Episode
Regular Season Rules Needed for NBA, NHL Playoffs
- Podcast
- Freedom Unaffiliated
- Published
- Jun 25, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 349
- Processing state
not_requested- Canonical source
- https://thinkfreedom.org
Actions
POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/freedom-unaffiliated-6377441/episodes/regular-season-rules-needed-for-nba-nhl-playoffs/transcription-requests
Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode.GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/freedom-unaffiliated-6377441/regular-season-rules-needed-for-nba-nhl-playoffs.md
Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource.
Summary
The simultaneous NBA and NFL playoffs, known as the second season, can be almost as exhausting and frustrating for the fans as it is for the players. For Avs and Nuggets fans, this year was especially disappointing, even though we knew that 15 of the 16 teams in the playoff bracket are fated to lose their last game. It’s an alleged truism that the NBA and NHL playoffs require a different kind of play than in the regular season. I think that’s a falseism. The leagues don’t change the rules for the playoffs, they change the way refs officiate. Openly changing the rules invites public controversy and requires negotiation with the players’ union on the CBA. I’m biased because the Avs and Nuggets are skill teams more than overly physical and dirty ones. The Avs won the Presidents’ Trophy having the best regular season record in the NHL over 82 games. It’s senseless to make teams play under one set of rules in the first six months of the season and different unwritten ones in the last two. Blowing the whistle The NBA has the bigger problem. Officiating is more difficult than in other sports. Play is so fast and congested in the paint and under the rim that officials routinely make an educated guess as whether a foul was committed and by whom. That’s unavoidable but hedging the rules isn’t. The playoffs should be the highest-quality version of the sport, not one over emphasizing defense creating inconsistent calls by different refs with subjective judgment on “marginal contact.” There used to be the “one arm, bent elbow” rule allowing a defensive player to place one hand with a bent elbow on an offensive player’s back or place one forearm on his back, maintaining contact only as long as the defender isn’t pushing or dislodging the player. Today, you see a defender bear-huggin…