With the start of the 2023-24 season right around the corner, I decided to look at how far each team is scheduled to travel throughout the season (roughly). I say roughly as we have the new in-season tournament this year so we don’t have the full schedule due to the unscheduled knockout rounds. This means the analysis is incomplete, nevertheless, you can find a summary table of the total distance each team will roughly travel.
| Rank | Team | Total Distance (km) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Los Angeles Clippers | 80,882 |
| 2 | Brooklyn Nets | 75,512 |
| 3 | Portland Trail Blazer | 73,356 |
| 4 | Denver Nuggets | 72,600 |
| 5 | Minnesota Timberwolves | 72,371 |
| 6 | Sacramento Kings | 72,364 |
| 7 | Miami Heat | 70,038 |
| 8 | Golden State Warriors | 67,646 |
| 9 | New Orleans Pelicans | 67,262 |
| 10 | San Antonio Spurs | 66,931 |
| 11 | Boston Celtics | 66,895 |
| 12 | Los Angeles Lakers | 66,846 |
| 13 | Memphis Grizzlies | 66,582 |
| 14 | Phoenix Suns | 65,665 |
| 15 | Orlando Magic | 65,568 |
| 16 | Oklahoma City Thunder | 65,030 |
| 17 | Dallas Mavericks | 63,994 |
| 18 | Philadelphia 76ers | 63,435 |
| 19 | New York Knicks | 62,671 |
| 20 | Utah Jazz | 62,593 |
| 21 | Cleveland Cavaliers | 61,513 |
| 22 | Atlanta Hawks | 60,691 |
| 23 | Houston Rockets | 60,554 |
| 24 | Chicago Bulls | 59,218 |
| 25 | Washington Wizards | 58,378 |
| 26 | Charlotte Hornets | 57,840 |
| 27 | Milwaukee Bucks | 55,456 |
| 28 | Detriot Pistons | 54,302 |
| 29 | Indiana Pacers | 53,480 |
| 30 | Toronto Raptors | 52,411 |
Each distance is calculated from stadium to stadium along a line of minimum distance. It’s also assumed that a team will only travel from one game to the next, so everyone sleeps at the stadium until they’re set to play their next game - no going home (or anywhere else) between games (sorry teams!).
For example, the Lakers play the Nuggets on opening night, so their travel distance is from their home stadium to the Nuggets’ stadium (1,337 km). In the analysis, the Lakers will stay at the Nuggets’ stadium until the next game, where they travel directly from the Nuggets’ stadium back home (1,337 km). The total distance travelled is 1,337 + 1,337 = 2,674 km and so on and so on until we get the above numbers.
I’ve also made an interactive dashboard in Tableau where you can dive deeper into the distance analysis at the link below. If you enjoy it and fancy helping me out, nominate it for “Viz of the Day” using the little ribbon button in the top right of the dashboard.
NBA Schedule 2023-24 Dashboard
TL;DR The Clippers are scheduled to travel the furthest total distance (80,882 km) this season with the Raptors scheduled to travel the least (52,411 km).
Raptors being the least is wild considering they’re the only team not based in the US
i mean geographically they’re actually pretty central but it’s still weird
I found that wild as well! Could be that the NBA plan the Raptors’ games more strictly to minimise the amount of country swapping they need to do?
Could be but also like the other guy said, Toronto is pretty central. Super close to Cleveland and Detroit and generally not that far from Milwaukee, NY, Philly, etc. For reference, Toronto is closer to Cleveland and Detroit than LA is to any other NBA City.
It’s probably a correlation between the two, the other teams near the raptors are also low on travel distance, and it is known that players and teams find it a hassle to go through border security. The raptors happen to be pretty central to other east teams, combined with the NBA attempting to limit the border crossing that players from raptors and other teams go through. Which also means that Raptors will have long periods of he games, followed by long periods of road trips if im correct