The Real Sweet 16

I've long said that the best two months in sports are the NBA playoffs. It is the highest level of basketball in the world, played on the biggest stage, featuring the best players in the world. It gets no better.

Yet this time every year, the NCAA tournament takes over the basketball world and people seem to get swept up in March Madness enough to not care about seeing good basketball.

It's where we chose to settle for a good story over good shot selection because it's fun to root against Duke.

It doesn't matter that we just watched 39 minutes of poorly played basketball, if the cute underdog team hits a miracle shot, it'll be pandemonium for 45 seconds and someone's bracket will get busted.

After tuning in to day one of the tournament Thursday afternoon, I couldn't wait for TNT double-header to start to finally see some good basketball. It didn't disappoint. The Celtics beat Dallas and the Lakers beat the Jazz in Utah in two very good games.

So while John Q. Basketball Watcher is busy hoping for a buzzer-beater on CBS, I'll be tuned into the League Pass enjoying the race for the NBA playoffs.

The NCAA can have it its Sweet 16.

Here is the Real Sweet 16: 16 reasons to watch the NBA stretch run over the round of 16.

1. They actually play basketball.

The thing that bothers me most about the college game is how many timeouts there are. You can hardly get into a flow because there are so many stoppages. Think about it like this. A college game is 40 minutes long. Each team gets 5 timeouts, that's 10. On top of that, there are officials' timeouts every four minutes (the first dead ball inside of 16, 12, 8, and 4 minutes remaining). There are 8 of those.

That means that there are 18 timeouts in a 40-minute game. In the NBA, with each team getting 7 timeouts, there are 14 timeouts in a 48-minute game. There is more of a flow to the NBA game, and it is much more TV friendly.

2. They can advance the ball with a timeout.

The fact that a college team can't advance the ball to half-court after a timeout is a terrible rule. For a tournament that sells itself on how much drama it produces, it has a rule that completely takes away most opportunities for last-second shots.

For every Christian Laettner-, Bryce Drew-, and Tyus Edney-type play, there are ten botched baseball passes or three quarter court shots that sail into the photographers.

If there were three seconds left to play, my guess would be that six, maybe seven out of 10 half-court plays would get a decent shot at the basket. If a team has to go the length of the floor, how many times out of 10 do they get a half-way decent shot off? One? Two?

Allowing teams to advance the ball after a timeout increases the chances that a team will score late in the game. More late-game scoring means more buzzer-beaters, which means higher ratings, which means more money.

The NBA realizes this and it has been the rule for as long as I can remember. The NCAA is missing the boat by handicapping the team trying to make a great play.

3. They actually score.

I know that fewer minutes is going to result in fewer points, that is a given. But that doesn't mean that it has to directly translate to teams being less efficient.

After the first two round of the tournament, 26 of the 65 teams shot less than 43% from the field. No team in the NBA shoots less than 43%.

If the Sweet 16 warrants better teams, expect to also see better defense. There are six teams left that have shot over 50%. I'd be surprised if any of the six finishes the tournament over 50%.

4. They can shoot free throws, too.

Free throw shooting is one of the easiest and most basic basketball plays. Yet so many college games are decided because one or both teams can't make big free throws.

Thirty-nine of the 65 teams (60%) shot 70% or lower from the free throw line in the first two rounds. Not a single NBA team shoots below that mark. When the worst the NBA has to offer is better than more than half of tournament teams, it says a lot about the quality of the game being played.

5. The three-point line is the right distance.

I actually like what the NCAA is doing about this. The three-point line is too close in college right now, but at least they are moving back to the international line next season. The problem isn't so much that the line is too close and is too easy a shot; it's that it is too close to the basket and it impacts spacing.

If a team packs into a 2-3 zone, they can cover the entire two point area. With the three-point line where it is in the NBA, if a team goes zone and the offense spaces near the three point line, it stretches the defense out enough to create scoring lanes. That's part of the reason why the zone defense is so ineffective against good offensive NBA teams.

6. An upset is well earned.

Upsets are what make the tournament great, but let's face it, most of them are flukes. The neutral location alone gives the underdog a natural advantage. Obviously, the various locations of the games is part of what makes the first two rounds so special and unique, but an upset at a place where the crowd is 75% in your favor solely because you're the little guy is easier than battling a hostile environment.

To upset an NBA team, you have to go on to a better team's home court and outplay them in front of their fans and steal at least one, if not more games. Golden State knocking off Dallas last year impresses me a whole lot more than San Diego hitting a last-second shot over UConn in Tampa.

7. There's always tomorrow.

I'm not arguing with the one and done style of the tournament. The format is perfect. It's just that I personally prefer a seven-game series because it adds a whole new element to the game: coaching.

In both the NCAA and the NBA, both coaches will make several in-game adjustments. But when you have Hall of Fame-caliber NBA coaches getting to know the other's team inside and out, the chess match from the bench both during and between games adds a whole new dynamic to each game.

8. You actually see a rivalry game.

With the spacing of the brackets, the upsets, the luck of the draw, and all other things considered, it needs to be a perfect storm to see some of the biggest rivals in college basketball play each other. Part of the excitement of the tournament is playing a team you know nothing about to see who is better.

But when the stakes are high and dislike for the other team is, too, it makes for some intense and compelling basketball. Seeing old rivals meet and new rivalries start to take shape is one of the best subplots of the NBA playoffs.

9. There is too little continuity in the college game.

Since the rosters change so much year to year in college, every tournament is completely different. With the new NBA age rules, it throws another wrinkle into things where a team like Kansas State can land a player like Michael Beasley and become a threat, if only for the short-term.

It's hard to get casual fans to support you when you can go from back-to-back champs to NIT No. 2 seed in one season.

10. You can see teams take "the leap."

I'll always bet on the team that has playoff experience. I firmly believe that an NBA team has to lose in order to learn to win. In the recent history of the league, the teams that have the most success suffer a period of close-but-no-cigar type seasons.

If you have a team that's young enough, good enough, with a front office smart enough to keep the key pieces around, losing to a really good team in the playoffs is sometimes a stepping stone in the right direction to becoming a champion.

It happened to the Bulls. The Pistons. The Lakers. The Spurs, too. Good teams lose and learn from it.

That's why I think Utah and Cleveland are my sleepers in each conference. It doesn't look like either team will likely finish any higher than fourth, but both made deep playoff runs last season and kept their core intact. (Well, Utah kept its core, Cleveland kept LeBron.) One of those teams could be poised to make "The Leap" this season.

New Orleans impresses me and would scare me if my team drew them in the first round. They won't be able to hang with an experienced team deep in the playoffs this year, but are the number one "leap" candidate for next season.

11. You tend to notice the name on the back as much as the name on the front.

And that isn't intended to imply that NBA players are selfish. What it means is that you know the players that you are watching. I'm just as impressed with Stephen Curry and his 35 points per game as you are, but I'll admit I didn't catch too many Davidson regular season games to know that this was coming.

In an NBA series, I'm tuning because I want to see Chris Paul dish out 15 assists. I want to see LeBron manhandle entire defenses. I want to see Kobe take over a fourth quarter. I know what to watch for ahead of time because it makes watching the games more enjoyable, I don't have to spend the first half trying to figure out who is who.

12. They make it look easy.

This to me might be the biggest misconception of the NCAA over the NBA: the college players play harder. Really? NBA players aren't capable of giving their all because they are millionaires?

Just because NBA players don't slap the floor when they guard the ball doesn't mean they are giving less effort. If a college big man snags an offensive rebound and gets over-excited and it takes him three tries to convert a put back, that doesn't mean that he is trying harder than an NBA player, it just means that he needs to try more times.

You watch a consummate professional rebounder like Lamar Odom or Antonio McDyess get an offensive rebound and put it back up, it looks effortless. They are trying their hardest, but they make it look a hell of a lot easier than some of the bigs I saw this past weekend.

13. You get to watch old veterans rather than new freshman get their first taste of the big game.

It's much more satisfying for me to watch a crafty veteran like Robert Horry come in and play 10 minutes, do very little in the stat sheet, and still contribute with a bunch of savvy plays than it is to see a freshman go through his growing pains while he adapts to the big stage.

Neither the old nor the young will have the skills as the best out there, but for my money, I'd rather watch the guy who's been doing it longer than the alternative has been alive.

14. Heroes get remembered, but legends never die.

Who know the tagline from "The Sandlot" would help so much in illustrating my point? If you come up big in the NCAA tournament sometimes you can go down in basketball lore forever. Sometimes you don't. Either way, you are a hero for a short period of time while your team celebrates success.

Let's face facts here; legends are made in the NBA Finals. Bill Russell won two NCAA titles. Magic has one. Jordan has one. For some reason, I doubt you picture them as a Don, Spartan, or Tar Heel respectively.

That's because they were heroes for a few years on campus. They became legends because of what they achieved on the next level.

15. It's where amazing happens.

Okay, I'll admit my addiction to the League Pass has brainwashed me into fully believing this, but it is actually true for the most part. There are going to be no fewer than 10 can-you-believe-that-just-happened games in the playoffs before it is all said and done.

There will be roughly 80 NBA playoff games this year, considerably more than the 63 tournament games. That leaves more opportunities for amazing to happen, and if the regular season has been any indication, the playoffs will have no shortage of amazing things happen this year.

16. The play-in game actually matters.

In the final week of the season, there are at least six games that could make or break a team's season, depending on how the next eight or so games play out. With the West as wide open as it is, anyone can beat anyone in a playoff series. But first you have to get there.

There could several teams vying for the last couple of Western Conference playoff spots in the final week, and each of the nine teams in contention plays at least one other playoff contending team in the final four days.

So there you have it. If none of those 16 reasons can convince you to watch the NBA over the NCAA tournament, I don't know what to tell you. All I can say is feel free to shoot me an e-mail and let me know who wins the Sweet 16 games this weekend.

I'll be too busy watching basketball to pay any attention to it.