If you think this year’s NBA playoffs have seemed a bit more physical than the regular season or any playoffs of years past, you’re not alone.
And while fans may be loving the raucous physicality, Mark Cuban sees an issue if these types of edgy games persist.
While he says it draws more viewers, Cuban posted to X that he thinks that “wondering who will get into a fight next” is “bad for the future of the NBA.”
So, did the NBA, it seems, as the playoffs have been a time for officials to swallow their whistles.
Cuban assured the NBA world that this can’t be the case.
“I guarantee you that no one at the top of the NBA made the decision that the games should be more physical,” Cuban wrote in the X post. “It’s the officials managing the games their way. Nothing changed in the rule book or case book. Right now every team still in [the playoffs] is calling the NBA asking what the hell is going on.”
Cuban served as the Mavericks owner for more than two decades, so he’s seen his fair share of different styles and era switches in the NBA. Now serving just as a minority owner in Dallas, he’s less involved and hence observes the league more like the rest of us.
With the league as skilled as ever, Cuban doesn’t see any positives if team-needs start shifting from skill to physicality.
“The problem is that everything in the NBA always goes to excess. Guys will use physicality as a replacement for skill. Teams will adapt their rosters accordingly,” Cuban said. “If this stays in place for next [regular] season, I could see every team having a 2-way whose greatest ability is to fight and intimidate.”
Cuban’s comments came in response to Fox Sports’ Chris Broussard’s, who expressed his enjoyment with the newly rowdy NBA playoffs.
“I am not one that calls for a return to ‘90s basketball, but these NBA playoffs, where the refs are letting the teams play physical defense, are waaayyyy more entertaining than today’s matador-defense, easy-buckets regular season games,” he wrote on X. “It’s night & day!”
NBA fans and analysts alike are split on these physical playoffs, and teams like the Knicks and Pistons have had brutal back-and-forths all series. Timberwolves coach Chris Finch told reporters Thursday that the games have “gone way too far on the physicality.”
But one thing is for certain. It’s made for some entertaining basketball.
