Top Ten Ways to Improve the NBA in 2019

A wildcard round in the NBA would be great. The idea is that the 7 through 10 seeds in each conference would battle amongst each other in the format of: 7 vs. 10, 8 Vs. 9. Then the winner of those two games would battle for the higher seed. This could give the teams in the Playoffs an incentive to get in a higher seed so they could get rest for the Playoffs. The teams in the Lottery would have an incentive to get in the top 10 because we learned from this previous year is anyone can go high in the Lottery. So if you get the 10 seed you would the chance for both the Playoffs and the Lottery.

I have 3 ideas for this tournament. All 3 would take place before or after the All-Star Break and in all 3 the top 4 teams are given a money exception. The idea is to keep the Season entertaining. First idea is the winner of the tournament is given an automatic 4 Seed entry. This would give teams a reason to do well. Second idea is every team puts in a player to give up. The team that wins gets to pick a player out of the pool and that team is given an automatic Playoff entrance. And third is every team that wants to participate has to give up a 1st Round Pick. The winner gets every pick in the pool except the 2nd place winner who gets to keep their pick. This gives the young teams, Selling Teams and Buying teams to join, so they can get trade pieces or just picks for the future. The contending teams can get in a rest.

The NBA partially already has this with the supermax extension, but I feel like they should take it farther and add the ability to make a player stay on a team for a year longer.

I believe that after you activate your first meeting you are given a window of like 5 days to decide who you will join. If you don't you are fined. This could stop situations like what happened with Kawhi.

Hand Checking is something every fan over 10 wants to see. Hand Checking would change all of this crazy offensive teams we see now a days. Defenders would be free to put their hands on their match ups. When they got rid of hand checking the NBA went on a down hill trend of allowing defensive players to sit back on defense. It would be good to get hand checking back.

Whether that means not allowing a team that just made a conference finals get a player that was on the same contract as a year they got a All-NBA team, All-Defensive team, or All- Star or simply lowering the cap of a conference finals team. We got to do something. I'll admit the last 2 years have been very good in terms of parity.

The unfairness in this game isn't as bad as NFL, but it can be bad. Some players will get techs for no reason at all and others will get off the hook. It needs to stop.

I suggest just make another division called the international division. Add the Raptors, a team from Mexico, a team from Spain, a team from Britain, and a Team from France. Boom International Division.

Add exceptions for every 10 wins. It would definitely encourage the teams to win, so they can improve their team in the Playoffs. Plus the teams that are hard capped would be pressured to win.