Silver Considering 10-Minute Quarters

[Full Court]

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/nba-commissioner-adam-silver-raises-possibility-of-league-moving-to-10-minute-quarters-213929598.html

What do you think about this? I guess the only heartburt I have with it is that it screws up all the records and makes it even harder to compare players and teams across eras.

[ArbitraryWater]

Why?

[SouBeachTalents]

What he should be considering is another in season tournament.

[Phoenix]

I don't think screwing with the records should be much of a consideration in this case, because they're done things in years past that already do that. For example, switching the playoffs from best of 5 in the first round to best of 7 advantages guys who played under the latter format as far as accumulating numbers. With today's pace, lobbing 8 minutes off gametime should actually put the numbers more in line with the past few decades. As it is, you can't compare the numbers of today with guys from 2000, let alone further back.

As for how I feel about it generally? Eh, feels like a sideways move. I have more of an issue with how long games drag in the last 2 mins than I do the overall game-length itself. Silver doesn't know how to fix the ratings, so he's adapting a 'throw shit at the wall' style of tackling issues but there's far more pressing issues which have been discussed at length.

[sixerfan82]

Id rather them knock 20 games off the season and have longer playoffs, maybe series of 7-7-9-9-11. This is similar to what the NFL did with removing 1 preseason game to make the regular season longer, but let's have longer playoffs

[Patrick Chewing]

Silver is a moron.

[SouBeachTalents]

Id rather them knock 20 games off the season and have longer playoffs, maybe series of 7-7-9-9-11. This is similar to what the NFL did with removing 1 preseason game to make the regular season longer, but let's have longer playoffs
An 11 game series?

Lmao

[Full Court]

Id rather them knock 20 games off the season and have longer playoffs, maybe series of 7-7-9-9-11. This is similar to what the NFL did with removing 1 preseason game to make the regular season longer, but let's have longer playoffs

7 games is the max length a series should be. Anything longer than that just starts getting redundant.

[Jasper]

I see Silvers reasons .. less stress . on athletes minutes .. but you have a coach to coach TEAM.

Will never happen.

[Phoenix]

Id rather them knock 20 games off the season and have longer playoffs, maybe series of 7-7-9-9-11. This is similar to what the NFL did with removing 1 preseason game to make the regular season longer, but let's have longer playoffs

None of the stakeholders will agree to that due to the inevitable loss of revenue.

[jayfan]

What he should be considering is another in season tournament.

:lol

[jayfan]

I see Silvers reasons .. less stress . on athletes minutes .. but you have a coach to coach TEAM.

Will never happen.


Those aren't really his reasons. He wants to line up with the international game.

.

[Nowoco]

Silver is such a spineless maggot. A total disaster. The main issue is that the regular season sucks. Every other problem feeds off of that.

He can't reduce the games because the suits are never going to agree to less revenue or less ticket sales which that change would of course facilitate.

The reason the NFL is great and destroying the ratings is because every game matters. The hype for the season just intensifies each week. Whereas the NBA is this slow, overlong meandering cesspool until the playoffs. This is the world we live in. People lose attention quickly. They want things exciting and on demand. The NBA RS is the opposite of this. It's a stone age dinosaur of a bygone era and people simply don't care about it. 10 minute quarters wont change a damn thing except maybe make more games close. But no-one even cares about close RS games anymore.

[Phoenix]

Those aren't really his reasons. He wants to line up with the international game.

.

The international game has stricter ball-handling/travel rules and is more physical defensively. Mirroring the relevant rules in those areas would be far more positive for the current on-court product than shaving off 8 minutes. Problem is the NBA has long backed into being a brand that markets itself on the backs of stars and flashy offensive play, hence the often questionable officiating and pocketing the whistle on carrying and looking the other way when a player takes 3-4 steps.

[SouBeachTalents]

Silver is such a spineless maggot. A total disaster. The main issue is that the regular season sucks. Every other problem feeds off of that.

He can't reduce the games because the suits are never going to agree to less revenue or less ticket sales which that change would of course facilitate.

The reason the NFL is great and destroying the ratings is because every game matters. The hype for the season just intensifies each week. Whereas the NBA is this slow, overlong meandering cesspool until the playoffs. This is the world we live in. People lose attention quickly. They want things exciting and on demand. The NBA RS is the opposite of this. It's a stone age dinosaur of a bygone era and people simply don't care about it. 10 minute quarters wont change a damn thing except maybe make more games close. But no-one even cares about close RS games anymore.
This is the crux of their problem. Maybe an 82 game season was ok back when you had basic cable, primitive video games and no internet. But now, with literally endless entertainment options available within a millisecond, asking fans to follow games that intrinsically have no meaning for 7 months is just not a sustainable business model for an entertainment industry.

Honestly, the only solution is to shorten the season, which the league will obviously never do due to all the lost revenue. So any other bullshit gimmicks they implement, in season tournaments, 10 minute quarters, won't address the fundamental problems with their product, they're band aids on cancer.

[Wally450]

Less ads will get the product down to 2 hours. But we all know that won't happen.

[Full Court]

Less ads will get the product down to 2 hours. But we all know that won't happen.

Agree. Way too many lengthy breaks in the game. Kills momentum and drags it out.

[Dbrog]

The international game has stricter ball-handling/travel rules and is more physical defensively. Mirroring the relevant rules in those areas would be far more positive for the current on-court product than shaving off 8 minutes. Problem is the NBA has long backed into being a brand that markets itself on the backs of stars and flashy offensive play, hence the often questionable officiating and pocketing the whistle on carrying and looking the other way when a player takes 3-4 steps.

Absolutely this. Idk why a bunch of you are talking about shortening the season. 1) This will never happen due to revenue reasons (more games = more $$$) and 2) This was never an issue when weekly or biweekly you could look forward to watching stars battle it out against each other to keep you entertained. Now, they dodge these type of games with 1 or more stars straight up sitting out. It's also not them battling out, but rather who got hot from 3 that night

[ArbitraryWater]

What he should be considering is another in season tournament.



:roll:

[ArbitraryWater]

Absolutely this. Idk why a bunch of you are talking about shortening the season. 1) This will never happen due to revenue reasons (more games = more $$$) and 2) This was never an issue when weekly or biweekly you could look forward to watching stars battle it out against each other to keep you entertained. Now, they dodge these type of games with 1 or more stars straight up sitting out. It's also not them battling out, but rather who got hot from 3 that night


82 games is strenuous. There is no good reason for having 82 games.

[SouBeachTalents]

82 games is strenuous. There is no good reason for having 82 games.
The only reason you could possibly advocate for that is because you're simply used to it. I guarantee if the season had been 58 games and Silver proposed to extend it to 82, virtually everybody would agree it was a terrible idea and an unnecessarily long schedule.

Just because something used to be that way is not a good enough reason to keep what's clearly a failed scheduling model in place, one where almost everybody has checked out, including the players.

It's just so obvious the current format does not work, but we're all stuck with it because they'll never lose the additional revenue.

[tpols]

The only reason you could possibly advocate for that is because you're simply used to it. I guarantee if the season had been 58 games and Silver proposed to extend it to 82, virtually everybody would agree it was a terrible idea and an unnecessarily long schedule.

Just because something used to be that way is not a good enough reason to keep what's clearly a failed scheduling model in place, one where almost everybody has checked out, including the players.

It's just so obvious the current format does not work, but we're all stuck with it because they'll never lose the additional revenue.


Even if it was cut down to 58 games people still wouldn't watch the regular season because stars would still load manage and sit out for the bag.

[Dbrog]

82 games is strenuous. There is no good reason for having 82 games.

See, you are coming at this from a players/fans standpoint. Silver literally doesn't care about this at all and just wants whatever nets him the highest TV deal and again...more games = more $$$. That's the only way they can even come close to the type of deals NFL gets, despite NFL being significantly more popular in the US

[90sgoat]

Agree. Way too many lengthy breaks in the game. Kills momentum and drags it out.

This.

Also when the game is over in many cases early, then you still have to sit through a ton of ads and who wants to do that.

[Phoenix]

It's safe to say this version of the NBA is past its sell-by date. The issue is, the league has reached its mature stage, its apex, and there's just too much money on the table now. Every one of the stakeholders would say the product needs an overhaul, but any drastic changes will likely result in revenue loss, and nobody is going to take less for a better product to emerge. The irony is, if ratings continue to fall then revenue will be lost regardless, whether it be gate attendance, memorabilia sales, marketing deals, ad revenue, nearby restaurants/bars relying on 7-8 months of NBA activity, etc etc.

[Nowoco]

This.

Also when the game is over in many cases early, then you still have to sit through a ton of ads and who wants to do that.

This is a good point. So many NBA games are blowouts. All but the most devoted fans don't bother to watch the 4th or sometimes 3rd quarters of games they don't have any skin in. Especially east coast fans watching west coast games. They ain't staying up to watch a half of garbage time with bench players scoring easy buckets. There's also stacks of people who only watch the last few minutes of RS games that are close. This goes back to the earlier point of people wanting everything on demand and with short attention spans.

Basically the NBA has loads of problems with very few simple solutions. All these problems have been in existence and getting worse for years and the what little solutions the powers that be have come up have been trash. Like the NBA Cup. One thing we know for sure, nothing's getting better with Adam Silver in charge.

[Phoenix]

This is a good point. So many NBA games are blowouts. All but the most devoted fans don't bother to watch the 4th or sometimes 3rd quarters of games they don't have any skin in. Especially east coast fans watching west coast games. They ain't staying up to watch a half of garbage time with bench players scoring easy buckets. There's also stacks of people who only watch the last few minutes of RS games that are close. This goes back to the earlier point of people wanting everything on demand and with short attention spans.

Basically the NBA has loads of problems with very few simple solutions. All these problems have been in existence and getting worse for years and the what little solutions the powers that be have come up have been trash. Like the NBA Cup. One thing we know for sure, nothing's getting better with Adam Silver in charge.

The NBA cup isn't even the worst of it. This new all-star game format is the very definition of throwing shit at the wall.

[3ba11]

Why?


because today's players are inferior physically and mentally, so they cannot play 48 minute games anymore

and because Silver has completely destroyed the game

[Nowoco]

To make the point, you need to look no further than last nights games. 11 in total.

8 of them were blowouts (4 by 20+) and only one of them was a single possession game going into the final minute.

[bison]

This would take away valuable minutes from end of the rotation type players. By removing 8 minutes from a game, teams will shrink their rotations to 7-8 players, leaving a lot of guys unable to get reps and earn future contracts. Seems like a bad deal for a lot of potential talent. I'm sure Thibs would love it though,.

[Hey Yo]

Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau and Denver Nuggets coach Michael Malone, whose teams squared off Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden, both expressed their dislike of any potential changes.

"I'm more of a traditional guy, so I'd hate to see that," Thibodeau said, citing how shortening the game would hinder the ability to break leaguewide records.

Malone said he respected the NBA's willingness to pay attention to viewership trends. But he also said there was a risk to going too far to cater to them.

"I give the league credit, because they're always trying to find ways to keep the fans engaged," he said. "But I hope we don't go to 10-minute quarters. I hope we don't put in a 4-point line. I hope we don't become Barnum & Bailey, or do whatever we have to do to keep viewership. Because there's a greatness and a history to this game, and a purity to this game that I hope we can find a way to stay true to."

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/43617073/nba-commissioner-adam-silver-floats-idea-shortening-games-10-minute-quarters

[ImKobe]

I don't like this idea. Minutes aren't the issue, the issue is the time spent on replays at the end of games where the last 2 minutes take 30 minutes to finish. Reducing the actual game time by 8 minutes isn't going to make the product any better.

[L.Kizzle]

Can't believe he actually said that out loud.
Game has been 12 minute quarters since before 1946.
But 80 years later, it's a good idea to remove 8 minutes from a game.

What next, take the shotclock away.

They've literally made the game easier in the past 10 years.
8 secs to bring the ball up court instead of 10.
Shotclock doesn't reset to 24 after gaining another possession.
Advancing the ball to damn near under your basket after a timeout.

[Phoenix]

Easy way to speed up the last 2 minutes, restrict each team to one full timeout. Use it wisely.

[Real Men Wear Green]

May not be what Silver is doing this for but cutting back on the length of the game could in theory help reduce load management and when it comes to ratings that's the biggest problem, the fact that they want to market stars that will then be held out of nationally televised games like it's nothing. There will be some coaches that play their reserves less instead of giving starters more rest (looking at Thibs here) but even if they do that they are giving fans a higher percentage of the game's minutes with star play. It will make breaking records harder but that's not what drives viewership so it's no big loss. The only real loss for the league here would be the loss of commercial time that goes along with cutting out a 6th of the game's length. And they might not even lose much there, although they would have to sneak in more breaks in the action.

It's not a guaranteed fix to all problems but it's not such a terrible idea that it's not worth thinking about.

[rawimpact]

Because he doesnt want to cut down the number of games. Significantly more financial loss there.

IMO expand the NBA 2-4 teams, reduce overall season. That way total nba games/year is more or less the same and he can reduce the total number of games played per team down.

[Phoenix]

Because he doesnt want to cut down the number of games. Significantly more financial loss there.

IMO expand the NBA 2-4 teams, reduce overall season. That way total nba games/year is more or less the same and he can reduce the total number of games played per team down.

Not a bad idea, but something tells me whatever number they come up with( let's say 62) and counterbalance it with expansion, the players will find a way to say its still too many games. There's a mentality amongst this generation that is prevalent no matter what you do to cater to their whims.

[L.Kizzle]

This is getting ridiculous, however you all try to spin it.

At the end of the day, it's just a bunch of complaining to me.
I wonder if players from yester-year cried this much.
Did Elgin Baylor say we're playing too many games in a Season. Did Bob Cousy say it was a better league with no shot clock?

Teams played as many as 4 to 5 games (IN A ROW!)
Some of the courts had dead spots on them. All the rims and backboard weren't even the same. If you forget what city you're in, you might mess up if you try to bank a shot in off the glass.

And cities, team had to travel by train to the next game.

These players got it made.

[Real Men Wear Green]

Not a bad idea, but something tells me whatever number they come up with( let's say 62) and counterbalance it with expansion, the players will find a way to say its still too many games. There's a mentality amongst this generation that is prevalent no matter what you do to cater to their whims.
I don't hear a lot of players saying it's too many games. Not if it would mean they have to lose money. But that may not be addressing your true point, which is load management (apologies if I'm misunderstanding you here). Load management is on both the players as well as the teams. There are a lot of cases where a guy wants to play, or is at least willing to play, and the team decides to sit him because they're more concerned with the playoffs and their long-term investment.If teams actually cut everyone's minutes down by a 6th we should see less load managing. But there will be coaches and GMs that approach it as an excuse to invest less in depth.

[Real Men Wear Green]

This is getting ridiculous, however you all try to spin it.

At the end of the day, it's just a bunch of complaining to me.
I wonder if players from yester-year cried this much.
Did Elgin Baylor say we're playing too many games in a Season. Did Bob Cousy say it was a better league with no shot clock?

Teams played as many as 4 to 5 games (IN A ROW!)
Some of the courts had dead spots on them. All the rims and backboard weren't even the same. If you forget what city you're in, you might mess up if you try to bank a shot in off the glass.

And cities, team had to travel by train to the next game.

These players got it made.
Two reasons the modern player misses more games than players in the past that work together: They make much more money with most of it being guaranteed, and they have a better understanding of injuries and the long-term ramifications of playing with them. A guy with 40 mil in the bank isn't so easy to force to play. In Baylor's day there were guys working regular jobs in the offseason. Can you imagine Kawhi Leonard mowing your lawn? Players have been empowered by money and with the knowledge of how good recovery can be for their long-term health they aren't going to accept what players of the past that knew less and were not financially secure did. They see the "reward" Isaiah Thomas got for playing when he should have sat a few years ago and understand they have to take care of themselves.

Neither of those reasons can be dealt with in any way without a hard fight from the NBPA.

[StrongLurk]

Silver sucks ass

[Nowoco]

This is getting ridiculous, however you all try to spin it.

At the end of the day, it's just a bunch of complaining to me.

These players got it made.

It's not the players complaining though. It's the fans and the press. The product is dogshit and people aren't watching.

[Norcaliblunt]

2 things real fans should never care about….

Low ratings and teams overspending.

If you actually care about these things you are being an armchair businessman who is more entertained by capitalism than the actual sport. Go read the Wall Street journal and be entertained with that.

Stop messing with the game just for ratings.

[Phoenix]

I don't hear a lot of players saying it's too many games. Not if it would mean they have to lose money. But that may not be addressing your true point, which is load management (apologies if I'm misunderstanding you here). Load management is on both the players as well as the teams. There are a lot of cases where a guy wants to play, or is at least willing to play, and the team decides to sit him because they're more concerned with the playoffs and their long-term investment.If teams actually cut everyone's minutes down by a 6th we should see less load managing. But there will be coaches and GMs that approach it as an excuse to invest less in depth.

The funny thing about load managing is the players seem to be more injured nowadays in spite of the 'modern science' aspect. You look at some of those old statlines, and you had alot of guys doing 38-40 minutes. AI IIRC had seasons doing 43-44 mins a night. Even Duncan, whose Spurs pioneered this whole thing, had a number of 39-40mpg seasons at the start of his career. These guys now are playing 36mpg at most, playing 60-70 games, with all the athletic expertise at their disposal, and seem more fragile. I wonder if it's because its a faster game and the court is spread out from the 3pointer, so they're having to cover more ground and leading to injuries.

[Norcaliblunt]

They need to completely get rid of either the regular season or the playoffs.

You can’t have both and expect people to care equally about each.

You either have a long season and the team with the best record is the champion.

Or you have multiple playoff style tournaments throughout the year.

I’d actually prefer no season or tournaments and just see super teams battling each other in epic PPV events like boxing or MMA.

[Real Men Wear Green]

The funny thing about load managing is the players seem to be more injured nowadays in spite of the 'modern science' aspect. You look at some of those old statlines, and you had alot of guys doing 38-40 minutes. AI IIRC had seasons doing 43-44 mins a night. Even Duncan, whose Spurs pioneered this whole thing, had a number of 39-40mpg seasons at the start of his career. These guys now are playing 36mpg at most, playing 60-70 games, with all the athletic expertise at their disposal, and seem more fragile. I wonder if it's because its a faster game and the court is spread out from the 3pointer, so they're having to cover more ground and leading to injuries.

It's related to the modern player's financial security. In 1960 if a guy had a sore knee but he could still get the 15 points the team expects him to score then he's not going to miss the week or so of games he needs for the minor injury to heal. He's worried about losing his job to his back-up and without the security of a long guaranteed contract feels he better impress the coach by playing with the pain or not even letting them know that he's hurt. But now these guys have too much money to be pushed around like that and they know that if they don't take care of their bodies they won't be getting that next contract anyway.

It's fair for us fans to judge the tactics Harden and Butler employ to get traded harshly. It's unprofessional. But if we're being honest with ourselves most of us would take a break from the game when a doctor told us it was in our best interest. You know you could be signing for two hundred mil, you know what happened to Isaiah Thomas, are you going to play on that sore knee that the doctor is telling you isn't stable?

[Phoenix]

It's related to the modern player's financial security. In 1960 if a guy had a sore knee but he could still get the 15 points the team expects him to score then he's not going to miss the week or so of games he needs for the minor injury to heal. He's worried about losing his job to his back-up and without the security of a long guaranteed contract feels he better impress the coach by playing with the pain or not even letting them know that he's hurt. But now these guys have too much money to be pushed around like that and they know that if they don't take care of their bodies they won't be getting that next contract anyway.

It's fair for us fans to judge the tactics Harden and Butler employ to get traded harshly. It's unprofessional. But if we're being honest with ourselves most of us would take a break from the game when a doctor told us it was in our best interest. You know you could be signing for two hundred mil, you know what happened to Isaiah Thomas, are you going to play on that sore knee that the doctor is telling you isn't stable?

I understand the reasons why, unfortunately it's diminished the product. Which tends to be a common effect when there's tons of money involved and everyone is just trying protect their bag. I don't follow other team sports strongly enough to know if the same thing is happening elsewhere, but I do know the NFL and Baseball ratings are holding and even increasing the past few years. There's some fundamental issues with the NBA that require solutions that would probably lead to less revenue........so that's a non-starter for all concerned.