On Friday, Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN reported that the NBA is moving closer to implementing an in-season tournament that would include a significant overhaul of the current schedule. Commissioner Adam Silver has long been a proponent of this idea, and he and other league officials will reportedly make their pitch to the NBPA sometime in the near future.
The changes could come as soon as the 2021-2022 season. The in-season tournament would be the most dramatic change to the current schedule that the league has seen in years. The tournament itself would reportedly include all 30 teams and could carry a financial incentive of up to $1 million per player on the winning team.
The tournament would be scheduled for sometime in December, and its early rounds would ostensibly be integrated into the regular season games. Later on Friday, Shams Charania tweeted additional details about the proposal that the league has reportedly sent to teams.
Sources: NBA has sent teams the proposal for 2021-22 season changes:
– 78-game regular season
– In-season tournament ($1M per player, $1.5M coaches pool for champion)
– Play-in tourneys for 7-8 playoff seeds
– Final 4 reseed in playoffs based on regular season records— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) December 21, 2019
Sources: NBA's in-season tournament format proposal: All 30 teams involved from late Nov. to mid-Dec.:
– Divisional games (4 home, 4 away) for group stage
– 6 divisional stage winners, plus 2 wildcards for knockout
– Quarterfinals at home market; semifinals/Finals at neutral site— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) December 21, 2019
The new format would also apparently include play-in games for the 8th and final playoff spot in each conference, and would also include a reseeding of the last four teams in the conference finals based on their record. The timeline for a decision is unclear, but with the proposal now in the hands of the NBPA and the owners, the league has taken a serious step toward what would be a fundamentally new season of NBA basketball.
