Silver says Warriors are good for business

Adam Silver’s NBA has endless action and daily drama. That’s the offseason. Then the regular season starts, and some of the intrigue ends.

Most predictions again see Golden State and Cleveland standing above their challengers for a fourth straight season, a pattern of dominance that even has Michael Jordan fearing a league where 28 teams are “garbage.”

The NBA commissioner isn’t worried. Silver believes great teams are good for business, the way Jordan’s Bulls were in the 1990s and the way Stephen Curry’s and LeBron James’ teams are now. The commissioner says any of them can be beaten, too.

“Sometimes it’s just the nature of things, but I’m confident that given some of the moves that our teams made in the offseason that there’s no doubt there are multiple teams gunning for the Warriors and for that matter gunning for the Cavaliers this season as well,” Silver said.

Jordan now owns the Charlotte Hornets, one of perhaps 25 teams in the NBA with little-to-no hope of winning a title this season — or maybe anytime soon. The Hornets have just one All-Star, not nearly enough to compete when the Warriors have arguably four top-20 players, and the Cavaliers restocked around James with Dwyane Wade and Derrick Rose after Golden State’s romp last June.

“I think it’s going to hurt the overall aspect of the league from a competitive standpoint,” Jordan told “Cigar Aficionado” magazine about multiple stars joining together on the same team. “You’re going to have one or two teams that are going to be great, and another 28 teams that are going to be garbage. Or they’re going to have a tough time surviving in the business environment.”

Silver understands the comments, given Jordan’s competitiveness, and acknowledges that “at the end of the day we sell competition and we want to have as many competitive teams as possible, but sometimes it just happens that again, combinations of certain players come together, they’re well-coached like those Bulls teams were in the ’90s.

“He’s obviously frustrated that his team isn’t being talked about as a potential champion this season and I think it’s just that. He’d love to win and he’s frustrated,” Silver said. “Having said that, Michael also happens to be the chairman of our Labor Relations Committee and nobody is suggesting we have the perfect system here or that over time we can’t make it better. And that’s something we’ll continue to look at.”

While Silver downplays Jordan’s concern, it does have merit.

So the league has made changes, in part, to make the regular season more meaningful.

Silver can fine teams that sit out healthy players during nationally televised games, and the lottery system has been tweaked so that teams will have less incentive to lose on purpose in hopes of having the best odds at landing the No. 1 pick.

Silver is interested in doing more. He likes how international soccer teams can play in multiple leagues or tournaments, giving them more avenues to a championship. He sees that as a potential midseason opportunity for teams.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE Commissioner Adam Silver’s NBA has had a frenetic offseason filled with more drama than the games themselves, particularly regular season contests. A fourth straight year of the same NBA Finals matchup seems likely.