How accurately does Drtg represent teams for playoffs?

[GSP]

This years Thunder is rated top 5 in defense but they have a bad record against the top teams who score well about their season defense while Okc had some historic blowouts against crap teams this year like Bobcats and Hornets. Is there a more accurate defensive measure for team weighting?

[Chicago76]

So what you're suggesting is that OKC's D is not as good against better teams. The first step would be to test that. OKC's defense is currently 3.4 pts/ 100 poss better than leage average. We can look at how their D stacked up v. the better teams in the league (SRS of 3.0+). They played over 20 games vs. teams of this caliber to date. On average they held these teams to an Ortg 3.3 pts per 100 possessions below their average with a median expectation that their opponents offense would be 2.6 pts per 100 poss worse.

In other words, they are performing just as well defensively (some random statistical sampling noise aside) vs. better teams than they do vs. the rest of the league. I think what you think you are seeing isn't that OKC's defense isn't as good vs. better teams but rather they are playing better teams, many of whom have better than league average offenses.