In every NBA season there are what are called “scheduled losses” where some team is going to lose a game thanks to the schedule maker. If you are on your third game in four days and draw a rested Oklahoma City, you are in trouble no matter who you are.
This year there are going to be a lot of scheduled losses. Details of the NBA schedule — set to be released Tuesday at 7 p.m. (Eastern) — are starting to leak out and my legs are getting tired just reading about it.
Like the Lakers opening the season with a back-to-back-to-back — at home to Chicago, at Sacramento then back to Los Angeles to face Utah, reports the Los Angeles Times. Pretty pumped if you’re the Lakers fan who spent crazy cash to get tickets for that Utah game so you can watch the Lakers slog around on tired legs, aren’t you?
Then there is this tweet from Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo.
Who wants to see how the Boston Celtics’ old legs look on the fifth game in six nights? Who wants to pay to see that?
That is one area the league could see backlash — in its effort to get as many games as possible in (read: rake in more revenue) they will have games so compacts as to hurt the quality of play. They are selling a weakened product.
And there are going to be a lot more “scheduled losses” this season where we can expect teams to lose basked on the schedule and not talent.