This format provides all teams playoff games (at least 3), where they have a chance to promote or risk relegating.
Teams in each league are divided into 3 groups:
(1) The top 4 - two conference winners and 2 wild cards who play a straightforward two round playoff, with both rounds being a best of 3 series, and the winner promoting.
(2) The next 4 who start out in an interleague competition, and are joined by teams from the 1st group as they are eliminated, and eventually by teams from the division above, providing extra promotion opportunities.
(3) The bottom 8, who play among each other, and include regular season games in their ranking. So instead of keeping 5th and 8th place teams out of the playoffs, the 5th place teams start with an advantage, and the 8th place teams with a disadvantage. The bottom 4 will relegate, and the next two will have to win a playoff with teams from the division below to retain their places.
This format would require extending the playoffs from two to 3 weeks.
This shows the flow of teams through the 3 week playoff.
(http://home.pipeline.com/~jimrtex/_uimages/bbbracket5.bmp)This shows the weekly schedules.
(http://home.pipeline.com/~jimrtex/_uimages/bbbracket3.bmp)This explains which teams are doing which.
(http://home.pipeline.com/~jimrtex/_uimages/bbbracket4.bmp)