This whole East vs. West debate is so tiring. There's no argument because what's the harm merging conferences, divisions, even the schedule out so each team plays every one else exactly three times, and then let the best 16 fight things out in the playoffs?
It's not the 80s where travelling distance matters so much. You would probably need to extend the regular season by two weeks or so to get a couple more rest days and have longer home and away stretches, but other than that? Also it's not like we have plenty of great rivalries in conferences and divisions in today's NBA.
Maybe East vs. West is exaggerated a bit, but you could still get rid of all the complaints with a fair league system. I bet somebody could even write some fancy algorithm that makes sure all teams do the same travel mileage throughout the season.
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