problem I have with shortening the games, which is like they're talking about instead of it being a 48m minute game, it's now a 40-minute game because that works in college. Or shortening the season where instead of it being an 82 game season, it's now I mean they mentioned right here the WBA plays 44 games. So shorten it tremendously. I'm not a traditionalist in any term of the word when it comes to the NBA. But I do love records and the idea of records being broken. Can you imagine if we go from 48 minutes to a 40minute game? How every goes down? The idea of somebody scoring 101 points goes down or you get rid of a 82 game season in favor for a 72g game season. You're like, damn, now total points are going to go down season across season and and Braun got a lead over everybody when it comes to these total points. You shorten that season, Braun's total points in NBA career is going to be an unbeatable record. And right now it kind of does feel like that. The man's been all NBA player 23 years. But like the idea that those records become completely completely untouchable, I hate the idea of that. I think the simple recipe for this outside of shortening the season cuz I think logically speaking, shortening the season to 72 games makes too. It makes sense. Let's be real. But it's unrealistic because of the money that's involved and the ads is being sold and the owners and all of that. What makes the most sense if we want to keep 82 but also one to the to shorten the load as Kurt um Goldsbury says and you have to get the NBA players to buy into this is elongate the season right so now this this goes into the offseason of players and maybe they won't agree with this either but maybe starting the season two weeks earlier ending the season two weeks later and now that eliminates as many two games and three nights or three games and four night opportunity things that you see but I don't know again I'm not a traditionalist but I I love the idea of records potentially being broken And if we shorten the season and if we shorten the amount of minutes per game, a lot of that stuff goes out of the way. And am I I guess I'm not willing to sacrifice health from these players in order to get rid of that. Maybe I'm I'm the selfish one here. I'm selfish. I want I want all of them to play 82 games plus, you know, win 16 games in the postseason to get the NBA championship. Number seven, bring back prep to pro era. No notes. I I think that if AJ Debons was coming out of high school and some team wanted to draft him number one or number two or number 12, he should have been able to go straight to the league. I I understand the idea of one year after preps before you turn pro. I think it has done some interesting stuff for the for the college game. Maybe it won't be as black and white nowadays because of NIL. And I think that's maybe the point Danny is making right here where like maybe AJ De Broner still goes to college because of the bag that he got from BYU. But I I think that if if somebody is willing to employ you at 18 and you want to take that job, you should be able to take that job, you know? So, bring bring it back because it's not it's not as like I don't know guar not a guarantee that the guy that you draft out of high school is going to be it. think like you of course you got your bronze of the league and Dwight Howard like guys that immediately went in and become DPOS and NBA MVPs and Hall of Famers and stuff but you also got your the saga deops of the world where like we just going we just going to draft a high school guy because we think he could be it and you're going to miss and and I feel like there's not a ton of crazy things happen in an NBA draft anymore having prep the pros come back you will see a 17-year-old guy get drafted number 10 and he's going to be ass and and wow I hope that doesn't end up happening to my team. I think it's it's funny. I don't know. I think it's funny. All right, so we're in part two. You want to get nuts? Let's get nuts. Number eight, get rid of instant replay entirely. Oh my god. We can all agree that the refs going to that damn monitor and this thing that this the fans be or the players be doing after every foul is annoying as hell. I don't think we should get rid of instant replay entirely. I think it is a very simple solution. If you go to the monitor and you can't make a decision within like two minutes, then the call stands. Give a shot clock to the referees and if they can't determine it or the people in Sakus, right? Isn't that where they at? Sakus can't figure it out in two minutes. Ball up top. You know, we could we can't have 10-minute reviews anymore. I don't care if it is the NBA Finals game seven. You get a twominute window to figure it out. And if you don't, then the initial call stands. Finally bring one to NBA All-Star weekend. No notes. It's just a matter of can we convince the top end level players to actually do it. I don't know the answer to that. I know like guys like Kyrie Irving have said they would do and maybe Kyrie is the guy that could get it all going. Um but I also think it's an event that of course we benefit from having true allstar level players in there. Some of these role players in the league as y'all know are just buckets. Like go into an open run and don't miss. So can you imagine? Let me let me think of let me think of like like Lonnie Walker the fourth. Lonnie Walker the fourth just spent the year overseas and now he's back with the Denver Nuggets, right? Right. I think it's the Denver Nuggets. You put him in a one-on-one competition, he he's going to don, you know, so maybe it gives an opportunity for some of the role players to say, "Look, I could do this, but I adjusted my role to be in the NBA." So 100% no notes. Bring this to the NBA All-Star weekend. Let's make it work. But I think the first year has to be Allstars to get people excited and then maybe fall off after that because somebody's gonna get embarrassed and they're gonna be like, "Oh, I'm not doing that again." Number 10, introduce NBA red zone rim, Kobe Payne. Let me tell y'all, I have had the luxury over the last couple years to be in a lot of meetings with a lot of big companies just pitching my brand and pitching myself. I have brought up the idea of NBA Red Zone a thousand times in these meetings and I think NBA TV did something similar. It was called um was it game time or something? They did something similar and every time I bring it up in the meetings, the main response is basically it is a great idea. It is just the execution part is the toughest part of it all right between all the different partners. You have to get every single partner to agree to allow, let's say it is NBA TV, to allow NBA TV to broadcast these rights because it might be a 10ame slate and one of those games is on Amazon. You have to get Amazon to agree to allow you to use that game for Red Zone and I don't know if they'd be willing to do that. So, it's just too many moving pieces to make it work. But I promise you, I've been in the meetings pitching and I of course I'm pitching myself to be the host, but I even been saying like, "Hey, I ain't even got to be the host. I KNOW SOMEBODY'S GOT TO get this done and get it done well." Um um MLB Network has their own version of this. It's amazing. Of course, Red Zone is the greatest piece of media of all time. You know, it's 13 football games on right now. I can't watch them all. Give me the Bears on the big screen, the Reds on the small screen, so I can see if my fantasy team is doing good. It is perfect. And yes, the the NFL is the better league for an idea like this because there's so many stoppages of play and you can flip between this channel and this channel, never miss a real play, and the NBA is a lot different than that. There is a world in my opinion where an NBA red zone can work. I pitched it. I' I swear I've been in I pitched them damn meetings, y'all. And it's just it's just tough to to make it happen realistically. Um I even pitched like Okay, this is pre-Amazon. This is preNBC. So this is what two years ago at this point. Um when it was only basically Turner/ ESPN or Turner and ESPN as the major rights owners and then you got all the local broadcastings that I'm like, bro, don't even include the ESPN game. If we have seven games on, yes, the ESPN game might be the best one because it's LeBron versus Kevin Durant. There are NBA fans that would want the smaller version. It's just like I said, I wanted my Bears on my big screen and then all the other games on red zone. You can you can put Kevin Durant and LeBron versus LeBron James on your normal monitor and then if you want to see the Charlotte Hornets versus the Cleveland Cavaliers, put that on a small monitor and let Kitty Beach be the narrator and bring you in and out of these games. I've tried it, bro. It's just not something I feel like is going to really work. Um, crunch time is what what they try. That's what's called the NBA actually tried this before NBA crunch time. By researching this, found many people was confused on what it was, where it errored and whether it exists. Uh, maybe uh so I just I don't know. Somehow these videos that I make here gets a wider reach. So maybe one of them executives that I talked to is now watching this and saying, "Oh my god, Kenny Beach, maybe you got another good idea." It's not my idea. It's not my idea. I just want to be the one executing. [laughter] I will move to your city. straight up move to your city. All right, number 11. Give owners a 10ear limit. How are you cooking? What up, Beck? You know I got love for you. Um 100% something I've been pitching for a long time. Not obviously not to anybody, but I mentioned on on the podcast many times. There is a league in Germany, if I'm not mistaken, a football/s soccer league in Germany that basically has this where like if you're an owner of this this club, you have a window to to do the right thing and to get fans excited. And if you don't do that, then you get your ass out of there. It is so crazy that we put on these hats, we put on these jerseys, and we root for these teams, but the reality is these owners have so much power and control, and they can be at their job, and we just are sitting here like, "Oh my god, what am I supposed to I'm a Clippers fan today. What am I supposed to do?" Because Steve Bum and them was tripping and now I got 10 years where I can't do anything. The Bulls so great for the 90s. The Rintor family done a good thing since they they lucked out to get Derrick Rose and we got to the conference finals once, but golly, what else? So, if you have it where there's a 10-year window and you let the fans decide after that 10-ear window, can Jerry keep this team or he be forced to sell? Will he get will he get forced to put it on the open market and then now we get to the point where we have 30 owners that care about the fan base that's more than just money hungry, which is they're billionaires at the end of the day, right? I mean, they're going to be money hungry, but like people that actually care. Like, say what you want. [laughter] I'm going to give this guy a compliment. Say what you want about Matt Ishbium and how crazy his decision-m has been since he became the owner of the Phoenix Suns. He cares about that franchise. He's like a no stone unturned type of guy. So much so he gave up the whole future for Kevin Rant to win a playoff. Did they win a playoff series together? I don't know. But he came in and he tried it and that didn't work out. So he traded away and now defending Suns last year were surprised team and he gave up a 2031 first round pick to get Miles Bridges for the reason. But like he came in, he said, "I care." You know, I think he made it so that it's it's free to broadcast if you're in Phoenix area. You get a free antenna. And then there was like some benefits for the workers in in the Phoenix Suns arena and stuff. So like, wow. It's well, he's a billionaire. You know what I'm saying? You got to tread Waters likely care. But there are people out there that would be willing to own a franchise and try to put the franchise before everything. 10 year 10ear window. And then you got it where like these these ownership groups can like be thinking the Bulls are on year number eight. The Bulls on year number eight and I know them fans is not gonna feel good. So now we got two years to figure out if we want to put offer because we know that they going they not going to renew Jerry Risdorf's contract. You feel me? Give them a window. Damn it. This makes too much sense. I mean there's probably the money reasons why they won't make it happen. And of course Adam Silver is an employee of the owners. So the owners would have to be the ones to say good idea. You're going to fire me in four year. No, they they would never do that. So, yeah. Um, bring back home and away jerseys. Sure, I don't mind it. I mean, I've never really been a jersey guy. Like, I as growing up, I didn't have a ton of jerseys. I I understand the appeal of having them and and how important they can be to a franchise where they mention like Celtic screen in the 80s or the 90s Bulls. I I'm not I don't really care. I'm sure they saying like, "Yeah, the white team or the home team wears this color, the white team wear this color." Nowadays, you can wear your home jersey and your road jersey on backto-back games and it don't matter. Um, fix the NBA aesthetic problem. Okay, let's see what Raheem is talking about here. Um, I'm with Jomie. Okay, so this person that that brought in the home and away jerseys, but let me take it one step further. The NBA has a visual identity problem since Nike took over the exclusive provide of onc court uniforms in the 1718 in 1718 turn the NBA game has truly become a perplexing experience despite decades of established brand identity. Ah, you now see the Pistons wearing green, the Warriors wearing white and brown, the Cavaliers wearing bright orange, the Grizzlies wearing red, and even the most egregious, the Chicago Bulls, who are some of the most iconic jersey uniforms in the history of the sport, wearing white and gold. I mean, yes and no. I mean, that jersey sucked in the first. No disrespect to the people that designed it, but they wore it like three times. I don't really care about that. Um, stop trying to profit from the gimmick. I think that's going directly against Huh. I don't really have an opinion on that one. Um, next we get the and we've lost control of the exercise. So, these are the craziest craziest ideas and there's seven of them. All trades are secret trades. [laughter] All right. Obviously, we know that these ideas are not great, but it's they're basically saying like this is Royal WWF WWE Royal Rumble where it's the first it's the beginning of the season and it's like oh my god, Jaylen Brown is in the start lineup for who? What? [laughter] What? Obviously, that kills all offseason talk. Um, but it does open up the idea and obviously these are no these now we get to the point where these ideas are literally never going to happen. But now we let's just have fun with it. Um, it does open up the opportunity for like us fans to be detectives and be like there there's a private jet flying from Boston to to Philly. You're like, "Huh, who could be on that jet?" And there's one going from Philly to Boston. They must have they must have traded Peyton PRITCHARD AND BOOM. IT'S [laughter] LIKE, OH MY GOD, UM, DID PAUL GEORGE now plays on this stage? You know, that's that is kind of funny. They use the Luca Dantis trade as an example. Yes, bro. Can you imagine? Again, there there's no way we knew that this trade happened. Lakers play again. I forget who they played against that first game with Luca. I forget Luca first game and it's like starting lineup for the LA Lakers, Edgar, Luca Donic. You like what the what the what just Anyway, that's that's funny. Uh, the next one. Why? Why Jeff? Every team gets a roster for one retired player. Okay, let me think. Who's the retired player for the Chicago Bulls? Todd Gibson. He's not retired. The brother's still hooping as far as I know. Uh, one retired player. Uh, [laughter] still this is like the one year where Dwayne Wade and Dirk both made Allstars in their last year because their farewell tour. This is basically a NBA regular season version of that. I wonder how old can you get? Can you get Charles Oakley to wear an NBA? I know him and his relationship with the Knicks have kind of wavered over the last couple years, but can you get him in a Knicks jersey at 60? Can you get Michael Jordan to come out of retirement to play for the Bulls? He's just at the end of the bench collecting a check and and and look what is what does he look like in a jersey nowadays? How about side note, never say how do how do coaches wear jerseys too like baseball teams pick their own three-point line. This is so left field. I wish there was a I tried to do something like this in 2K once where like you know baseball fields have the you have the short porch with the Yankees or you have the the Ivory or the the Green I what the is it called? The I'm a White Sox fan not a Cubs fan by the way where the the the stuff on the wall over there in Wrigley. Um and they're just saying let's customize our own courts. We're like, of course you could, if I make my three-pointer 22 feet, yes, Steph Curry gonna come into my arena and break my record, break, break all the records. But also, we can benefit from it because we play here 41 times out of the year. That could be funny. But also, I'm sure teams some teams get rid of the corner three completely. So PJ Tucker now is an unvaluable NBA player. Once you once you come to our our city in 2021, PJ Tucker can't play cuz there's no corner three-pointer anymore. Matter of fact, our team, we What's the wor What was the worst three-point shooter team off off RIP last year? Whatever that team was. We actually don't even have a three-point line, baby. Let's say you beat us with all tools. Start awarding extra points for cool shots. Only in the only in the schoolyard is this cool. Um, and who who is the person that decides to cool shot? We already take 30 minutes for replays. Imagine if referee had to review and be like, "Ah, that was a cool one. He did switch his hand midair. Instead of two points, it's three. I who who is the player that benefits the most from cool shots? That's the conversation. Who is the player that you signed for max contract because he's got cool shots and now them shots is worth four points instead of two. Make dunks worth three points. Oh my god, Rudy Goar, get ready to average 20, big fella. Get ready to average 26, big fella. You got LaMelo Ball on your team and it's worth three points nowadays. Golly, you about to go crazy. Uh, this is an idea that was experimented with in some very small basketball league. They didn't have the athletes of the NBA. Uh, it's interesting. Make buzzer beater dunks worth even more. I just How many buzz ducks do we see? We get the Valley oop all those years back. Um, but okay, 21 is 17 points. Okay, let's get into it. add a 16th spot on NBA benches to give to a f me spikely. Uh uh uh uh Jack Nicholson. Um uh damn it. Uh Eminem. Clipper Daryl. Is Clipper Daryl still a Clippers fan? I think he left Clipper Fandle for a little bit and then came back. Who Who are some more famous famous fans? Oh, I put myself in that. That's That's a tough look. Uh yeah. down. I wouldn't I would, for what it's worth, I can't accept that. I got kids. I can't travel with the NBA team to sit on the bench in the Can you imagine me in a in a Chicago Bulls jersey sitting next to I don't know, Nicholas Claxton, 6'10, 6' 11, I'm 5 foot 7, 145. I'm I'mma look crazy. And I'm like three years older than him. I'mma look crazy out there. So, no, I wouldn't be excited for this personally, but I do like the idea. And what if that player comes into the game and scores? That's a 10-point bucket. Let's make Let's make some fun of it. Uh, make everything in the NBA six inches short, eight inches shorter. Um, huh. Well, shout out to the team at the Ringer. That was fun. At the end of the day, whether not whether you agree or disagree with some of these ideas, you can say it was fun. Shout out to them. I'll put the link in description if you want to read it because again, we just skim through it. Uh, shout out to them. Happy winner.