Playoffs!?

[Ferry Avenue]

Or it's the continuity. The sample size of this group goes back to 2019 when they went to the bubble championship game. Had a trash playoffs the following year where the dogs stayed home. The next year made the ECF. This year in the Finals. To look at this team and say they're a normal 8 seed would be completely ignoring context and history. Just like the Patriots run, they largely had the same guys around for two decades (and, for the most part, stayed healthy). That's probably the secret ingredient.

The Patriots had loads of variation in personnel over those two decades. The constant was Belichick and Brady, who together created the culture and made it persist. New players were simply assimilated into it. Randy Moss for example, previously a malcontent, shaped up and flew right as part of the Patriots culture, and was a key ingredient in their nearly undefeated 2007 season.

If you want to argue that the Heat have a culture that persists despite variation in personnel, I'll agree with that all day. In that sense the key ingredients could very well be Spoelstra and Udonis Haslem, muck like Belichick and Brady. There is most certainly a reason they keep Haslem around when he almost never takes the court. His effect has to be almost entirely in the locker room and on the sideline.

But there isn't much variation in personnel, so I don't understand that point. The starters for the 2019 Lakers series were Jimmy Butler, Tyler Herro, Duncan Robinson, Jae Crowder, and Bam Adebayo. Only one of those guys is no longer on the Heat. Yes, I'm sure Pat Riley's prospect/free agent archetype is focused on hard workers and gym rats. That definitely contributes to success and the "Heat Culture" stuff. But understanding the playbook and having a level of comfort with your teammates after playing with them for years is probably more important.

There isn't grind your heart out "Nuggets Culture" always trending on basketball boards. But Jokic knows where everyone is on the court all the time and can toss passes on the money to where MPJ and Jamal Murray like it because he's been playing with them 4-6 years. Their offense is a well oiled machine; in part because of immense talent, but also because of, you guessed it, continuity.

How are the Heat beating teams with similar personnel continuity, to which they're expected to lose?

[Negrodamus]

The Patriots had loads of variation in personnel over those two decades. The constant was Belichick and Brady, who together created the culture and made it persist. New players were simply assimilated into it. Randy Moss for example, previously a malcontent, shaped up and flew right as part of the Patriots culture, and was a key ingredient in their nearly undefeated 2007 season.

If you want to argue that the Heat have a culture that persists despite variation in personnel, I'll agree with that all day. In that sense the key ingredients could very well be Spoelstra and Udonis Haslem, muck like Belichick and Brady. There is most certainly a reason they keep Haslem around when he almost never takes the court. His effect has to be almost entirely in the locker room and on the sideline.

But there isn't much variation in personnel, so I don't understand that point. The starters for the 2019 Lakers series were Jimmy Butler, Tyler Herro, Duncan Robinson, Jae Crowder, and Bam Adebayo. Only one of those guys is no longer on the Heat. Yes, I'm sure Pat Riley's prospect/free agent archetype is focused on hard workers and gym rats. That definitely contributes to success and the "Heat Culture" stuff. But understanding the playbook and having a level of comfort with your teammates after playing with them for years is probably more important.

There isn't grind your heart out "Nuggets Culture" always trending on basketball boards. But Jokic knows where everyone is on the court all the time and can toss passes on the money to where MPJ and Jamal Murray like it because he's been playing with them 4-6 years. Their offense is a well oiled machine; in part because of immense talent, but also because of, you guessed it, continuity.

How are the Heat beating teams with similar personnel continuity, to which they're expected to lose?

Read on Twitter

ICYMI

Also, I think the Heat will lose the series, but I was never under the impression it would be a sweep. The 8 seed Heat might have underperformed in the regular season, but they are and have been a top 4 team in the East. So the "expectation to lose", at least at this point, is purely media driven or casual fan driven.

[mjkvol]

The Patriots had loads of variation in personnel over those two decades. The constant was Belichick and Brady, who together created the culture and made it persist. New players were simply assimilated into it. Randy Moss for example, previously a malcontent, shaped up and flew right as part of the Patriots culture, and was a key ingredient in their nearly undefeated 2007 season.

If you want to argue that the Heat have a culture that persists despite variation in personnel, I'll agree with that all day. In that sense the key ingredients could very well be Spoelstra and Udonis Haslem, muck like Belichick and Brady. There is most certainly a reason they keep Haslem around when he almost never takes the court. His effect has to be almost entirely in the locker room and on the sideline.

But there isn't much variation in personnel, so I don't understand that point. The starters for the 2019 Lakers series were Jimmy Butler, Tyler Herro, Duncan Robinson, Jae Crowder, and Bam Adebayo. Only one of those guys is no longer on the Heat. Yes, I'm sure Pat Riley's prospect/free agent archetype is focused on hard workers and gym rats. That definitely contributes to success and the "Heat Culture" stuff. But understanding the playbook and having a level of comfort with your teammates after playing with them for years is probably more important.

There isn't grind your heart out "Nuggets Culture" always trending on basketball boards. But Jokic knows where everyone is on the court all the time and can toss passes on the money to where MPJ and Jamal Murray like it because he's been playing with them 4-6 years. Their offense is a well oiled machine; in part because of immense talent, but also because of, you guessed it, continuity.

How are the Heat beating teams with similar personnel continuity, to which they're expected to lose?

Negrodamus said it, but no one that really knows basketball looks at this Miami team as your standard fare '8 seed' - I guarantee the Bucks, Knicks, and Celtics sure as hell didn't see them that way. But it makes a wonderful narrative for the NBA to sell the series.

[Jailblazers7]

I still personally think Nuggets should win in 5 but we’ll see how it actually plays out. I think I underrated the coaching advantage because I think highly of Malone.

[Mik317]

Miami has a plan beyond just keep making trades until it works. They also didn't trade Bam at the first sign of conflict and also constantly added the right guys in any position. Spo being the coach there forever now means he has a set system that when you have good players plugged into it...**** works. We are on our third coach. The last two's system was throw the ball to Biid and hope he isn't sad today. While often not having the right spacing or movement around him and never having any depth so when Biid is on his period, the team taaaaaanks. Jimmy can go games without even looking at the rim but the way the system is set up, they have a second plan of action in those situations. But lets look at the other team in the finals.

Denver is made up of a MVP and a bunch of dudes. I don't even consider Mike Malone a great coach (vocal Denver fans seem to hate the guy lol...but thats every team I think) but you look at the last two seasons and see that when Jokic is missing Murray and/or MPJ....he can't solo teams. Denver schematically is perfectly built around Jokic's strengths and weaknesses IMO. The two man game he has with Murray is built off of years of playing together. They have the wing defender athletes to cover his defense but also guys who can cut off of his gravity for his passing..which alongside him being an absolute unit of a man...makes defending them a tougher task than our brand of throw the ball to Biid and hope he either grifts to the line or the tough fadeaways go in. Both teams are versatile in approach and thats due to flawless team building...small moves around the medium that we don't make (Brown and KCP for Denver; Caleb Martin for Miami)....development of young players...and foresight in general (trading Grant for Gordon for example).

This does not absolve the players and most importantly Biid from their part in it either by the way. I think Biid needs to adjust his game from having to be involved in every single offensive set. Feels like he got spoiled from the pre Harden times IMO. This is the first year that I felt like the team played better when he sat out games if only just from a flow stand point. However...we aren't trading him unless he asks so worrying about that is pointless. I think you can build a team around Biid that covers for the weaknesses that he has. You have to make it harder to double him; that includes some adjustments to his game too such as making quicker decisions and playing faster in general but it also means you can just go 5 out because the defense in the playoffs can scout where guys are going to be and how to recover. They knew PJ was going to be in the corner, Maxey on the wings, Harden at the top and Tobias probably out of position but not really a threat to always pull any way lol. So Harden's man and PJs man were always ready to dig in and when they went to double big...it also took away any driving lane with Rob at the rim playing off of PJ. So a better built and coached team would be able to adjust to that. Run some DHOs with Maxey. Have Tobias and Biid run some PNRs instead of Harden all the time...hell run some Harden/Tobias PNRs. That way the defense can't just sit on the same play all game.

I think these finals runs are bit flukey with some injury luck but my main takeaway is that you have to be able to play more than one way. NO ONE is that dominant enough to just bludgeon teams one way. Both of the remaining finals teams have multiple ways to kill you and each way has enough moving pieces that even if you figure it out you have to be near perfect to do so every time IMO. We thought our PNR system was unstoppable and it was...but it relied waaay too much on a tough contested look too often and for teams to actually fear Harden at the rim. Now its possible that the Celtics are simply just built to stop it and not many teams will have a Horford to torment Biid AND a rim protector to stifle drives but still.

Both of these teams have "technically" one all star and a bunch of guy specifically crafted to play their roles and make the stars life much easier....and thus much harder to guard. We have to find a system that does that for our star, flaws and all. Harden was a huge help no doubt but I think it was too 1 dimensional overall and it also seems to have come at the expense of everyone else too.

i hate this franchise but if I didn't , this offseason would be super interesting from aschematic standpoint.

[Ferry Avenue]

But there isn't much variation in personnel, so I don't understand that point. The starters for the 2019 Lakers series were Jimmy Butler, Tyler Herro, Duncan Robinson, Jae Crowder, and Bam Adebayo. Only one of those guys is no longer on the Heat. Yes, I'm sure Pat Riley's prospect/free agent archetype is focused on hard workers and gym rats. That definitely contributes to success and the "Heat Culture" stuff. But understanding the playbook and having a level of comfort with your teammates after playing with them for years is probably more important.

There isn't grind your heart out "Nuggets Culture" always trending on basketball boards. But Jokic knows where everyone is on the court all the time and can toss passes on the money to where MPJ and Jamal Murray like it because he's been playing with them 4-6 years. Their offense is a well oiled machine; in part because of immense talent, but also because of, you guessed it, continuity.

How are the Heat beating teams with similar personnel continuity, to which they're expected to lose?

Read on Twitter

ICYMI

Also, I think the Heat will lose the series, but I was never under the impression it would be a sweep. The 8 seed Heat might have underperformed in the regular season, but they are and have been a top 4 team in the East. So the "expectation to lose", at least at this point, is purely media driven or casual fan driven.

Right, but we're not talking about "at this point," where we have the benefit of hindsight. We're talking about the large sample of play consisting of the playoffs, before which their odds were a whopping +30000 to win the title.

What explains their performance over that large a sample of play, against teams to which they were expected to lose, and which have similar levels of player continuity? That's the question.

[Negrodamus]

How are the Heat beating teams with similar personnel continuity, to which they're expected to lose?

Read on Twitter

ICYMI

Also, I think the Heat will lose the series, but I was never under the impression it would be a sweep. The 8 seed Heat might have underperformed in the regular season, but they are and have been a top 4 team in the East. So the "expectation to lose", at least at this point, is purely media driven or casual fan driven.

Right, but we're not talking about "at this point," where we have the benefit of hindsight. We're talking about the large sample of play consisting of the playoffs, before which their odds were a whopping +30000 to win the title.

What explains their performance over that large a sample of play, against teams to which they were expected to lose, and which have similar levels of player continuity? That's the question.

I guess I'm failing to understand the point.

They were expected to lose because they had a bad regular season and had to play 2 play-in games. It's surprising they have played as well as they have, but it's not as surprising as it would be if the Hawks or Wizards or Bulls had done it. This iteration of the Heat have been here before, so for them to go on a run and win the East shouldn't seem implausible.

[GoSixersBro]

Cleveland was closer to a real 8 seed than Miami was. Same way the Lakers weren't really a 7, more like a 4-5.

[mjkvol]

I still personally think Nuggets should win in 5 but we’ll see how it actually plays out. I think I underrated the coaching advantage because I think highly of Malone.

Well, we're going to find out quickly how good a coach Malone is. If he can't find a way to make Jokic a distributor, Miami might steal the series.. It wouldn't be a bad move to do the same on the other end - make Butler beat you by guarding the 3 pt line. Should be interesting.

[Ferry Avenue]

Read on Twitter

ICYMI

Also, I think the Heat will lose the series, but I was never under the impression it would be a sweep. The 8 seed Heat might have underperformed in the regular season, but they are and have been a top 4 team in the East. So the "expectation to lose", at least at this point, is purely media driven or casual fan driven.

Right, but we're not talking about "at this point," where we have the benefit of hindsight. We're talking about the large sample of play consisting of the playoffs, before which their odds were a whopping +30000 to win the title.

What explains their performance over that large a sample of play, against teams to which they were expected to lose, and which have similar levels of player continuity? That's the question.

I guess I'm failing to understand the point.

They were expected to lose because they had a bad regular season and had to play 2 play-in games. It's surprising they have played as well as they have, but it's not as surprising as it would be if the Hawks or Wizards or Bulls had done it. This iteration of the Heat have been here before, so for them to go on a run and win the East shouldn't seem implausible.

The point is that they've beaten two teams that were widely considered far more talented and to which they were expected to lose convincingly, and they're holding their own so far with a third one. The odds of their winning the series against Milwaukee were +750. They were +4000 to win the series 4-1, which they did. They then had +400 odds to beat the Celtics. Prediction models gave them a very small chance of beating either team and reaching the finals. Player continuity can't explain it, because they've played teams with similar levels of continuity, and if player continuity were a variable with that degree of predictive power and the Heat had significantly more of it than the teams they've played, you can bet Vegas would've identified it and implemented it when generating the above odds.

Over that long a haul, and with that degree of improbability generated by physical factors, what we're left with in explaining what we've seen are non-physical factors.

[Negrodamus]

Player continuity can't explain it, because they've played teams with similar levels of continuity, and if player continuity were a variable with that degree of predictive power and the Heat had significantly more of it than the teams they've played, you can bet Vegas would've identified it and implemented it when generating the above odds.

Continuity is important in execution. The other teams didn't execute as well. The Celtics had a first year coach running the show. Giannis was missing for basically 3 games which I guarantee threw off execution. Knick don't have the same continuity and are really just a fraudulent playoff team.

Everyone on this board was hoping for the Knicks to pull it out against the Heat in the event we beat the Celtics. But why? The Knicks were a 5 seed! They obviously are the better team, right?

I removed the rest of your post regarding Vegas. Their formula likely doesn't extend past the current season.

[Ferry Avenue]

Player continuity can't explain it, because they've played teams with similar levels of continuity, and if player continuity were a variable with that degree of predictive power and the Heat had significantly more of it than the teams they've played, you can bet Vegas would've identified it and implemented it when generating the above odds.

Continuity is important in execution. The other teams didn't execute as well. The Celtics had a first year coach running the show. Giannis was missing for basically 3 games which I guarantee threw off execution. Knick don't have the same continuity and are really just a fraudulent playoff team.

Everyone on this board was hoping for the Knicks to pull it out against the Heat in the event we beat the Celtics. But why? The Knicks were a 5 seed! They obviously are the better team, right?

I removed the rest of your post regarding Vegas. Their formula likely doesn't extend past the current season.

Miami entered the playoffs with 150-1 odds, the longest odds for any team to reach the championship game for any NBA/NFL/NHL/MLB team in the past 30 seasons. The last time a team reached the NBA Finals with even 100-1 odds was the 1981 Houston Rockets. Only the Nets, Hawks and Timberwolves entered the 2023 postseason with longer title odds.

The Heat odds dipped to 250-1 after their play-in loss to the Atlanta Hawks. They already cashed 100-1 tickets to win the East at that point. But since they clinched the 8-seed, they became the first team since the 1999 New York Knicks to win three straight series upsets as an underdog en route to the NBA Finals. The last team to win all four playoff series as an underdog was the 1995 Houston Rockets.

Their +750 odds against the Bucks created the second-largest series upset in the past decade. Their +430 odds against the Celtics made the largest upset in the conference finals since 2009.

The Heat have also pulled off nine money-line upsets this postseason, tied for the most upsets by any team in a single postseason in over three decades. No team has won more games as an underdog entering the Finals in that span.

https://www.espn.com/chalk/story/_/id/37751207/2023-nba-finals-betting-trends-odds-ats-stats-heat-vs-nuggets-finals-championship

Nominating easily observable things to account for that degree of improbability just doesn't hold. Anything easily observable that had that degree of predictive power would've changed the probability significantly along the way.

[Negrodamus]

Alright, it was the nebulous dog factor that got this upstart Miami team to the Finals. Everything else they've done for the previous 3 years is superfluous. I know this because Vegas couldn't quantify it.

[Ferry Avenue]

And the Heat remain underdogs even at home tonight, with a mere 33% chance of winning:

https://www.espn.com/nba/game/_/gameId/401544848

Whatever has been easily observable and replicable over the long haul in explaining their extremely improbable playoff run doesn't even hold tonight, for example, as they remain underdogs to a team they beat on the road three days ago. Certainly if whatever was responsible for their playoff run was easily observable and replicable, they'd be favorites at home against a team they just beat on the road, with far better than a 33% chance of winning.

[ProcessDoctor]

This is pure basketball goodness. I don’t know what the ratings look like, but this is the kind of finals series I want to see. Two well-coached teams with a good amount unpredictability of each game.

[mjkvol]

Denver is finally guarding the 3-pt.line, and Miami looks lost. Make them work and beat you without the 3 and they are suddenly very mortal.

[Jay555]

Joker is a joke. Guy has not played one bad game yet this post season.

[brannigan73]

Miami is not going to beat Denver. And BTW until he plays well all the time when it matters its pretty clear to me that Jokic is the superior player toEmbiid. I honestly thought it was even or slight edge to Embiid before this season but its crystal clear to me now. Maybe it will light a fire under Embiid. The idea of Embiid having 10 triple doubles in a single playoffs based on his post season track record is unfathomable. I would go so far as to say that if Embiid played like Jokic has this post season we would be likely champions. If I was Nick Nurse my to do list for Embiid would be for him to come into the season in the type of shape Jokic is in and focus more on rebounding and making his teammates better then forcusing on scoring so much. We don't need him to score 32 points a game. Id rather see him average 26 and get 12-14rebs and 6-7 assists per game.

[Jay555]

Miami is not going to beat Denver. And BTW until he plays well all the time when it matters its pretty clear to me that Jokic is the superior player toEmbiid. I honestly thought it was even or slight edge to Embiid before this season but its crystal clear to me now. Maybe it will light a fire under Embiid. The idea of Embiid having 10 triple doubles in a single playoffs based on his post season track record is unfathomable. I would go so far as to say that if Embiid played like Jokic has this post season we would be likely champions. If I was Nick Nurse my to do list for Embiid would be for him to come into the season in the type of shape Jokic is in and focus more on rebounding and making his teammates better then forcusing on scoring so much. We don't need him to score 32 points a game. Id rather see him average 26 and get 12-14rebs and 6-7 assists per game.

26 pts and 12-14 rebs are pretty darn superior than the current version and would put this team over the hump easily. I would not go as far as 6-7 assists lol. Start with 3-4 assists. If he can do it consistently, then that’s already money. I tend to think that’s something you can not improve on significantly.

[Iverson Armband]

Jokic plays under control and within himself at all times, that is the main difference IMO.

Joel is an excellent talent. He said he got in to basketball watching Kobe Bryant play and it shows…not in a good way.

Joel is quickly becoming the Carmelo Anthony of centers if he doesn’t eliminate the nonsense. You don’t see Jokic dribbling around the 3 point line for 8 seconds trying to get to a 30 ft fadeaway. Everything he does is read and react, quick decisions. Not saying Embiid has to be Jokic, but he’s got to be more sharp and deliberate for us on the offensive end if we’re ever going to win big with him.