NBA playoffs intriguing ... so far

There were a lot of NBA fans and beat writers who freaked out during last year's NBA playoffs. Several writers and bloggers — most notably ESPN's John Hollinger, a stats geek (in a good way) — proposed several changes to the NBA playoffs.

My favorite one was to keep the same seeds per conference, but create one big 16-team bracket.

There hasn't been as much outcry this year, mainly because the Celtics tore through the regular season, Orlando developed into a legitimate No. 3 team and Cleveland still has that LeBron fellow.

When I did a simulated, what-if bracket last season, six of the eight teams to advance into the second round were from the West. With the East a bit stronger — and just for fun — let's take a look at what this year's playoffs would have looked like using the 16-team bracket projection, which was incredibly popular last season.

Imagine this as one giant bracket:

(1W) Los Angeles
(8E) Atlanta

(4E) Cleveland
(5W) Utah

(3W) San Antonio
(6E) Toronto

(2E) Detroit
(7W) Dallas

(1E) Boston
(8W) Denver

(4W) Houston
(5E) Washington

(3E) Orlando
(6W) Phoenix

(2W) New Orleans
(7E) Philadelphia

We again get a few fascinating first-round matchups, including Phoenix-Orlando, Cleveland-Utah and Detroit-Dallas. A quick projection give us a probable second round of Los Angeles-Utah, San Antonio-Detroit, Boston-Houston, Phoenix-New Orleans and a potential semifinals of Los Angeles-San Antonio, Boston-New Orleans.

There are still some crying for some sort of playoff change, and there are some interesting scenarios in certain new formats, but I think the NBA right now is better than it has been in many, many years.

The talent level is incredible, the historic rivalries are returning in some form and the influx of young, capable players and innovative coaches make for some great up-and-down basketball. I think this year's playoffs will serve as a sign of increased competition in the future.