Southeast Standings Summary

[azuresou1]

OVERALL STANDINGS
Atlanta Hawks - 26-8
Washington Wizards - 23-11
Miami Heat - 15-20
Orlando Magic - 13-24
Charlotte Hornets - 12-24
Bonus: Brooklyn Nets - 16-18, projected 16th pick

Atlanta Hawks
Record: 26 wins, 8 losses
Simple Rating Score (SRS): 4.06
Strength of Schedule (SOS): -0.82
Divisional standing: Divisional Leader

JAN 6TH UPDATE
Our defense has improved significantly (6th best), largely in part due to our swarming team defense which effectively challenges opponent shots, generates a great deal of turnovers (7th best), and almost never fouls (2nd best in the league). The biggest source of improvement is our defensive rebounding, which is now about league average, which makes a huge difference in limiting second chance points.

Statistically we've actually dropped to the 11th rated offense in the league, and the primary reason is that we don't secure offensive boards. Specifically, we're second worst in the league, just baaaaarely above Orlando. A big part of this appears to be scheme and due to the nature of our offense (jumpshot heavy), but part of it is also due to our overall ability to rebound. Nevertheless, our offense remains buoyed by our sharpshooting and effective ball movement, resulting in the 4th best team TS%.

Clearly this team has been on a roll, and a lot of reasons for us to be excited, but there are some vulnerabilities.

Nov 28, 2014

Strengths:
Our 7th ranked offense has been humming along due to our shooting. We're above-average in terms of both quantity and quality of 3 pt shots, but our primary edge is actually due to our ability to make midrange shots at an efficient clip. We're league best from 15-24 ft in terms of efficiency - in fact we should probably be taking more shots from this range to improve the spacing for our drives. This shooting edge is facilitated by our team ball movement, which manages to generate a high % of assisted looks while limiting turnovers.

We've also been very good at making our opponents work for their initial shots (by the eye test; don't have stats on hand to conclusively prove), greatly limiting the number of opponent 2 pt shots to 3rd lowest in the league. We've also been extremely good at limiting points in transition, partly due to our ability to make shots, but also due to our ability to get back quickly.

Weaknesses:
Despite solid defense on initial shots, our defense fails to secure defensive boards (3rd worst in league), leading to quality followup looks for opponents. In fact, we are the single worst team in the league in terms of opponent 2nd chance points. The end result: opponents have the 6th best eFG% against us in the league, and we have a bottom 5 defense.

This poor defensive rebounding is partly to blame on Al Horford, who is posting a defensive rebounding rate of 18.3%, well below his career average of 23.4%. Horford in general has not been playing well, as lineups that substitute Pero perform quite a bit better in terms of on/off on both ends of the floor. Interestingly, we have only played Pero next to Al for 4 minutes this season.

Overall Synopsis:
Our good offense has been marred by a bottom 5 defense, which appears to be significantly affected by our inability to secure defensive rebounds and giving up too many second chance points. There is some reason to be optimistic, as if Horford regresses to his historical averages our rebounding should be much improved. Also, playing Horford next to Pero may likely address these issues.

[azuresou1]

Washington Wizards
Record: 23 wins, 11 losses
Simple Rating Score (SRS): 1.45
Strength of Schedule (SOS): -0.70
Divisional standing: 3 GB

JAN 6 UPDATE

Okay, I guess I have to talk about them since they're our only real challenger for divisional leader.

Washington's offense has improved to right about league average. John Wall is one of the best passing points in the league, and Washington is top 5 in many assist metrics (AST%, AST Ratio, etc.) They draw fewer FTs than you'd expect for a team with John Wall, but Beal and Rasual Butler, both high minute guys, don't draw many fouls. Washington also actually leads the league in 3PT%, but fortunately for us they're tied for the 2nd lowest 3PT rate with Memphis. Outside of that, the story is generally that they're solidly average across the board.

Defensively, they're pretty solid, at 9th in the league. They're keep opponents out of the paint, and are a very good rebounding team, but their propensity to foul means they give away lots of points at the line.

I don't think Washington is a great team by any means, but they're a good team that can be a tough matchup for us, particularly in the playoffs.

Nov 28, 2014
Overall Synopsis:
This team so far has been boringly average. They have had a relatively easy schedule, but they also have not had Beal until the last few games.

Washington has had a solid defense this year, being top 10 in opponent eFG%, opponent TOV%, and DRB%. On the other hand, Washington's offense has been below average, although it remains to be seen how the team adjusts now that Beal is back. Their spacing has been ugly - good 3pt %, but very few attempts

This is a boring team and I'm bored just talking about them. Let's move on.

[azuresou1]

Miami Heat
Record: 8 wins, 7 losses
SRS: -1.45
SOS: -0.92
Divisional standing: 1.5 GB

Overall Synopsis:
Miami looks to be just as good as us, both in terms of divisional standings as well as in terms of SRS. They're in a similar boat as us - good offense, bad defense, albeit to a lesser degree.

Miami is really, really efficient at scoring. 3's constitute a big percentage of their offense, and they have the second best 3pt percentage in the league. They also draw a lot of fouls, and their team TS% is Top 5.

Fortunately, they have some turnover issues, and their same offensive strength of having a big man who can shoot outside means that they have no interior presence on offense, both in terms of scoring as well as rebounding.

Defensively, they don't particularly give up a lot of shots, but they're not great at stopping the shots, and they also foul a lot.

So far Shawne Williams has had a career year - hard to say whether he'll be able to keep this up, or if it's just a start of the season surge. On the flipside, Josh McRoberts is playing very poorly. I think Miami's performance will depend on how those two can perform, as well as lingering questions about Dwyane Wade's health.

[azuresou1]

Orlando Magic
Record: 6 wins, 11 losses
SRS: -5.95
SOS: -0.53
Divisional standing: 4.5 GB

Overall Synopsis:
Orlando is experiencing some growing pains and has the issue of having lots of young rotation-caliber guys without having many legitimate starting-caliber players. They field an average defense, but their offense is very poor.

They very rarely draw FTs, and also don't shoot many 3s. They also turn it over quite a bit. In general I think their offense is sloppy and disorganized, and they don't have enough spacing which complicates things.

Their only real area of strength is defensive rebounding, where Nikola Vucevic, Tobias Harris, Victor Oladipo and Elfrid Payton are all above-average defensive boarders for their position.

Still this team can be entertaining to watch.

[azuresou1]

Charlotte Hornets
Record: 4 wins, 13 losses
SRS: -4.22
SOS: 1.96
Divisional standing: 6.5 GB

Overall Synopsis:
And here we are, the current bottom dwellers of the conference. Charlotte has had some bad luck in having a tough schedule to date, but at the same time they've looked very, very bad. Much of the hype surrounding this Charlotte team, which made a loud splash in FA by signing Lance Stephenson, has disappeared.

Charlotte is really bad on both sides of the ball, but their bigger concern is offense. As predicted this offseason, the combination of Kemba Walker and Lance, both ball-dominant combo guards who can't consistently shoot from deep or play off ball, has led Charlotte to have lots of issues with efficiency. How bad? Charlotte's team TS% is 4th worst, after OKC (Ibaka + role players), Detroit (Josh Smith + Brandon Jennings... nuff said), and the 76ers who are barely an NBA team.

The floor spacing is nonexistent - they have the 6th lowest 3PT rate, and the 4th worst 3PT%. Their offense is almost entirely predicated on feeding Al Jefferson or 2pt jumpshots, and as a result they don't draw many fouls OR grab many offensive boards - probably because they take so many jumpers. I think they really miss Josh McRoberts, who was a great facilitator and shooter at the 4, while also having the ability to occasionally finish inside.

On a plus side for them at least they don't turn it over much. Iso offenses generally are low on turnovers.


Charlotte's defense, which was Top 5 last season, has become a below-average defense with the absence of Michael Kidd-Gilchrist. Despite some clear strengths (Top 5 defensive rebounding and a very low foul rate), Charlotte also has some clear weaknesses.

First, they are, somehow, bad at defending the midrange. This is amazing because midrange jumpshots are generally poor shots which are easy to contest. Despite this, Charlotte gives up the most midrange attempts - and makes -in the league.

Charlotte also gives up a lot of 3PTers, although from a percentage perspective they're not terrible. They have the opposite issue at the rim, where opponents rarely take shots inside, but score at a really high rate when they do.

Finally, they generate very few turnovers, which means opponents get a lot more shots on basket.

These are all symptomatic of what I believe is Charlotte's big defensive issue - a lack of defensive athleticism. Charlotte is playing a rotation at the 4 of Marvin Williams and Cody Zeller, both of whom are not laterally mobile; at the 3 they are also missing MKG (injury) and Jeff Taylor (suspension for being a scumbag). Al Jefferson is a strong, solid post defender but he's also terribly immobile and can't provide much help. Bismack Biyombo is actually a very good defender who would provide them with the athleticism and rim protection they need, but he's just SO bad on offense that it's hard to justify playing him.


Charlotte should get better on both ends when MKG returns and as they begin to figure out how to fit Kemba and Lance better (perhaps by staggering their playing time), but they definitely have an uphill climb this season. It's just a really poorly constructed roster from a fit perspective, IMO.

[azuresou1]

Reserving for Brooklyn

[Jamaaliver]

Very well written, Mike.

Well done.

[theatlfan]

Excited about this series. Good job.

[azuresou1]

Bump for updates to standings, Hawks review, and Wizards review. Will do the rest later today.

Mods, can I get a sticky for this thread?