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With the playoffs about to begin, I decided to check out average competition. I used SRS (strength of schedule and margin of victory) as an all in one number. Obviously this doesn't take into account injuries and other factor that must be measured when looking at strength of schedule. I used 1990 as the starting point because that was the first year the NBA had 27 teams and it gives us 25 years of data.

Prominent Teams Conference Opponents rated by SRS


Kobe's lakers dominante when you take into account this is seven years of data in comparison to only two for the rockets. Even more impressive is that they were high seeds for all of these runs. Lebron's teams rank at the bottom of the list.

EC Seeds Avg. SRS since 1990



WC Seeds Avg. SRS since 1990

Seed 1 7.09
Seed 2 5.33
Seed 3 5.49
Seed 4 4.79
Seed 5 3.74
Seed 6 2.27
Seed 7 1.91
Seed 8 1.19

WC has had better teams by a clear margin. This is almost entirely due to the last 25 years.



Feel free to check this data out to make sure I am correct. There was a lot of copy and pasting so the potential for human error is high.

I'm also going to try to parsh the data to figure out who was the luckiest and who had the most snake-bitten road to the finals.

The 02 Lakers played similar competition to the 95 Rockets despite the fact the Lakers won 58 games while the Rockets only won 47 games.

BTW, if the Clippers make the finals after landing GSW/LAC/SAS they would easily clinch the toughest road to the finals and the least lucky team by this metric.

Interesting stuff. One other angle you might want to take is to look to compare the conference playoff opponent SRS of the two finalists for each year. It should be more difficult to get to the finals more recently (conference disparity excluded) because there are more teams in the league fighting for the same number of playoff spots since about 1983 or so.

For example, opponent SRS for the Sixers in the conference finals and semis was 5.86 in '82, while for the Lakers it was 2.42. I excluded Philly's first round matchup to keep things similar between them and the Lakers. This was one of the last years of the first round bye and LA got a bye that year.

Chicago76 wrote:Interesting stuff. One other angle you might want to take is to look to compare the conference playoff opponent SRS of the two finalists for each year. It should be more difficult to get to the finals more recently (conference disparity excluded) because there are more teams in the league fighting for the same number of playoff spots since about 1983 or so.

I actually calculated that since 1990. As said before, I did in this good faith but there is the potential for human error so feel free to check if you think a number looks wacky.

Here are the numbers as I found them:





Raptors/Grizzlies enter NBA



Bobcats enter NBA



By conference



Raptors/Grizzlies enter NBA



Bobcats enter NBA

I've never heard about how "easy" Jordan's path was in 1991. That's interesting.

I don't think Howard will get any credit for that 2009 run. It's not like he was playing with Wade or O'Neal or something.

How often was the series with the highest average SRS outside of the finals (like in the conference finals)?

acrossthecourt wrote:I've never heard about how "easy" Jordan's path was in 1991. That's interesting.

I don't think Howard will get any credit for that 2009 run. It's not like he was playing with Wade or O'Neal or something.

How often was the series with the highest average SRS outside of the finals (like in the conference finals)?

Since 1986:

86 BOS-MIL (EFC)
88 BOS-DET (EFC)
89 LAL-PHO (WFC)
90 POR-PHO (WFC)
93 PHO-SEA (WCF)
95 ORL-CHI (ECSF)
98 CHI-IND (EFC)
99 SAS-POR (WCF)
00 LAL-POR (WCF)
01 SAS-DAL (WCSF)
02 LAL-SAC (WCF)
03 DAL-SAC (WCSF)
04 LAL-SAS (WCSF)
05 SAS-PHO (WCF)
06 DAL-SAS (WCSF)
07 SAS-PHO (WCSF)
09 ORL-CLE (ECF)
10 ORL-ATL (ECSF)
11 MIA-CHI (ECF)
12 OKC-SAS (WCF)

So 20/28.

Thanks for the work


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sp6r=underrated wrote:

Code: Select all

         1990   1991   1992   1993   1994   1995   Average
Winner   1.11   0.75   1.69   3.83   4.11   5.83   2.89
Loser    3.58   4.49   3.48   2.56   2.75   1.91   3.13

How did you calculate that?

lorak wrote:

sp6r=underrated wrote:

Code: Select all

         1990   1991   1992   1993   1994   1995   Average
Winner   1.11   0.75   1.69   3.83   4.11   5.83   2.89
Loser    3.58   4.49   3.48   2.56   2.75   1.91   3.13

How did you calculate that?

(Round 1 SRS OPP + Round 2 SRS OPP + Round 3 SRS OPP)/3

I decided against weighting it by games played because it would penalize teams for eliminating the opposition quickly. You can make a credible argument that I should have gone the other way. This is also slightly an issue for pre-2003 1st round series that were best of 5 instead of best of 7.

As I've said a few times in this thread if a number looks wacky check it out. There was a lot of cutting and pasting so the potential for human error is high.

sp6r=underrated wrote:

lorak wrote:

sp6r=underrated wrote:

Code: Select all

         1990   1991   1992   1993   1994   1995   Average
Winner   1.11   0.75   1.69   3.83   4.11   5.83   2.89
Loser    3.58   4.49   3.48   2.56   2.75   1.91   3.13

How did you calculate that?

(Round 1 SRS OPP + Round 2 SRS OPP + Round 3 SRS OPP)/3

I decided against weighting it by games played because it would penalize teams for eliminating the opposition quickly.

I think it wouldn't penalize them, but the more important thing is that if your goal was to "check out average competition", then you should weight it by games. I did something similar several months ago.

Here are champions since 1976 sorted by opponents SRS:

lorak wrote:
I think it wouldn't penalize them, but the more important thing is that if your goal was to "check out average competition", then you should weight it by games.

The number of games* in a series shouldn't be included in trying to determine averaged competition. Each team plays 3 teams to get to the finals in this sample size. A series only goes farther than 4 games if the victorious team fails to sweep the opposition. Take the following teams:



By Average SRS: 4.67 for both Team A and B
By average SRS with GP: Team A: 4.67, Team B 4.86

Team A and Team B faced the same level of competition by metric. Team A was able to sweep the competition each round. Team B wasn't and took 6 games to eliminate the opposition.

When you factor in games played you are punishing Team A for being able to beat a similar opponent in 4 games rather than 6. That isn't something you should do if you are attempting to calculate average competition.

* for best of 5 first round you probably should weigh number of potential games. That should have been factored in.

sp6r=underrated wrote:

lorak wrote:
I think it wouldn't penalize them, but the more important thing is that if your goal was to "check out average competition", then you should weight it by games.

The number of games* in a series shouldn't be included in trying to determine averaged competition. Each team plays 3 teams to get to the finals in this sample size. A series only goes farther than 4 games if the victorious team fails to sweep the opposition. Take the following teams:

Code: Select all

          Team A            Team B
        GP       Opp SRS         GP     OPP SRS
1st R:   4          4            4           4
2nd R:   4          4            4           4
3rd R:   4          6            6           6

By Average SRS: 4.67 for both Team A and B
By average SRS with GP: Team A: 4.67, Team B 4.86

Team A and Team B faced the same level of competition by metric. Team A was able to sweep the competition each round. Team B wasn't and took 6 games to eliminate the opposition.

When you factor in games played you are punishing Team A for being able to beat a similar opponent in 4 games rather than 6.

No team is punished if we include games played. Look, the point of looking at average opponent SRS here is to see which team had tougher road to the finals or championship. So we HAVE TO include games played! Like in your example - team B played more games so team's B road to the finals was more difficult (because team B played MORE games vs 6SRS team) and SRS per games played shows it, while SRS per rounds played doesn't.

lorak wrote:

sp6r=underrated wrote:

lorak wrote:
I think it wouldn't penalize them, but the more important thing is that if your goal was to "check out average competition", then you should weight it by games.

The number of games* in a series shouldn't be included in trying to determine averaged competition. Each team plays 3 teams to get to the finals in this sample size. A series only goes farther than 4 games if the victorious team fails to sweep the opposition. Take the following teams:

Code: Select all

          Team A            Team B
        GP       Opp SRS         GP     OPP SRS
1st R:   4          4            4           4
2nd R:   4          4            4           4
3rd R:   4          6            6           6

By Average SRS: 4.67 for both Team A and B
By average SRS with GP: Team A: 4.67, Team B 4.86

Team A and Team B faced the same level of competition by metric. Team A was able to sweep the competition each round. Team B wasn't and took 6 games to eliminate the opposition.

When you factor in games played you are punishing Team A for being able to beat a similar opponent in 4 games rather than 6.

No team is punished if we include games played. Look, the point of looking at average opponent SRS here is to see which team had tougher road to the finals or championship. So we HAVE TO include games played! Like in your example - team B played more games so team's B road to the finals was more difficult (because team B played MORE games vs 6SRS team) and SRS per games played shows it, while SRS per rounds played doesn't.

You're wrong. Your simply punishing a team for winning in 4 games rather than 7. If you're trying to calculate point differential or SRS. you should obviously factor in games played but that is different than topic at hand.

In this hypothetical team A and team B had the same road to the finals. To say they didn't is inaccurate


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sp6r=underrated wrote:In this hypothetical team A and team B had the same road to the finals. To say they didn't is inaccurate

No. They didn't (12 games aren't equal to 14 games!) and I'm shocked someone wouldn't understand that.

SP6R is right.

Number of games played in a series is irrelevant to his question. The number of games in a series (1 or 100,000) doesn't change the SINGLE opponent a team played against. The rules state that you have to beat 4 teams in the given format to win a title. The question is, what was the quality of those teams?

It's analogous to you wanting to factor in overtime to determine opponent strength in a game. It doesn't matter if the game is 48 minutes or 96 minutes...the single opponent you played is of a certain quality just the same.

ElGee wrote:SP6R is right.

Number of games played in a series is irrelevant to his question.

Playing more overall games, more vs better team and more days is "the same road to the finals"...?

The number of games in a series (1 or 100,000) doesn't change the SINGLE opponent a team played against.

But it changes "the road"!

EDIT
To clarify: seems we are talking about two different things. True, to compare average opponents quality we don't need number of games. But I was referring to something different (and sp6r=underrated also mentioned it in his last post!) - which team has more difficult road to the finals or championship. And that strand appeared after accrossthecourt's point about 1991 Bulls, that's why my first post here quoted table with that data. And to calculate "difficulty of the road" we need number of games.

ElGee wrote:SP6R is right.

Number of games played in a series is irrelevant to his question. The number of games in a series (1 or 100,000) doesn't change the SINGLE opponent a team played against. The rules state that you have to beat 4 teams in the given format to win a title. The question is, what was the quality of those teams?

It's analogous to you wanting to factor in overtime to determine opponent strength in a game. It doesn't matter if the game is 48 minutes or 96 minutes...the single opponent you played is of a certain quality just the same.

Thank you

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lorak wrote:

ElGee wrote:SP6R is right.

Number of games played in a series is irrelevant to his question.

Playing more overall games, more vs better team and more days is "the same road to the finals"...?.

ElGee nailed it with the overtime analogy. Taking your argument to its logical conclusion you should also weigh overtime, which is nuts


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sp6r=underrated wrote:

lorak wrote:

ElGee wrote:SP6R is right.

Number of games played in a series is irrelevant to his question.

Playing more overall games, more vs better team and more days is "the same road to the finals"...?.

ElGee nailed it with the overtime analogy. Taking your argument to its logical conclusion you should also weigh overtime, which is nuts

It depends on the question!

If the question is "what was average opponent in each series during playoff run", then there's no need to weight OTs or games.
But if the question is the one I'm asking (and you also asked that question, but you've chose wrong method to answer it), so "which team had more difficult road to the finals/championship", then we have to include games and including OTs would give even more accurate result (but not by much, because overtimes aren't big factor anyway during playoff runs, unless we deal with extreme examples like BOS-CHI series several years ago).

lorak wrote:It depends on the question!

If the question is "what was average opponent in each series during playoff run", then there's no need to weight OTs or games.
But if the question is the one I'm asking (and you also asked that question, but you've chose wrong method to answer it), so "which team had more difficult road to the finals/championship", then we have to include games and including OTs would give even more accurate result (but not by much, because overtimes aren't big factor anyway during playoff runs, unless we deal with extreme examples like BOS-CHI series several years ago).

You're badly confused. This is beating a dead horse but I'll try one last attempt to explain it to you with a final analogy.

The only way to a destination is down Elm Street. Both Car A and Car B go down the road in the exact same environmental conditions. Car A goes 70 mph. Car B goes 40 mph. That Car A gets there faster is irrelevant to who had a more difficult road. They were going down the exact same road in the same environmental conditions. They had to go down the exact same road. That Car B took longer is evidence car B is inferior not that it was driving down a harder road.

It is the exact same thing with the NBA playoffs. Each team has to play 4 rounds of basketball in the sample size. There is a minimum of 4 games per round since 2003*. The NBA doesn't force a team to play game 5 if they won games 1-4. Accordingly weighing game is irrelevant for who had a more difficult road.

* Whether I should have weighed the 1st round pre-2003 is debatable.