The Tank Watch has expired. Time to cheer to win again!

[Higga]

We're playing in Miami on Saturday, that's a guaranteed L right there since the Heat still have a shot at the #1 seed in the East. So we'll clinch the 2nd worst record then. I'd like to win out though and hope the Hornets win one more, so I can say I nailed my 20 win prediction.

[Jay81]

Miami with a big win tonite over chicago. They will be plenty motivated to beat us Saturday as they are only 1.5 games out of top seed

[hands11]

Miami with a big win tonite over chicago. They will be plenty motivated to beat us Saturday as they are only 1.5 games out of top seed

And that is why taking them out is going to be so sweet. We will eat their tears.

You realize we very likely just took MIK out of the playoffs ? They can still make it in but it is going to be tight. 3 down with 4 to go and a head to head against Philly on Wed, Apr 25.

Keveen and Nene are going to beast on Bosh on offense. On defense, Bosh will be left shooting Js, which he can do. I give him that.

James Singleton, Ves and Chris will run the platoon at LaBron. Chris has a decent game last game. Lets hope his confidence is up.

Wall locks down on Mario Chalmers. Wall the last two games has been coming into the game defense first. I want to see more of that.

Wade will get his though I hope we can keep him out of the lane doing it. Maybe even a hard foul by Cook if he goes in there.

Mo and Almond Butter will come in to nail some 3s and stretch the floor.

Randy will have them up for the challenge.

The thing I liked about last game was we finally had a team that was deep enough to keep rolling out line ups. We are going to bring it and make them a jump shooting team. I think this is actually going to be a good game. As long as we get Nene again and Crawfords ankle is ok, I like our chances.

[dobrojim]

I talked to Chris Singleton at 6 Flags. Told him I had a small favor,
that they beat MIA last game of the season. I think the Zards
will be up for this game. And it's very possible that MIA will
need both Ws to take home best record. I'm conceding Sat
night in MIA to them right now. The refs won't let them lose
that game.

[The Consiglieri]

New Orleans wins yet again. The magic number is now 1 (either another New Orleans win or Washington loss) and the Wizards have the second most number of balls.

Wow.

OT against ATL.

http://scores.espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=320419003

Now that was a gift to the Wizards. No doubt the basketball God will shine on them for a win like this. Who are we kidding, we know they are getting the #1 The team was just sold. Wonder if that was part of the package.

But this helps us to secure a top 5. Problem is, we really need a top 4. I'm still not comfortable. I don't want to tie them and I see the Wizard able to win at least 2 more. Question is, while they monster and go into Miami and take them down. I sure want to see that. As long as NO keeps winning, it doesn't really matter. They are on a nice run but the last 3 games are on the road.

Go New Orleans. One more win. You can do it.

If we finish slot 2, pre lottery, i have a hard time seeing us fall a full 3 slots. 2? Yes, I can see that, but I can't see us falling 3 slots. Last year the draft went that direction, with none of the bottom 3, holding a top 3 pick, via the lottery. I can't see that happening again. I imagine we're gonna get 1, 3 or 4.

[gesa2]

We should run a poll on how many times the gambler's fallacy will be invoked between now and the draft. If we finish below New Orleans, we have a 12.3% chance of getting the 5th pick this year, the same chance that the team with the second worst record has every year.

[dobrojim]

it's already been invoked a lot....

if I get heads 10x in a row on a coin toss, what are the odds on the next toss people?

uh, try 50-50

which is a completely different question from asking what are the odds of getting
10 heads in a row before the first toss.

[The Consiglieri]

yep, i should say i expect, 1, 2, 3 or 4. I would be shocked if the draft had entirely new top 3 for a second year in a row. Wonder what the odds are, in general, of all bottom 3 teams failing to grab a top 3 pick. Is it like 12% or something?

[gesa2]

yep, i should say i expect, 1, 2, 3 or 4. I would be shocked if the draft had entirely new top 3 for a second year in a row. Wonder what the odds are, in general, of all bottom 3 teams failing to grab a top 3 pick. Is it like 12% or something?

According to the chart on Wikipedia's NBA draft lottery page, the chance that the team with the third worst record ends up drafting 6th is 4%.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBA_Draft_Lottery

[The Consiglieri]

sweet. Thanks

[hands11]

it's already been invoked a lot....

if I get heads 10x in a row on a coin toss, what are the odds on the next toss people?

uh, try 50-50

which is a completely different question from asking what are the odds of getting
10 heads in a row before the first toss.

I remember this from statistics but can remember the big picture logic to it.

I know a coin with two side is always 50 50 on any toss.

The odds of getting 10 heads in a row not knowing anything before the started is lower odd. But still, on any given flip it is 50 50

Hard to see how that same evaluation doesn't apply if you already got 9 heads. Each flip is still always 50 50 but the chance of getting 10 in a row is still lower.

What say you CCJ.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

it's already been invoked a lot....

if I get heads 10x in a row on a coin toss, what are the odds on the next toss people?

uh, try 50-50

which is a completely different question from asking what are the odds of getting
10 heads in a row before the first toss.

I remember this from statistics but can remember the big picture logic to it.

I know a coin with two side is always 50 50 on any toss.

The odds of getting 10 heads in a row not knowing anything before the started is lower odd. But still, on any given flip it is 50 50

Hard to see how that same evaluation doesn't apply if you already got 9 heads. Each flip is still always 50 50 but the chance of getting 10 in a row is still lower.

What say you CCJ.

The odds are (½)¹⁰ or 1⁄1024 or 0.0009765625

An easier way to compute the odds would be to use a tabular approach. For three coin tosses there are the following possibilities.

H T H

H T T

H H T

H H H

T T H

T T T

T H T

T H H

Out of those 8 combinations, only 1 is H H H and only one is T T T. Therefore, the odds of getting the same side with only 2 possibilities and three tries is (½)³ or 1/8 or 0.125.

I really sucked at probability but I do know that much. The possibility of 10 straight heads (or tails) is 1 in 1024. Odds are 50 50 that you could pull that off once in 1024 tries.

My "bad math" got jim going when I said I like the odds of winning from the lottery for the third or fourth place finisher based on the pattern of lottery winners over the years. No matter what, the Bobcats have the best chance and the Wizards have the second best, given the odds (ping pong balls out of 1000 to be selected). I compounded my bad math assumptions by saying I don't like the Wizards chances to win again because of Kwame and the John Wall. Seems like we shouldn't win three times. Regardless of my bad math, the odds remain the same of the odds for the 2nd worst team.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

jim Is correct in saying this: "If you toss a coin 9 times, and each time you've gotten heads, the odds are 50-50 you will get heads again".

The 9 straight heads at a 1/512 probability is the part that is not likely to happen.

[hands11]

Miami with a big win tonite over chicago. They will be plenty motivated to beat us Saturday as they are only 1.5 games out of top seed

And that is why taking them out is going to be so sweet. We will eat their tears.

You realize we very likely just took MIK out of the playoffs ? They can still make it in but it is going to be tight. 3 down with 4 to go and a head to head against Philly on Wed, Apr 25.

Keveen and Nene are going to beast on Bosh on offense. On defense, Bosh will be left shooting Js, which he can do. I give him that.

James Singleton, Ves and Chris will run the platoon at LaBron. Chris has a decent game last game. Lets hope his confidence is up.

Wall locks down on Mario Chalmers. Wall the last two games has been coming into the game defense first. I want to see more of that.

Wade will get his though I hope we can keep him out of the lane doing it. Maybe even a hard foul by Cook if he goes in there.

Mo and Almond Butter will come in to nail some 3s and stretch the floor.

Randy will have them up for the challenge.

The thing I liked about last game was we finally had a team that was deep enough to keep rolling out line ups. We are going to bring it and make them a jump shooting team. I think this is actually going to be a good game. As long as we get Nene again and Crawfords ankle is ok, I like our chances.

Not exactly the game I was looking forward to but the W against them is still sweet.

And NO took out Houston the other day putting their playoff hopes at risk like we did MIL.

I guess they keep going for the Ws until they need one more game in the L column.

As for the math equation you did CCJ, where is the Stern factor in there ? Solve for S.

[dobrojim]

they don't let you pass Genetics or graduate with a science degree without
taking probability and stats. I still have a few functioning synapses left
but I'm doing my best to take care of those after this win (vs MIA)

[hands11]

jim Is correct in saying this: "If you toss a coin 9 times, and each time you've gotten heads, the odds are 50-50 you will get heads again".

The 9 straight heads at a 1/512 probability is the part that is not likely to happen.

I away found this one to the be tricky because it is all in how you word things.

The chance of getting 9 straight head is 1/512. That is the point.

Any given flip is 50/50

So if you have 8 heads already, you still have 50/50 on any given flip. But the odd of it happening 9 straight times is still 1/512

[dobrojim]

BTW - the magic number is still one but now it's one for 2 different teams.

Both Sac and NOH have 20 wins. We need to either lose one more game
or have EACH of them win one game to avoid a tie for 2nd worst.
I almost hope CHA beats us Monday. That would clinch it. Then we
could root root root for the home team THU vs MIA. Safest thing would
be to lose one more game.

[long suffrin' boulez fan]

Could we really be stupid enough to play ourselves out of the top five?

Of course, I think we all know the answer to that semi rhetorical question.

They are the Boulez....

And I'm the long suffrin' Boulez fan

[7-Day Dray]

Good thing SAC plays CHA tomorrow, and NO still has GS on their schedule. Those are guaranteed wins (well if those teams don't pull off last-minute tanking moves of course).

[jangles86]

The tank is still in doubt!