Race to the bottom: Who's our biggest competition?

[DetroitSho]

^^^^^^^^ what he said. Looking at and caring what other teams are doing has gotten pretty pointless at this stage.

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[flow]

damn Minny loses a close one to Memphis who we are playing tomorrow.

hopefully the grizzlies still have some juice in the tank tomorrow

Wow. I just looked at the score of that game and my first thought was, 'how many overtimes?'
None, is the answer. That's unreal, even in today's game. 139-135 in four quarters. Talk about a track meet.

.

[tmorgan]

Not that surprising. Both of those teams are loaded with offensive talent and suspect defenders. Youngsters in particular.

[buzzkilloton]

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2021-nba-predictions/

Thanks to Ellington and Cojo we are now being projected for a 4 way tie for 2nd worst record and finishing one game ahead of the Wolves. If things play out as predicted by 538's model that means their will be a four tie that will have a drawing for draft position before the lotto which draws our actual spot in the draft.

We are also projected to finish only one game over the Wolves. What a tank race for the 2nd worst record.

[Snakebites]

[DBC10]

Looking like a complete nail biting finish to the bitter end.

Is half the team going to be knee contusioned come the Minnesota game? Because, they should

[Manocad]

OH MY F***ING GERD I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS SHHHTTT!!!

Game over, man! Game over! Let’s put Newt in charge!

[440BB]

Our season is ending like most of the games this year - down to the wire. Hopefully five more competitive losses to come.

[Niximusprime]

Our season is ending like most of the games this year - down to the wire. Hopefully five more competitive losses to come.

I highly doubt it. Our team has been trying to win most games, they haven’t embraced the tank. Weaver tore apart the roster and Casey is wasting an opportunity to get a great player in the draft.

Love what Weaver has done so far…Casey needs to be replaced. Hire Juwan Howard instead.

[NYPiston]

They'll need to lose all 5 now if they want to stay in the bottom 2 and not leave it up to the fate of a coin flip. 1 win and it could very well be a four way tie with the winner of Wolves-Magic above all. 2 wins and...lets hope it doesn't come to that.

[tmorgan]

Five games left. 2 are almost certain losses (Philly, Denver). Miami should be as well, given their positioning.

Chicago is pretty bad right now. Hopefully Lavine and Vuc go bananas. Minny really should beat us the way they’re competing lately, but who knows.

Fives losses, fellas. Then it’s over.

[El Chivo]

We'll win 2 more games and the board will explode.

Hopefully lottery balls will redeem ourselves.

[Manocad]

Our season is ending like most of the games this year - down to the wire. Hopefully five more competitive losses to come.

I highly doubt it. Our team has been trying to win most games, they haven’t embraced the tank. Weaver tore apart the roster and Casey is wasting an opportunity to get a great player in the draft.

Love what Weaver has done so far…Casey needs to be replaced. Hire Juwan Howard instead.

The players are always going to try to win. They only for them to lose outside of leaving the five worst guys on the floor until they're puking blood is for the players to intentionally play badly and they're not going to do that.

And there's no way Juwan Howard is going anywhere anytime soon. He's worth $80 million, can make up to $2 million/year on his current 5-year contract (i.e. he doesn't need the money) and he's positioned perfectly for a run at an NCAA championship.

[DetroitSho]

Our season is ending like most of the games this year - down to the wire. Hopefully five more competitive losses to come.

I highly doubt it. Our team has been trying to win most games, they haven’t embraced the tank. Weaver tore apart the roster and Casey is wasting an opportunity to get a great player in the draft.

Love what Weaver has done so far…Casey needs to be replaced. Hire Juwan Howard instead.

How many holes need to be poked in this argument before it stops being made?

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[440BB]

Our team has been trying to win most games, they haven’t embraced the tank. Weaver tore apart the roster and Casey is wasting an opportunity to get a great player in the draft.

With the second worst record in the league, they haven't embraced the tank? The facts don't support that thinking.

[Manocad]

Our season is ending like most of the games this year - down to the wire. Hopefully five more competitive losses to come.

I highly doubt it. Our team has been trying to win most games, they haven’t embraced the tank. Weaver tore apart the roster and Casey is wasting an opportunity to get a great player in the draft.

Love what Weaver has done so far…Casey needs to be replaced. Hire Juwan Howard instead.

How many holes need to be poked in this argument before it stops being made?

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When the lead is "Our TEAM has been trying to win most games" and finishes with "Casey is wasting an opportunity..." you can reasonably assume that the argument will never stop being made.

To me a logical assumption is that Weaver, Casey and even the players themselves are going for the best balance of development of players, development of a team, and positioning themselves for a good draft pick. Oh yeah, and that they know more about what that best balance is than the posters on this board.

[edmunder_prc]

I highly doubt it. Our team has been trying to win most games, they haven’t embraced the tank. Weaver tore apart the roster and Casey is wasting an opportunity to get a great player in the draft.

Love what Weaver has done so far…Casey needs to be replaced. Hire Juwan Howard instead.

How many holes need to be poked in this argument before it stops being made?

Sent from my SM-N975U using RealGM mobile app

When the lead is "Our TEAM has been trying to win most games" and finishes with "Casey is wasting an opportunity..." you can reasonably assume that the argument will never stop being made.

To me a logical assumption is that Weaver, Casey and even the players themselves are going for the best balance of development of players, development of a team, and positioning themselves for a good draft pick. Oh yeah, and that they know more about what that best balance is than the posters on this board.

There are 4 more games in the year. Seriously, get out of here with development or other BS playing Cojo and Ellington with 4 games left.

He had one job, lose 5 games. And he **** it up. End of discussion. These games dont matter. Stewart/Bey/Hayes career won't be hurt by not playing some worthless games at the end of a bad season.

[Manocad]

How many holes need to be poked in this argument before it stops being made?

Sent from my SM-N975U using RealGM mobile app

When the lead is "Our TEAM has been trying to win most games" and finishes with "Casey is wasting an opportunity..." you can reasonably assume that the argument will never stop being made.

To me a logical assumption is that Weaver, Casey and even the players themselves are going for the best balance of development of players, development of a team, and positioning themselves for a good draft pick. Oh yeah, and that they know more about what that best balance is than the posters on this board.

There are 4 more games in the year. Seriously, get out of here with development or other BS playing Cojo and Ellington with 4 games left.

He had one job, lose 5 games. And he **** it up. End of discussion. These games dont matter. Stewart/Bey/Hayes career won't be hurt by not playing some worthless games at the end of a bad season.

Seriously get out of here with deciding what Casey’s job is, unless your name is Troy Weaver. And there are five games left.

There. That was easy.

[NYPiston]

Moving on from the incessant arguing, the lottery odds are very interesting.

For people who see this as a "Big 4" at the top, they shouldn't be that upset at the Pistons winning games because the odds of finishing top 4 aren't drastically different from 1-6 (52% at 1 and 40% at 6) while 1-4, the odds are almost entirely flat.
52% at 2
52% at 3
48% at 4
40% at 5
40% at 6

So where they end up between 2-6 is largely irrelevant in terms of top 4 odds. Yeah the odds decline a bit as you go down the ladder but it's mostly inconsequential as it doesn't really matter much where they finish 6-10.

For those who see this as a "Big 5" like I do, it's imperative to finish at 2 because the odds of finishing top 5 are...
80% at 2
67% at 3,
55% at 4,
42% at 5
40% at 6

As you see, the odds of finishing top 5 drop off significantly as you go down the ladder so for those who lump Kuminga in with the big group, it's even more important to finish lower.

[Sort]

I think it's a legitimate point Pistons needed a little feel-good win. Look, the "core four" just don't have it yet for being the central focus of the team. All three that played looked substantially better being role players, support players, feeding off the play of veterans. That's not bad. Pistons did seem a little lifeless and depressed previously.

Now go back to losing....