Tank Standings Thread

[p00ka]

Sacramento, Utah, Chicago, NY, Cleveland and Washington all won last night.

There are now 13 teams that have between 12-15 wins on the season (only 3 teams have less than 12 wins - 11, 10 and 7 wins).

The 8 teams that are clearly the class of the NBA have 22 or more wins.

That leaves 6 teams in the middle, with 16-20 wins, including Toronto. Atlanta is the only other EC team in that group but, with the injury to Horford, they're likely to drop into that bottom pack pretty quickly.

Toronto's only saving grace is playing in the EC, since their record leaves them in the 3rd/4th place in the EC standings, currently positioning them for home-court in the 1st round of the playoffs.

On one hand, they're a top-tier EC playoff team. On the other hand, they're the epitome of "in no man's land" in the NBA (based on current win totals). I'm very curious how MU views this team and how much weight he puts on the competitive balance of the EC this season, when evaluating his team.

Hasn't MU said that for him, it isn't about wins/losses, but what he sees in the development of these guys? He's gotta be pretty damn impressed with what he's seeing, regardless of what the rest of the conference is doing.

[S.R.]

Sacramento, Utah, Chicago, NY, Cleveland and Washington all won last night.

There are now 13 teams that have between 12-15 wins on the season (only 3 teams have less than 12 wins - 11, 10 and 7 wins).

The 8 teams that are clearly the class of the NBA have 22 or more wins.

That leaves 6 teams in the middle, with 16-20 wins, including Toronto. Atlanta is the only other EC team in that group but, with the injury to Horford, they're likely to drop into that bottom pack pretty quickly.

Toronto's only saving grace is playing in the EC, since their record leaves them in the 3rd/4th place in the EC standings, currently positioning them for home-court in the 1st round of the playoffs.

On one hand, they're a top-tier EC playoff team. On the other hand, they're the epitome of "in no man's land" in the NBA (based on current win totals). I'm very curious how MU views this team and how much weight he puts on the competitive balance of the EC this season, when evaluating his team.

Meh. Not looking to flog the horse or whatever, but I don't like how W/L keeps coming up in this thread.

#1 - The 6-12 (6-13?) start with Rudy Gay is pretty much a write-off. This team has changed so much, but all "W/L totals" analysis includes that record and roster.

#2 - W/L ignores SOS and point diff. Yes, the Raps are hovering at .500 and in "no man's land" in terms of W/L. But, they've had the 3rd most difficult schedule in the league yet have a positive point diff on the season (+1.3 - including the Rudy Gay team) and a top 10 point diff over the last 10 games (+4.1). They're 7-3 in the last 10, which puts them in the company of the Pacers, Heat, Spurs, and Warriors over that stretch. The Raps are +.500 on the road, along with ONLY the top 4 WC teams and the top 2 EC teams. Nobody else has a winning road record. The Raps struggled at home to start the year, but are starting to win there, too. The most likely outcome is obviously for them to be +.500 at home as well, which is going to ^^ their wins. The most likely outcome for the next few weeks of games, with a markedly easier schedule, is that the Raps are going to win at a higher rate than the teams below/around them.

CalgaryRapsFan - I know you'll say "I know all that" but I don't get why you keep ignoring it and only bringing up the season totals for W/L. The Rudy Gay trade was far to big of an event, and having the 3rd toughest schedule is far too significant to leave out of a conversation that draws conclusions about where the Raps currently rank in the league.

Sure, anything could happen, a trade (or trades), or a key injury (Lowry) would change everything. But right now the most likely outcome over the coming weeks is that the Raps are going to continue to separate themselves from the middle of the pack teams. They've been on a hot streak and will likely cool off a bit and lose some winnable games, but they're 10-5 post Rudy after being 6-12 with Rudy - that alone makes drawing conclusions from W/L season totals kind of pointless, imho.

Just my two cents .

[CalgaryRapsFan]

CalgaryRapsFan - I know you'll say "I know all that" but I don't get why you keep ignoring it and only bringing up the season totals for W/L. The Rudy Gay trade was far to big of an event, and having the 3rd toughest schedule is far too significant to leave out of a conversation that draws conclusions about where the Raps currently rank in the league.

The reason I prefer to look at win totals, is two-fold. First, the lottery standings are based on W/L standings for all non-playoff teams (obviously). Second, it's the only objective measure we have to rank the teams at any given moment.

I totally get what you're saying and you can look at various power rankings, strength of schedules past and future, projected wins totals, playoff predictors, estimate based on trades/injuries, etc... but it's all subjective.

If every poster on here were to look at the standings, we'd probably all find a way to justify our own personal predictions for which teams will be in the lottery and where they'll rank going into the lottery.

So, I figure it's easiest to look at the one thing we can't argue about, which is wins already accumulated. There are so many variables and unknowns (controllable, semi-controllable and completely uncontrollable) looking forward, but this is an accurate up-to-date snapshot of the standings. It's not trying to be a predictor of the future.