Hornets Record vs Top Tier Teams

[fatlever]

How many games will the Hornets win this year vs the top tier teams in the league? For this exercise I consider the following teams to be the top tier teams - Warriors, Cavs, Spurs, Clippers, Raptors, Thunder and Celtics. We have a combined 20 games vs this group. How many can we win?

Last year vs the same seven teams we only played 18 games (only played Boston and Raptors three times). Last year we went 4-14 vs this group with wins vs Cavs, Celtics, Raptors and Spurs.

We've been a borderline playoff team for the past four years with very few wins vs the league elite to show for it. Will this year be any different? I think a lot more people, media and fans, would take the Hornets more seriously if they could have a few more games where they are able to take down some of the best teams in the league. 4-14 does not earn you respect. We are already 0-2 vs this group. Anything less than 5 wins out of these 20 games would be massively disappointing.

Debating whether or not the Thunder or Celtics should be considered in this group isn't really the point, but feel free to argue for or against that seven or any other teams that should be included.

Main point being, until we are more competitive vs these types of teams, we can't really think of ourselves as being on this level.

Thoughts?

[JDR720]

Warriors? no wins
Cavs? probably no wins.
Clipps? maybe 1, probably no wins.
Thunder? maybe 1
Celtics? maybe half of them
Raps? maybe half of them

so far, we are on that 2nd/3rd tier of teams.

how many games are against the Celtics and Raps?

need more than 5 wins. 5-15 is pretty terrible.

[yosemiteben]

Kind of arbitrary to just pick random win numbers, but I think we'll be competitive against the top teams, more so than in years past. Just need to get healthy. Feel pretty strongly we would have won with MKG Friday, we just needed help keeping DD from closing down the stretch.

[Mystical Apples]

Utah should be included.

[Mystical Apples]

Hornets are 1-2 so far against the top teams. Without looking at H/A schedules I'd say W% ~ 33% v. GSW-CLE and maybe 40-50% v. the other teams.

Not sure about ATL but rather than splitting hairs about who is/isn't a top team I'd roll with top 1/3rd.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/NBA_2017.html

[LamarMatic7]

fun fact about tonight's game and the Cavs - we've lost the last 25 out of 26 games against a LeBron James team. if the worst happens this year, we could end up at a very ugly 29 out of 30.

[fatlever]

And as the LoF like to point out, that one win happened with Kemba out and Lin starting. So Kemba is something like 0-25 vs Lebron.

[Eoghan]

Utah should be included.

They can make the playoffs first.

[TinmanZBoy]

for the 4 wins, Jeremy Lin's scored
21
25
35
29
he swept the gold hammers

[fatlever]

for the 4 wins, Jeremy Lin's scored
21
25
35
29
he swept the gold hammers

Tell him to come back. The Nets clearly don't need him. 3-1 since he got hurt. We'll trade the Nets Sessions and Hawes for Lin. Then the Hornets have a superteam that can finish top 3 in East.

[TinmanZBoy]

for the 4 wins, Jeremy Lin's scored
21
25
35
29
he swept the gold hammers

Tell him to come back. The Nets clearly don't need him. 3-1 since he got hurt. We'll trade the Nets Sessions and Hawes for Lin. Then the Hornets have a superteam that can finish top 3 in East.

you still have a good chance to finish top 3, i don't see any team other than Cavs is better than Hornets in the east, however, it is a logjam among Hawks, Raptors, Celtics and Hornets, anyone of them could be the No. 2...

[Sauce_Castillo]

for the 4 wins, Jeremy Lin's scored
21
25
35
29
he swept the gold hammers

Tell him to come back. The Nets clearly don't need him. 3-1 since he got hurt. We'll trade the Nets Sessions and Hawes for Lin. Then the Hornets have a superteam that can finish top 3 in East.

you still have a good chance to finish top 3, i don't see any team other than Cavs is better than Hornets in the east, however, it is a logjam among Hawks, Raptors, Celtics and Hornets, anyone of them could be the No. 2...

Agreed all those teams you mentioned on a neutral floor would be a pick em IMO. I think other than Cle, Gstate, Spurs, LAC, Hornets are a pick em or better vs every team in the league on a neutral floor.


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[Sauce_Castillo]

Warriors? no wins
Cavs? probably no wins.
Clipps? maybe 1, probably no wins.
Thunder? maybe 1
Celtics? maybe half of them
Raps? maybe half of them

so far, we are on that 2nd/3rd tier of teams.

how many games are against the Celtics and Raps?

need more than 5 wins. 5-15 is pretty terrible.

Man, you really hold thunder in that high of regard? I think we are a clearly superior team to them on paper.


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[JDR720]

Warriors? no wins
Cavs? probably no wins.
Clipps? maybe 1, probably no wins.
Thunder? maybe 1
Celtics? maybe half of them
Raps? maybe half of them

so far, we are on that 2nd/3rd tier of teams.

how many games are against the Celtics and Raps?

need more than 5 wins. 5-15 is pretty terrible.

Man, you really hold thunder in that high of regard? I think we are a clearly superior team to them on paper.


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we only play them twice. and they still have wb. dipo and adams too

[Mystical Apples]

Utah should be included.

They can make the playoffs first.

Certainly a reasonable starting point but would've resulted in some awkward benchmark's last November:

'14-15 velvet ropers: Milwaukee, Washington, New Orleans, Brooklyn, and Chicago.

'14-15 top tier (50+): Houston, Dallas, Chicago, Memphis, Portland, and Atlanta (60)

Missed PO or meh: OKC, Charlotte (33), Boston (40), Miami (37)

[Eoghan]

Utah should be included.

They can make the playoffs first.

Certainly a reasonable starting point but would've resulted in some awkward benchmark's last November:

'14-15 velvet ropers: Milwaukee, Washington, New Orleans, Brooklyn, and Chicago.

'14-15 top tier (50+): Houston, Dallas, Chicago, Memphis, Portland, and Atlanta (60)

Missed PO or meh: OKC, Charlotte (33), Boston (40), Miami (37)

I'm just tired of hearing how good Utah is. I've been hearing this for like 4 straight years now and they keep going fishing.

[fatlever]

How many games will the Hornets win this year vs the top tier teams in the league? For this exercise I consider the following teams to be the top tier teams - Warriors, Cavs, Spurs, Clippers, Raptors, Thunder and Celtics. We have a combined 20 games vs this group. How many can we win?

0-5 so far vs this group.

[yosemiteben]

All but the most recent CLE game was very competitive, though the most recent CLE game was also the only game where we were 100% healthy.

I'm not really worried because it feels like we always start slow and I'm glad we have a decent record this far into the season. With that said, we need to be able to elevate our game and close out good teams, especially at home. We should have had TOR at home, and we could have easily taken BOS if we could just stayed on Bradley and forced someone else up beat us. Those should haves have to turn into dids at some point.

[HornetJail]

I'm not worried at all. For the most part, we're beating the teams we need to beat. With a couple exceptions of course- even Golden State has off-nights and drop an easy game to the Lakers or Grizz every now and then.

But there are major changes that need to be made to our rotations and defensive gameplan, and they start with MKG and Frank. What the hell is Clifford doing playing Frank this much when he's clearly not there offensively, and what the hell is he doing not putting MKG on LeBron in crunch time while LeBron is hot? I just do not get it.

I really think Clifford just believes he can have a good defense regardless of which players he puts out there, and he just tries to mess around with his offensive guys as much as possible. I don't know what our defensive ranking is this year but it can't be great.

[yosemiteben]

I really think Clifford just believes he can have a good defense regardless of which players he puts out there.

I mean isn't this basically proven at this point? We have had a top ten defense every year regardless of injuries or personnel.

I don't know what our defensive ranking is this year but it can't be great.

We currently have the 6th best DRTG on the season.