The NBA is continuing to throw out ideas for a resumption of the 2019-20 NBA season and see what the best way will be to go about resuming the season. There is the idea of playing some regular-season games to get everybody up to 70 games and then there’s also the idea of reformatting the playoffs and having it seeded 1 through 16.
There is also a new playoff format idea that has been put out about the league adopting a World Cup format from soccer where the top 20 teams would be placed in four groups of five teams. Those teams would play each opponent in their group and the teams with the two best records in each group advance to Round 2 of the playoffs. From there, it would be a seven-game series. This is an idea that the NBA sent in a survey to general managers to get an idea of how the league wants to resume.
As explained by Kevin O’Conner from The Ringer:
The 16 current playoff teams would qualify for the group stage, plus the four teams with the next-best records (Trail Blazers, Pelicans, Kings, and Spurs). The remaining 10 teams would be done for the season. The survey sent to each general manager noted that “tiers” would first be created using the regular-season standings to ensure competitive balance between the groups.
Now, what does this mean for the Philadelphia 76ers? In the example set by O’Connor, they would be in tier 3 which would group them in with the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Houston Rockets, and the Indiana Pacers. That is just an example as the groups would be determined by an NBA Draft Lottery format.
O’Connor explains:
Groups could then be randomly drawn, with one team from each tier going into each group. The NBA is working on approaches to fairly balance the groupings, such as limiting each group to only three Western Conference teams, according to multiple front office sources. Drawings for the group stage could be televised, league sources say. The NBA draft lottery has yielded between 2.4 million and 4.4 million viewers the past 10 years on ESPN; a live drawing of the groups, even with Silver and a representative from every team broadcasting from their own homes, would do major numbers.
For the Sixers, this means that their potential playoff opponent would be selected at random. Every playoff format at the moment has them matched up with the Boston Celtics, but they would have to be prepared for essentially any opponent at that point as they figure out how they move forward and finish their season.
Would a potential playoff matchup with the Rockets and Thunder be better than facing a physical Pacers or Celtics team? Possibly, but the idea of it being random really tests coach Brett Brown and his staff as they try and prepare for any possible playoff opponent. [lawrence-related id=31551,31529,31544]