the best regular record rewarded
We knew the Larry O’Brien trophy, which rewards the champion team at the end of the Playoffs. We will now discover the Maurice Podoloff trophy, which will recognize the accomplishments of the team with the best regular season record.
The Suns will be able to breathe: the season is not completely lost! Unlike this ball. But joking aside, this addition is part of a dynamic initiated by the League in recent years. The NBA is constantly seeking to modernize and create ever more media events, as we saw a few days ago with the announcement of the slight shortening of the regular season next season, following the introduction of the “ In-Season Tournament”.
NBA informed teams today that the 2023-24 season will start on Oct. 24, 2023, and conclude April 14, 2024.
Noteworthy: If/when In-Season Tournament is approved, initial schedule will have 80 games per team; remaining games scheduled after eight teams advance to knockout rounds.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) November 30, 2022
Adam Silver’s latest find? A new trophy, brand new, invented to reward the team ending the regular season with the best record in the League. Named after the first president of the league from 1947 to 1963, Maurice Podoloff, he shares this “naming” with the trophy… of MVP. What to wonder if the NBA would not consider renaming the Most Valuable Player trophy. After the creation of the Larry Bird and Magic Johnson trophies last season, to underline the performance of the two MVPs of the Conference Finals, one can easily imagine that the name of another legend (Michael Jordan perhaps?) will soon be used in this end.
Named after the NBA’s first commissioner Maurice Podoloff, this trophy is presented to the team with the best record after 82 regular season games and features elements that represent the season and both conferences. pic.twitter.com/SRS2Ng7Nux
— NBA (@NBA) December 6, 2022
We know a few teams who would have liked such a trophy to exist in their time (we think a lot of John Stockton and Karl Malone), it is now done. The NBA also took the opportunity to reveal the new designs for the Executive of the year, Sportsmanship (Joe Dumars Trophy), Teammate of the year (Twyman-Stokes Trophy) and Coach of the year (Red Auerbach Trophy) awards. : we let you make up your own mind, but here we strongly validate.
Introducing the new NBA non-Kia award trophies.
The new Twyman-Stokes Trophy, Joe Dumars Trophy, Red Auerbach Trophy, Executive of the Year Award and Maurice Podoloff Trophy were each designed in partnership with Victor Solomon.
A THREAD ⤵️
— NBA (@NBA) December 6, 2022
