How good is the typical supporting cast of a Finals team?

[colts18]

...

Who do you have as the #1 player on the 99 Knicks?

[mysticbb]

...

Who do you have as the #1 player on the 99 Knicks?

The guy with the 2nd most minutes and the highest +/- numbers, Larry Johnson. For me he was the most important player to the team based on that. I used the same approach for the other teams to come up with the players. He was picked to play SF over Sprewell for that season. Ewing was less important, because his minutes could have been covered by Camby, Thomas and Dudley. So, yeah, we might disagree on that here, which changes the values somewhat. But I think the bigger concern is the differences in the other values, because your approach is not giving me the average team result.

[colts18]

The guy with the 2nd most minutes and the highest +/- numbers, Larry Johnson. For me he was the most important player to the team based on that. I used the same approach for the other teams to come up with the players. He was picked to play SF over Sprewell for that season.

By that logic, would you put Pau Gasol as the star of the 2010 Lakers?

[ElGee]

mysticbb made a post recently stating that the average supporting case of a champion is below average. I thought that was interesting so I went out investigating to find out. Turns out he was right. I went back and looked at plus/minus data of stars of finals winners and losers since 97 and the games missed record of finals winners/losers since 1986. Both of those data sets showed that the average supporting cast of a finals team is average to below average.

For the most part, figuring out the teams star player was easy. The only assumptions I made was Ben Wallace for the Pistons and Allan Houston for the Knicks

Here are the plus/minus of star players of championship teams from 97-12 (16 seasons):
on court: +11.0 per 100 possessions
off court: -1.1
Net: +12.2 per 100
They played 71.9% of their teams minutes (equivalent of 34.5 minutes per 48 minutes)

The average star title winner is picking up his team by over 12 points per 100 possessions. Also the average supporting cast of a title team is below average.

11 out of the 16 had negative off court values. The highest off court value was KG at +4.6, the lowest is Shaq 01 at -7.6. Only 6 of those guys had on court values of less than 10 (MJ, Shaq, Duncan, Wallace, Wade, Kobe).

Here is that same data for the championship losers from 97-12:
On court: +8.0 per 100 possessions
Off court: +0.2
Net: +7.8 per 100
They played 73.9% of their teams minutes (equivalent of 35.4 minutes per 48)

8 of them had positive off court values. Reggie Miller actually had a negative plus minus (-.9). Durant had the highest positive off court value at 5.6.

So based on that, the average finals teams supporting cast is average to slightly below average.

I looked at every finals winner and losers average supporting cast in the games that the teams star missed (86-12):
star player of Finals winner:
games missed: 58-61 record (.487, 40 wins per 82), -0.42 margin of victory
games played: .735 win% (60.3 win per 82)
Difference: .248 win%, 20.3 wins

When a star misses a game, his team plays below average, but when he plays, his team plays like a 60 win team. That is a 20 game lift by a star.

The best supporting cast was 08 KG since his team went 9-2 without him while the worst were 94 Hakeem (3-7), 11 Dirk (2-7), and 92+93 MJ (combined 1-5)

*note: the games played win% is weighted by the amount of games missed. That means 96 MJ's team record is not included since he didn't miss a game while dirk 2011 record is worth 9x more than Duncan 03 since his team played 9x more games without him.


Star player of Finals losers:
Games missed: 58-63 record (.479, 39.3 win per 82), +1.01 margin of victory
Games played: .708 (58.1 wins per 82),
difference: .229 win%, 18.8 wins

Same story here too. The star of the finals loser had his team struggle without him too. The worst record was 93 barkley when his team went 1-5 without him.


Overall the finals teams went 116-124 when their star player didn't play (240 game sample). That is big enough to conclude that these teams were average without their star, and finals worthy with him.

I'm not sure what your goal is here -- it seems like you don't like the previous conclusions on health and have some agenda to disprove by fishing for contradictory data. In your haste to do so, you've overlooked one of the biggest parts of this method...the average team's strength without "their star!" (NB: I've never said health is meaningless. I said it was overrated/misunderstood -- if you think cutting the odds of winning a title in half are meaningless, we'll have to disagree on the word meaningless.)

If you look at that, you'll notice that the teams you are looking at that make the Finals are a good 2 points better than league average. In other words, in a league of just "supporting casts," FInals teams are above average. These casts are not below average -- The picture you are trying to paint is not supported by your own evidence.

I understand that you were thinking "I'll look at the off values of teams without their best players and calculate playoff chances," only that's not a very accurate or stable method because off values are not entirely related to overall team performance (this is why I've said I no longer consider in/out or WOWY to just be a subset of on/off -- when we look at overall team performance in the NBA we see something different than what we see within a game...this should be obvious, as NBA teams don't move by 15 SRS points!) I'm not sure why you would think on/off is suddenly the most accurate determining of player and team quality, since we all know it's subject to opponent quality and a team's own substitution patterns. Based on your logic though, you must believe Kevin Garnett is the GOAT, right? And 2003 would be the peak season in NBA history, because you must conclude that KG took 7-win team to 57 wins!!!

My method involves 0 hypotheticals and one assumption -- which is continuity of contracts in one player in the league, basically. (eg If we added one player, can we just add him to any team with equal randomness or does salary cap weight it against the better teams?) It's also not designed to be a precise, perfect indicator but to paint a clear picture about player value, and I believe it does that very well. It does this by looking at real games and real results over large samples.

SRS is not subject to lineup variations across teams. We know 51% of teams since 1986 are above .500. We also know that Michael Jordan can literally "join" a 3 SRS team, in the same way others are just ADDED TO THE LEAGUE: Bill Russell (1957), Wilt Chamberlain (1970), Magic Johnson (1996), Tim Duncan (1998), Derrick Rose in 2013, etc. etc. etc. There is no "on/off" or lineup patterns or anything else to sort through, it is a simple question of "look at the league -- what are the odds a player's team will make the PS without him?"

Again, there is no substitution or replacement player in my method, just simply adding one person to the NBA, which is not something out of the ordinary. It's not really a hypothetical stretch and more importantly, there are no confounds to sort through. We can also look at injury data itself from stars and observe how teams played with/without the star and their final (PS) standing:

Stars missing 25 games or more
Year Player Games Out SRS
62 Lakers 32 Baylor -2.0
63 Lakers 26 West -2.1
66 Bullets 40 G. Johnson -0.1
68 Lakers 31 West -0.5
68 Warriors 31 Thurmond -6.3
70 Lakers 70 Wilt 1.5
70 Warriors 41 Thurmond -6.2
71 Lakers 25 West -1.9
74 Kings 47 Archibald -2.9
76 Blazers 31 Walton -3.8
80 Bulls 33 Gilmore -3.8
(81 Lakers 46 Magic 2.2)
83 Jazz 60 Dantley -3.8
85 Jazz 27 Dantley -2.5
91 Pistons 34 Thomas 2.0
91 Rockets 26 Olajuwon 2.3
92 Hawks 40 Wilkins -2.7
92 Lakers 28 Worthy 0.2
93 Blazers 26 Drexler 4.0
95 Bulls 65 Jordan 3.7
95 Cavs 34 Price 0.3
96 Lakers 50 Magic 2.8
98 Rockets 34 Olajuwon -1.1
04 76ers 34 Iverson -2.6
09 Celtics 25 Garnett 3.1
12 Bulls 25 Rose 4.7

That's 25 teams plus I threw in Magic Johnson in 1981 althoughI believe Kareem to be best there, but it's worth noting (especially since as a drafted player, Magic clearly *could* be better than Kareem without requiring anything hypothetical to make the point. Of the 25 teams above:

Average SRS = -0.7
10 of 25 (40%) of the teams were > 0
7 of 25 (28%) of the teams were > 2
2 of the 25 (8%) of the teams were < -4

Guess how often average teams make the playoffs...

[colts18]

Stars missing 25 games or more
Year Player Games Out SRS
62 Lakers 32 Baylor -2.0
63 Lakers 26 West -2.1
66 Bullets 40 G. Johnson -0.1
68 Lakers 31 West -0.5
68 Warriors 31 Thurmond -6.3
70 Lakers 70 Wilt 1.5
70 Warriors 41 Thurmond -6.2
71 Lakers 25 West -1.9
74 Kings 47 Archibald -2.9
76 Blazers 31 Walton -3.8
80 Bulls 33 Gilmore -3.8
(81 Lakers 46 Magic 2.2)
83 Jazz 60 Dantley -3.8
85 Jazz 27 Dantley -2.5
91 Pistons 34 Thomas 2.0
91 Rockets 26 Olajuwon 2.3
92 Hawks 40 Wilkins -2.7
92 Lakers 28 Worthy 0.2
93 Blazers 26 Drexler 4.0
95 Bulls 65 Jordan 3.7
95 Cavs 34 Price 0.3
96 Lakers 50 Magic 2.8
98 Rockets 34 Olajuwon -1.1
04 76ers 34 Iverson -2.6
09 Celtics 25 Garnett 3.1
12 Bulls 25 Rose 4.7

That's 25 teams plus I threw in Magic Johnson in 1981 althoughI believe Kareem to be best there, but it's worth noting (especially since as a drafted player, Magic clearly *could* be better than Kareem without requiring anything hypothetical to make the point. Of the 25 teams above:

Average SRS = -0.7
10 of 25 (40%) of the teams were > 0
7 of 25 (28%) of the teams were > 2
2 of the 25 (8%) of the teams were < -4

Guess how often average teams make the playoffs...

Do you want to guess how many titles are in that group? hint: its the same amount Charles Barkley has in his career.

Here are the average wins/SRS of each seed since the NBA expanded to 29 teams in 96

#1 seed: 61 wins, 6.62 SRS
#2 seed: 56.1 wins, 5.07 SRS
#3 seed: 53.8 wins, 4.18 SRS
#4 seed: 51.2 wins, 3.19 SRS
#5 seed: 48.9 wins, 2.78 SRS
#6 seed: 46.2 wins, 1.64 SRS
#7 seed: 44.2 wins, 1.23 SRS
#8 seed: 42.5 wins, 0.55 SRS

So if your team is in the 4th seed you need to beat a 49 win, 61 win, 56, and 61 win team. Thats why health and HCA is important. Its a rarity to beat to beat 3 56+ win teams without HCA. Only 4 teams in history beat 2 60+ win teams without HCA in a playoff (93 bulls, 95 rockets, 06 Heat, 09 Magic) and the 96, 97 bulls are the only ones to do it with HCA. Its tough to go through that gauntlet and win which is why its important to get HCA.

[mysticbb]

If you look at that, you'll notice that the teams you are looking at that make the Finals are a good 2 points better than league average.

Even with Colts not accurate data they are at -0.5, that is below league average. And then again, we are talking about the two best teams in a given season here, which have a supporting cast than better than the usual average team.

Your concern about the sample can be dismissed, because, as I pointed out, the correlation coefficient between minutes missed and off value is -0.1. Your concern would be valid, if the coefficent would be something like 0.6 or 0.8 or whatever, but there is NO sign which would point to the idea that we can dismiss the results, because in average with more minutes missed those teams are actually played WORSE.

Basing your whole argumentation of "championship odds" entirely on outliers is a mistake by you. But well, you have me set to ignore anyway, because you can stand to be corrected or called out for your own bias, while being quick at calling other biased.

[Rust In Peace]

It's usually not how good it is (though that matters too), it's how good it is relative to their opposition at the time. That's why the 94 Rockets (who were not a historically weak support cast per se), are regarded as right there with the 03 Spurs, the 76 Nets and the 77 Blazers- because even though the support casts were worse for the latter 3, Hakeem had (generally) tougher opponents.

The rockets are a historically weak cast any way you slice it.

And the 03' Spurs while weak, were facing no significant disadvantage talent wise compared to the rest of the playoff Competetion which was arguably the weakest year in history. Cwebb injury, nets being flat out one of the worst finals teams ever, Kobe injured while the lakers as a whole werent that good outside of their top 2, Dirk injury, and the marbury led suns

2009 Lakers faced the weakest oppostion in recent memory. lol at facing a Magic team who's best offensive weapon was Rashard Lewis. Meanwhile, Lakers were unfairly stacked while every other playoff team was injured or just plain mediocre.

[ElGee]

Stars missing 25 games or more
Year Player Games Out SRS
62 Lakers 32 Baylor -2.0
63 Lakers 26 West -2.1
66 Bullets 40 G. Johnson -0.1
68 Lakers 31 West -0.5
68 Warriors 31 Thurmond -6.3
70 Lakers 70 Wilt 1.5
70 Warriors 41 Thurmond -6.2
71 Lakers 25 West -1.9
74 Kings 47 Archibald -2.9
76 Blazers 31 Walton -3.8
80 Bulls 33 Gilmore -3.8
(81 Lakers 46 Magic 2.2)
83 Jazz 60 Dantley -3.8
85 Jazz 27 Dantley -2.5
91 Pistons 34 Thomas 2.0
91 Rockets 26 Olajuwon 2.3
92 Hawks 40 Wilkins -2.7
92 Lakers 28 Worthy 0.2
93 Blazers 26 Drexler 4.0
95 Bulls 65 Jordan 3.7
95 Cavs 34 Price 0.3
96 Lakers 50 Magic 2.8
98 Rockets 34 Olajuwon -1.1
04 76ers 34 Iverson -2.6
09 Celtics 25 Garnett 3.1
12 Bulls 25 Rose 4.7

That's 25 teams plus I threw in Magic Johnson in 1981 althoughI believe Kareem to be best there, but it's worth noting (especially since as a drafted player, Magic clearly *could* be better than Kareem without requiring anything hypothetical to make the point. Of the 25 teams above:

Average SRS = -0.7
10 of 25 (40%) of the teams were > 0
7 of 25 (28%) of the teams were > 2
2 of the 25 (8%) of the teams were < -4

Guess how often average teams make the playoffs...

Do you want to guess how many titles are in that group? hint: its the same amount Charles Barkley has in his career.

Here are the average wins/SRS of each seed since the NBA expanded to 29 teams in 96

#1 seed: 61 wins, 6.62 SRS
#2 seed: 56.1 wins, 5.07 SRS
#3 seed: 53.8 wins, 4.18 SRS
#4 seed: 51.2 wins, 3.19 SRS
#5 seed: 48.9 wins, 2.78 SRS
#6 seed: 46.2 wins, 1.64 SRS
#7 seed: 44.2 wins, 1.23 SRS
#8 seed: 42.5 wins, 0.55 SRS

So if your team is in the 4th seed you need to beat a 49 win, 61 win, 56, and 61 win team. Thats why health and HCA is important. Its a rarity to beat to beat 3 56+ win teams without HCA. Only 4 teams in history beat 2 60+ win teams without HCA in a playoff (93 bulls, 95 rockets, 06 Heat, 09 Magic) and the 96, 97 bulls are the only ones to do it with HCA. Its tough to go through that gauntlet and win which is why its important to get HCA.

I really don't know what you are trying to argue anymore, but my sense is you think I'm out to get you or something here.

Let's presume your question is "how important is HCA?" (This is a factor in the health issue I've brought up.) How do you go about answering that? You want to cite the records of teams with HCA...OK, but then you have a confounding variable, which is that better teams tend to have HCA. This has to be the fifth time this has come up and I still have no idea if you understand that -- this isn't an "opinion." I'm not saying that to "get you!" I'm saying it to clarify something widely agreed upon so we can collectively move forward on the same page.

Why do you think you ignore the questions I ask about your methodology? Your desire to use on/off to reflect what you want it to reflect here -- an accurate representation of teammate strength -- would lead you to believe that Kevin Garnett improved the 2003 Minnesota Timberwolves by 50 wins. Do you believe that?

In other words, why would you not apply the same use of on/off for him but in this discussion you've decided to treat it as an accurate measure of teammate quality? There may be a brilliant answer that I'm not (or anyone else reading isn't) understanding, and that's why I'm asking. If the answer is "dude, that's totally inconsistent and I didn't realize I was doing that, thanks for pointing that out," then that's not a big deal either. But when you ignore salient questions, or act like I'm out to get you or something antagonistic ("hint: its the same amount Charles Barkley has in his career") I'm left to conclude you're in an Ego War and if that's the case I'll leave you to fight it with yourself.

I'll again try to piggy back off your own ideas here...We are talking about what happens when better teams don't have HCA. That's implicit to the question -- you have to figure out what happens when a better team DOES NOT have HCA. My method to do this was to calculate the odds of winning a playoff series based on SRS differential (team strength differential). The probabilities are based on multiple seasons of actual game results. Why was this not sufficient to you?

I can think of many reasons, but I've never heard you address them. (I have, ftr...although I could still have made a calculation error, which you can check for yourself...)

You continue to claim HCA is important without factoring in the quality of a team, but that's missing the most important element which is the quality of a team. Would you not agree? Ironically, your last post has entered down the exact path I took that you have been questioning so dogmatically, which was to look at SRS strength of teams. If you do that, you will see that an 8 SRS slowly has its title odds diminish as its seeding declines, but putting an 8 SRS team as the 8th seed is still going to win them a title about 25% of the time.

You can easily see this using your own idea (which was the point of my previous post with "supporting casts" that can't make the PS -- just look at the real team results over seasons). The top 20 finalists since 1986 by SRS (all 7+ SRS teams for an entire season) have faced the following teams per round:

1st rnd: 0.4 avg. (2.4 std, 3.7 max)
2nd rnd: 3.3 avg. (2.6 std, 7.3 max)
3rd rnd: 5.5 avg. (2.1 std, 8.7 max)
4th rnd: 6.4 avg. (2.9 std, 11.8 max)

So yes, according to you the average 4th seed needs to play
2.8 SRS
6.6 SRS (assuming top seed wins, which doesn't always happen)
5.1 SRS (assuming top seed wins, which doesn't always happen)
6.6 SRS (assuming top seed wins, which doesn't always happen)

But what if you also compare that to the best NBA Finalists of the last 27 years. They play:
0.4 SRS
3.3 SRS
5.4 SRS
6.4 SRS

The difference is clear when presented this way --- a slightly harder first-round opponent, and a much bigger roadblock in the second round, then a wash. For 7+ SRS teams, how much do you think playing a 3 SRS team instead of a 0 SRS team and a 6 SRS team instead of a 3 degrades their title odds? Because that's essentially what I've calculated.

Best,
-LG

[jman2585]

It's usually not how good it is (though that matters too), it's how good it is relative to their opposition at the time. That's why the 94 Rockets (who were not a historically weak support cast per se), are regarded as right there with the 03 Spurs, the 76 Nets and the 77 Blazers- because even though the support casts were worse for the latter 3, Hakeem had (generally) tougher opponents.

The rockets are a historically weak cast any way you slice it.

And the 03' Spurs while weak, were facing no significant disadvantage talent wise compared to the rest of the playoff Competetion which was arguably the weakest year in history. Cwebb injury, nets being flat out one of the worst finals teams ever, Kobe injured while the lakers as a whole werent that good outside of their top 2, Dirk injury, and the marbury led suns

Um, no. The Rockets had an all-star PF on their team in 1994. Maxwell and Kenny Smith were good swing men, above average as NBA players, and superb shooters. The Rockets had alot of other superb shooters too, nice young guys (like Cassell and Horry), and nice vets (like Elie). It was a weak team, but certainly not weaker than the 03 Spurs, where Duncan really had nothing and nobody (D.Rob might as well not have existed in the playoffs he was so bad, especially against the Lakers).

Meanwhile you distort the Spurs in 03. The Spurs beat the Shaq-Kobe Lakers (in their prime), something which by default is probably better than any team Hakeem beat that year (and please, hush with the Kobe was injured in 03 thing, he was fine). They were leading the Mavs 2-1 when Dirk got hurt, and we have every reason to think they'd have beaten the Mavs and/or Kings. It's not as though the Don Nelson Mavs were some big stumbling block to the Spurs in the playoffs over the years, and the Kings looked about as good as the Lakers in 02 (the team the Spurs crushed). You can play "such and such was injured" in alot of years, but I don't think there's any real indication the Spurs don't win the title this year if guys are healthy.

[colts18]

I really don't know what you are trying to argue anymore, but my sense is you think I'm out to get you or something here.

Let's presume your question is "how important is HCA?" (This is a factor in the health issue I've brought up.) How do you go about answering that? You want to cite the records of teams with HCA...OK, but then you have a confounding variable, which is that better teams tend to have HCA. This has to be the fifth time this has come up and I still have no idea if you understand that -- this isn't an "opinion." I'm not saying that to "get you!" I'm saying it to clarify something widely agreed upon so we can collectively move forward on the same page.

Why do you think you ignore the questions I ask about your methodology? Your desire to use on/off to reflect what you want it to reflect here -- an accurate representation of teammate strength -- would lead you to believe that Kevin Garnett improved the 2003 Minnesota Timberwolves by 50 wins. Do you believe that?

In other words, why would you not apply the same use of on/off for him but in this discussion you've decided to treat it as an accurate measure of teammate quality? There may be a brilliant answer that I'm not (or anyone else reading isn't) understanding, and that's why I'm asking. If the answer is "dude, that's totally inconsistent and I didn't realize I was doing that, thanks for pointing that out," then that's not a big deal either. But when you ignore salient questions, or act like I'm out to get you or something antagonistic ("hint: its the same amount Charles Barkley has in his career") I'm left to conclude you're in an Ego War and if that's the case I'll leave you to fight it with yourself.

I'll again try to piggy back off your own ideas here...We are talking about what happens when better teams don't have HCA. That's implicit to the question -- you have to figure out what happens when a better team DOES NOT have HCA. My method to do this was to calculate the odds of winning a playoff series based on SRS differential (team strength differential). The probabilities are based on multiple seasons of actual game results. Why was this not sufficient to you?

I can think of many reasons, but I've never heard you address them. (I have, ftr...although I could still have made a calculation error, which you can check for yourself...)

You continue to claim HCA is important without factoring in the quality of a team, but that's missing the most important element which is the quality of a team. Would you not agree? Ironically, your last post has entered down the exact path I took that you have been questioning so dogmatically, which was to look at SRS strength of teams. If you do that, you will see that an 8 SRS slowly has its title odds diminish as its seeding declines, but putting an 8 SRS team as the 8th seed is still going to win them a title about 25% of the time.

You can easily see this using your own idea (which was the point of my previous post with "supporting casts" that can't make the PS -- just look at the real team results over seasons). The top 20 finalists since 1986 by SRS (all 7+ SRS teams for an entire season) have faced the following teams per round:

1st rnd: 0.4 avg. (2.4 std, 3.7 max)
2nd rnd: 3.3 avg. (2.6 std, 7.3 max)
3rd rnd: 5.5 avg. (2.1 std, 8.7 max)
4th rnd: 6.4 avg. (2.9 std, 11.8 max)

So yes, according to you the average 4th seed needs to play
2.8 SRS
6.6 SRS (assuming top seed wins, which doesn't always happen)
5.1 SRS (assuming top seed wins, which doesn't always happen)
6.6 SRS (assuming top seed wins, which doesn't always happen)

But what if you also compare that to the best NBA Finalists of the last 27 years. They play:
0.4 SRS
3.3 SRS
5.4 SRS
6.4 SRS

The difference is clear when presented this way --- a slightly harder first-round opponent, and a much bigger roadblock in the second round, then a wash. For 7+ SRS teams, how much do you think playing a 3 SRS team instead of a 0 SRS team and a 6 SRS team instead of a 3 degrades their title odds? Because that's essentially what I've calculated.

Best,
-LG

That run the 4 seed would need to play is much harder than the finalists run. No one in history has beaten 6.6+ SRS teams plus a 5 SRS team. Since the merger only the 08 Celtics and 09 Magic have beaten 2 6.6+ SRS teams.

Here are the good 4+ Seed teams. They all had 4+ SRS:

84-12 that was a 4 seed or lower and had a 4+ SRS.

39 teams qualify:
avg seed: 4.5
53-29 average record
5.10 SRS
22-39 series record (.361)

Twice the team with the best SRS in the league was in this sample and they combined for 2 series wins. the 10 Jazz had the best conference SRS but were swept in the 2nd round (hmmm).

18 out of the 39 won their 1st round series (.461). They faced each other in 7 series so when they didn't face each other, they had a .440 1st round series win% (11-14). Only 3 out of 39 teams even made it to the CF. Those were the 90 Suns who had the best SRS in the NBA that year yet still lost because they didn't have HCA in the WCF, the 94 Jazz who beat the 8th seed Nuggets in the 2nd round so a fluke, and 06 Mavs who actually had the #2 record and had HCA in the WCF. Only the Mavs made it to the finals. Mind you, here is the average NBA finalist loser since 84:

56 wins
5.36 SRS
1.97 avg seed

So they literally have similar SRS, yet they those "good" teams never made it far while the finalist losers did because they were the higher seed. If that is not proof then I don't know what is. Let's limit it to 4 seeds or worse with a 5 SRS or better:

4.45 seed average
54 wins average
5.72 SRS
13-20 (.394) series record

10 out of the 20 won in the 1st round and only 2 out of the 20 (90 Suns and 06 Mavs) even advanced to the conference finals. needless to say, none of those teams won the title. If you limit to 6 SRS teams, they were only 3-4 (.429) with a 7.09 SRS average and just 1 conference finals berth. These are elite teams yet they never advanced far because they had low seeds.

Not one of those teams made the finals with the exception of the 06 Mavs who were a 4 seed despite winning the 2nd most games (and they had HCA in the WCF). Those teams averaged over a 5 SRS, yet didn't succeed in the playoffs. There are examples of 1-3 seeds who did make the finals with a sub 5 SRS:

10 Lakers
07 Cavs
06 Heat
05 Pistons
03 Nets
02 Nets
01 Lakers
01 76ers
00 Pacers
94 Rockets
86 Rockets

That's 11 finalists (4 winners) compared to the 4 seed, 4+ SRS group that had just 1 finalist.

[colts18]

I went back to 1974 (last year b-r.com had gamelogs) and looked at the team's results when their star player was out.

Finals winner:
Games missed 78-89 (.467, 38.3 wins per 82)
Games played .724 win%, 59.4 wins per 82
Difference: .257 win%, 21.1 wins per 82 games

Finals loser:
Games missed 74-78 (.487, 39.9 wins per 82)
Games played: .697 win%, 57.1 wins per 82
Difference: .210 win%, 17.2 wins per 82 games

That's a 319 game sample size where these teams play below average basketball (39.1 wins per 82 games). These teams are being propped up from 39 wins to 58 wins. Fairly impressive.

[colts18]

I'll again try to piggy back off your own ideas here...We are talking about what happens when better teams don't have HCA. That's implicit to the question -- you have to figure out what happens when a better team DOES NOT have HCA. My method to do this was to calculate the odds of winning a playoff series based on SRS differential (team strength differential). The probabilities are based on multiple seasons of actual game results. Why was this not sufficient to you?

Here are the 1-3 seeds from 84-12 with a sub 5 SRS:

# of teams: 76
avg wins: 52.8 wins
avg SRS: 3.19 SRS
avg seed: 2.36 seed
series record: 114-70 (.620) (98-54 (.645) in series when they didn't play each other)
Champions: 6 (11%)
Finalists: 15 total (20% of the teams in the sample)
Made the conf finals: 33 (43%)
Won at least 1 round: 60 teams (79%)
1 and dones: 16 (21%)

Sub 4 SRS teams:
avg wins: 51.9 wins
avg SRS: 2.73
series record: 74-54 (.578) (.591 when they didn't play each other)
champions: 2 (4%)
finalists: 8 (14%)
conf finalists: 22 (39%)
won 1 round: 42 (75%)
1 and done: 14 (25%)


Now here are the teams with a 4 seed or lower and a 4+ SRS since 84:

#: 39 teams
avg seed: 4.5
53-29 average record
5.10 SRS
series record: 22-39 (.361) (.278 record when they didn't play each other)
finalists: 1 (3%) (that didn't win a title)
conf finalists: 3 (8%)
2nd rounders: 18 (46%)
1 and done: 21 (54%)

here are the 4 seeds or worse with a 5 SRS or better:

4.45 seed average
54 wins average
5.72 SRS
series record: 13-20 (.394)
finals: 1 (5%) (didn't win)
conf finals: 2 (10%)
2nd round: 10 (50%)
1 and done: 10 (50%)


Based on that data, there is a vast difference between the high seeds who had a low SRS and the low seeds with a high SRS. That proves that seeding/HCA is very important. Even if you limit it to 1-3 seeds with a sub 3 SRS, they had an average 1.93 SRS and 25-27 (.481) series record, which is better than the 4+ seeds with 4+ SRS, 6 out of the 27 made the conference finals (22%) and 1 made the finals. Even that group is achieving more than the 4+ seed, 4+ SRS group.

[bastillon]

that's very impressive Colts

[colts18]

that's very impressive Colts

Which part?

[mysticbb]

That proves that seeding/HCA is very important.

No, it does not. It only proves that you have not figured out the issue yet.

Since the merger, in 73 playoff series the higher SRS team did not have HCA, and yet, they won 39 times. If HCA would be so important, why didn't the HCA team win the majority of the series?

So, and that the HCA team with the higher SRS wins a series is what we can expect. That happened in 2/3 of the playoff series since the merger. And you, colts, are counting those wins as well, something which was pointed out to you before.

So, and I'm sure, if we would account for injuries during the regular season and the playoffs, a lot of those 98 series, in which the lower SRS team won without HCA were actually cases, in which the better team without HCA won. There are multiple occasions in which a team missed key players during the regular season, but had them available for the playoffs. Or the other way around, when the better team with HCA lost a key player for the playoffs and then obviously weren't as strong as the SRS indicated anymore.

[ElGee]

That run the 4 seed would need to play is much harder than the finalists run. No one in history has beaten 6.6+ SRS teams plus a 5 SRS team. Since the merger only the 08 Celtics and 09 Magic have beaten 2 6.6+ SRS teams.

How much harder is it?

Do you know why no one has beaten 2 6.6 SRS teams and a 5 SRS team? Because only 2 teams have ever PLAYED 2 6.6 SRS teams and a 5 SRS team since 1986!

The Lakers beat a 6.9 and 5.1 team before losing to the 9.3 Celtics. Notice 9.3 is not 6.6. If a team plays at an 9 SRS level with its star, it won't have HCA if he's healthy all year and it won't be the favorite.

The other team to have the shot to do this was the 09 Magic, who were a 6.5 SRS team that played 7.4, 8.7 and 7.1.

Well, that must prove it for you I suppose. HCA is craaaaaaaaazy valuable because the 6.5 SRS Magic couldn't beat 3 7 SRS teams without HCA!

EDIT: Of the 108 qualifying Conference FInalists since 1986, only 8 have even played 3 5 SRS teams. The other 6:
92 Por 6.9, 5.1 10.1 (L)
97 Chi 5.5, 5.6, 8.0 (W)
95 Hou 7.8, 5.9, 6.4 (W) **No HCA
93 Chi 6.3, 5.9, 6.3 (W)
04 LAL 7.5, 5.9, 5.0 (L) **3 of 5 games on road
08 SAS 5.1, 5.5, 7.3 (L)

[colts18]

No, it does not. It only proves that you have not figured out the issue yet.

Since the merger, in 73 playoff series the higher SRS team did not have HCA, and yet, they won 39 times. If HCA would be so important, why didn't the HCA team win the majority of the series?

So, and that the HCA team with the higher SRS wins a series is what we can expect. That happened in 2/3 of the playoff series since the merger. And you, colts, are counting those wins as well, something which was pointed out to you before.

So, and I'm sure, if we would account for injuries during the regular season and the playoffs, a lot of those 98 series, in which the lower SRS team won without HCA were actually cases, in which the better team without HCA won. There are multiple occasions in which a team missed key players during the regular season, but had them available for the playoffs. Or the other way around, when the better team with HCA lost a key player for the playoffs and then obviously weren't as strong as the SRS indicated anymore.

If seeding didn't matter, why does the teams 4th seed or worse with good SRS underperform their SRS in the playoffs? Only 3 out of the 39 4 or lower seeds with 4+ SRS even made the CF (90 Suns, 94 Jazz, 06 Mavs). All the other ones lost. It can't be a coincidence that the sub 5 SRS 1-3 seeds vastly outperform the 5+ SRS 4+ seeds.

[Carmelofan]

It's impossible for a championship team to have a terrible supportin cast. Each championship team has at least a decnt supporting cast. The worst one i can think of is the 2012 heat. Their supporting cast was terrible but they won because they played no title contenders in the east.

Wade and Bosh?

They had wade adn bosh and they lost in the 2011 finals. They only won 58 games that year, losing 24 games, more losses than the cavs did in 2009 and 2010.

Just because they were star heavy doesnt mean they had a good supporting cast. The 2003 lakers being prime example of what happens when you have the stars but lackluster supporitng cast.