Seeds may not matter in the West. Home court will

One of the odd impacts of wild parity in the West is how playoff match-ups are shaping up.

Good morning. Let’s basketball.

Romania Unchained, Gheorghe Tattarescu, 1866

There are a ton of knock-on effects from the increased competitive balance in the NBA, many of which will take time to reveal themselves. One that currently springs to mind in the Western Conference where five games separate the top 10 teams is that a lack of hegemonic power makes particular seeds not that important.

Here’s what I mean.

In a more traditional stratified conference, you’d have 1-2 teams at the top of the standings that rivals may want to avoid or target, depending on perceived match-up advantages or disadvantages. During the Warriors’ peak prior to the pandemic, every team wanted to avoid Golden State. In the era prior to that, you wanted to avoid the Spurs, and before that the Lakers. There was a structure to the seeds, and it was important to fans and perhaps teams that certain pairings were avoided until absolutely necessary. If the Warriors, for example, were destined to be the No. 1 seed, you really wanted to get in the 2-3 bracket, even if it meant being a 6-seed instead of a 5-seed (unless, of course, you felt you matched up better with the 5-seed than the 6-seed).

That’s not really the case right now: no one has any idea who will end up in what seeds, and while there may be team-based match-up issues the uncertainty about how this will play makes target certain sides of the bracket impossible.

However, what is pretty clear is that home court advantage should be especially important in the West playoffs this season.

Of the 10 teams currently in the play-in or playoffs, seven have substantial home-road splits. The Warriors’ epic split — 15-2 at home and 3-16 on the road — has gotten lots of attention, but other squads are in a similar if not quite as dramatic place. The No. 1 Pelicans are 15-4 at home and 7-8 on the road. The Also No. 1 Nuggets are 12-3 at home and 10-9 on the road. The No. 3 Grizzlies: 13-3 at home, 7-10 on the road. The No. 5 Suns: 14-5 at home, 6-11 on the road. The No. 7 Mavericks are almost identical: 14-5 at home, 5-11 on the road. The No. 9 Jazz: 12-5 at home, 7-13 on the road.

No team in the West playoff or play-in picture is better on the road than at home (that would be weird), but the No. 4 Clippers, No. 6 Kings and No. 8 Blazers have much closer splits. (Those three and the Nuggets are the only teams in the conference .500 or better on the road.) This is all to say that the majority of the conference may not care about avoiding that One True Killer Team at the top of the standings … but all of them will care about home court advantage, which along with the competitive balance should help boost stakes in the back half of the season.

This doesn’t just apply to the top four seeds, either. It applies in the race for the No. 2 seed and the individual seeds within the play-in tournament (7 is materially better than 8, 9 is materially better than 10). With how close these races are, every game actually matters, and I’d bet we’re going to see teams prioritize getting any home court advantage they can scrounge up, even if it means playing tired or slightly injured stars.