Pelicans should rejoice at idea of NBA conference realignment/dissolution

The New Orleans Pelicans have struggled hard this season. This isn't breaking news by any means. Fighting through a litany of injuries to practically their entire anticipated rotation, the Pelicans have had to field a lineup full of fringe NBA players, and the results have gone as poorly as anyone would expect.

Through 17 games, the Pels are 4-13 and in sole possession of the 15th seed in the Western Conference, representing the very bottom of the West. There's long been a disparity between the competitiveness of the two conferences, with the West being the far deeper half of the NBA for several years now.

This phenomenon may be reaching a head this season. At the time of writing, there are 11 teams in the West with a win percentage of .500 or better. The East has just five. The Sacramento Kings, the 12th seed in the West at 8-9, would be tied with the Milwaukee Bucks for the sixth spot in the Eastern Conference.

This is clearly a problem and one that the league and Commissioner Adam Silver are well aware of. The Play-In Tournament was actually partly installed to give all of the fiercely competitive teams in the West a fighting chance at making the playoffs but was ultimately extended to give both conferences 10 teams with a postseason appearance. With the way this season has gone so far, we could see some extremely talented and successful squads miss the Play-In altogether in the West while some actively tanking teams might wind up in the postseason on the East side of the bracket. Thankfully, the NBA might have an answer for the disparity between the two conferences soon.

How the Pelicans would benefit from the dissolution of NBA conferences

According to ESPN's Brian Windhorst, there is a rising belief among league executives that the NBA could do away with conferences altogether in the near future, opting instead to send the top 16 teams to the playoffs, regardless of conference or geography. He also reported, though, that the league could try to balance the power dynamic between the two conferences through expansion, sending one of the current Western Conference teams to the East. Windhorts named the Pelicans as one of the top candidates for this potential shift:

"The NBA is slowly moving toward expansion, perhaps 2-3 years from now, with Seattle and Las Vegas as the top candidates. If that happens, there will potentially be a battle among the Mississippi River teams (the Minnesota Timberwolves, Memphis Grizzlies and New Orleans Pelicans) to be the "fortunate" one to move East to balance the conferences at 16 clubs apiece.

Instead of dealing with that thorny competition, West executives told ESPN they believe both issues can be corrected by dropping conferences altogether and seeding teams 1 through 16 regardless of geography."

Either way, New Orleans stands to benefit, given that they're the chosen team to move to the East with expansion of course. There's a strong reason why the Pelicans are among the top contenders to change conferences. Of the 14 NBA arenas closest to New Orleans's home court, the Smoothie King Center, nine of them belong to East teams. Of the five West teams, three of them are in Texas and one is the Memphis Grizzlies, another candidate for reassignment.

If the NBA dissolves the conferences or moves the Pelicans to the East, it should significantly cut down on travel for New Orleans, meaning their players would get much better rest and wouldn't have to spend so much time on the road or transiting.

In 2022-23, the Pelicans went 42-40 and wound up the ninth seed in the West. They'd go on to lose the 9-10 matchup in the Play-In Tournament to the Oklahoma City Thunder and were eliminated from the postseason. Had they been in the East, they still would have been in the PIT that season but would have been the eighth seed, which would have given them two chances to try to get into the playoffs. They also would have been playing the Miami Heat and either the Atlanta Hawks or Toronto Raptors instead of the upstart Thunder. Had the NBA just sent the top 16 teams to the playoffs regardless of conference, the Pelicans would have gotten in as the 15th-overall seed.

This season, the Pelicans may already be too far behind the ball in the West to make the playoffs, even if they can right the ship with everyone back healthy. If they were in the East, however, New Orleans would be tied with the Toronto Raptors for the 13th spot, just 2.5 games back from the 10th seed and four games behind for the sixth seed and a guaranteed playoff spot. The NBA stands to gain as a whole from either conference realignment or dissolution, but the New Orleans Pelicans have an argument as the greatest benefactor from such a change.