NBA Champions by Playoff Seed

This is the summary of NBA Champions grouped by the Playoff seed they had that year. How many times teams with each seed won and lost the NBA Finals and the detail of champions one by one sorted by seed.

In 52 of the 78 NBA Finals played, the Champion has been one of the two number 1 seeds that year. That is 66.7% of the Finals. And if you take into account the seeds 1, 2 and 3, they total the 97.4% of the Champions. Only 2 titles were won by a team with a 4 seed or higher.

Summary of Champions and Finals by Seed

Notes: the NBA Playoffs have had the 7th and 8th seeds only since 1984, 6th since 1977, 5th since 1975, and in multiple years between 1954 and 1972 there have only been seeds 1, 2 and 3. Also, seeds are Conference seeds since 1973 and Division seeds previous to that.

Champions by Playoff Seed - One by one

1st Seed / 2nd Seed / 3rd Seed / 4th Seed / 5th Seed / 6th Seed / 7th Seed / 8th Seed