My father occasionally talks about how various sports seasons are too long. Does baseball really need to play 162 games? Wouldn't 100 games be just as indicative of how good a team is while making each game actually mean something? How about basketball? Is the 82 game season anything more than a way to wear down players and the fans? Wouldn't a 50 game season be just as worthwhile? Even the players in basketball talk about enduring the regular season just to get to the playoffs.

The playoffs do even more to draw out the season far past where it should end. In Major League Baseball division teams play each other so often I can't even keep track of it. In the National Basketball Association division rivals play each other 4 times and other teams a varying lesser amount. So over the course of an 82 game season teams potentially meet up 4 times. Yet once the playoffs begin the absolute minimum number of times a team meets its opponent is 4 times with a good chance of it stretching out to 5, 6, or sometimes even 7 games.

Until a couple of years ago at least the first round of the NBA playoffs was only a 5 game series. The grueling part of the playoffs didn't really start until the second round. Even better was the fact that the underdog team actually has a decent chance in a 5 game series. In a 7 game series the odds that they can pull off 4 wins against a team with a superior record are more against them than they would be to pull out the 3 wins necessary to win a 5 game series.

In my opinion that change was a severe mistake. The NBA wanted the increased revenue of more guaranteed playoff games. However, at least this season it backfired on them. Most of the series ended at 4 games. I believe 2 continued on to 5 games, and only 1 managed to go to a game 7. I would be willing to bet (without actually bothering to research it) that the number of playoffs games played in the first round this year weren't any greater than that of the average year when they only played 5 game series.

In fact I think that the second series should only be 5 games too. I just don't see how 7 is more entertaining than 5. Think back a bit to series like in '94 or '95 when the Supersonics got knocked off as the number 1 seed in the first round. That was exciting. Imagine if that same sort of underdog excitement existed in the second round. It doesn't happen with a 7 game series, but it could easily with a 5 game series. Fluke wins or lucky streaks make for good entertainment. I do think though that the championships and the Finals should be 7 games. That is where the lucky should be culled from the skilled.

Additionally with the advent of the 7 game first round series the playoffs stretch out even longer. For some ludicrous reason there is at least 2 days between each game. Basketball players are conditioned athletes. If a 7 game series is the way to go make all games in the same city back to back. This would mean games 1 and 2 are back to back. Give them a day off to travel. Then games 3, 4, and 5 would be back to back to back. Give them another day off to travel. To finish up games 6 and 7 back to back. This gets the entire 7 game series out of the way in 9 days. Then give them 2 days off before the next series starts.

NBA basketball is an indoor sport. It was meant to be played indoors. When spring rolls around it is time for baseball, golf, track, of any of the myriad sports that can't or shouldn't be played in inclement weather. When the NBA playoffs end in June then that is a problem. The latest professional basketball should go is the middle of May. When it is light outside until 9 or 10 pm the last thing I want to do is be cooped up inside watching the tv or in a gym watching the game. It is more fun to go outside and shoot some hoops myself than it is to sit inside during the tail end of spring. By the time the NBA finishes up high schools and colleges will have already finished their baseball seasons. That just doesn't seem quite right to me.

The NBA kind of makes it hard to be a fan. Most of the first round 7 game series were boring slaughters. The only even series was between Miami and New Orleans which nobody, except a few fans in their home cities, cares about in the slightest. Not only were the series uninteresting, there was so much time between the games that there was little to no buildup in excitement. The only series I saw much emotion in was the Minnesota Denver series, and that was only because of Sprewell mouthing off at the Denver bench. I know I have a hard time caring when the games are spaced out so far apart, and there are so many of them with the outcome already nearly pre-determined.