jinxed wrote:We are now about 10% done with the season and the NBA standings are looking much different than what any of us expected preseason. Lakers in the playoffs? Clips and Hornets in first place? Celtics out of the playoff race?
Is this a case of small sample size theater, or is 10% of the season a large enough sample to get a decent prediction? To test this out I looked at the standings on this date last year.
The first number before the team name is their standing on Nov 11, 2015. The second number after their team name is where they finished to end the RS.
East
1. Cavs (1)
2. Raps (2)
3. Hawks (4)
4. Heat (3)
5. Hornets (6)
6. Celtics (5)
7. Pacers (7)
8. Detroit (8)
West
1. GSW (1)
2. Spurs (2)
3. OKC (3)
4. Clips (4)
5. Blazers (5)
6. Mavs (6)
7. Grizzlies (7)
8. Rockets (8)
As you can see, by Nov 11th of last year, the standings were already almost a flawless match of where things would end up by the end of the season. The only deviation is that 4 way tie we had last year between the 3-6 seeds in the east. The WC played out perfectly.
It seems that 10% of the season is a large enough sample to get a good feel for how things will end up at the end of April. Given this, are you a believer that we we have today is going to be representative of what things will look like at the end of this year? If not, what changes do you see? Which team will fall out of the race? Which team will move up on the standings.
East
Raptors - 3rd.
Hawks - 4th.
Heat - lottery bound
Hornets - 5th.
Celtics - 2nd. When Horford returns, they'll take off.
Pacers - 6th
Pistons - 7th
Bulls - 8th
West
Spurs - 3rd
OKC - no playoffs
LAC - 2nd
POR - 5th
DAL - lottery bound
MEM - 7th
HOU - 6th
UTAH - 4th
DEN - 8th