RealGM

wafer88 wrote:damn our efficiency ratings are so good for a .500 team. Not sure how those numbers work, but are to's and ft percentage factored in offensive efficiency? Really didn't think our defense was doing this well..

wafer88 wrote:damn our efficiency ratings are so good for a .500 team. Not sure how those numbers work, but are to's and ft percentage factored in offensive efficiency? Really didn't think our defense was doing this well..

semi-sentient wrote:I wouldn't put too much stock into our offensive/defensive ratings this early in the seasons. There are a couple of factors that slant those ratings in our favor:

1) Simply put, we've had a very easy schedule with 11 home games and 5 road games. That helps our ratings both ways since teams tend to play much better at home than on the road.

2) The average offensive ranking of the teams we've played is 14th out of 30, so mostly average offensive teams. We've played 5 teams that have had a top 10 ranked offense, and against 3 of those teams our defense was pretty good (Clippers - 7th, Spurs - 5th, Nets - 6th). Against the other two teams (Grizzles - 4th, Nuggets - 9th) our defense looked pretty awful. So while we're ranked 7th currently I think we've played slightly above average defense overall given the competition.

3) The average defensive rating of the teams we've played is 17th out of 30, so mostly below average defensive teams. Again, we've played 5 teams that had a top 10 ranked defense. Against two of those teams our offense looked good (Clippers - 10th, Nets - 8th). Against the other 3 teams we struggled (Spurs - 5th, Grizz - 2nd, Pacers - 1st). Given that we're ranked 8th that's not too impressive, especially since 4 out of those 5 games were at Staples (and in general we've had a really home heavy schedule).


Like I said earlier, the potential is there to be great on both ends. Having Howard alone gives us the potential to be a top 3 defensive team in the league if our guards start playing smarter and with more enthusiasm. Give Hill and Ebanks more burn off the bench and it'll only help.

Offense requires a bit more time to develop chemistry so I'm more forgiving there. When it's all said and done I think we'll be pretty nasty. It's hard for me to imagine us not having a top 5 ranked offense by seasons end given that we stay relatively healthy, and to be quite honest we should have the #1 offense if Nash plays the rest of the way.

Michael Lucky wrote:It has more to do with the fact that when we win games we tend to blow out teams. Look at our +/- margin.

robert93436 wrote:do you guys think some one on the magic is gona take a cheap shot at d-12 tonight