News and Notes: Updated between Games

[Peoriabird]

Just now, AHF said:

Nigue has never been in the league.  Who is this person you are talking about?

Nique

[AHF]

1 minute ago, Peoriabird said:

Nique

Nique finished top 5 in MVP voting 3 times.  The same number of times as AI.

 

For the numbers:

Nique finished with almost 20% more win shares and a 20% higher WS/48.

Nique finished with a higher PER.

Nique finished with a higher BPM.

Nique finished with a higher career VORP.

Nique finished with almost 2000 more points and did it with a .536% TS% versus AI's .518% TS% as well.  

[Peoriabird]

9 minutes ago, AHF said:

Nique finished top 5 in MVP voting 3 times.  The same number of times as AI.

 

For the numbers:

Nique finished with almost 20% more win shares and a 20% higher WS/48.

Nique finished with a higher PER.

Nique finished with a higher BPM.

Nique finished with a higher career VORP.

Nique finished with almost 2000 more points and did it with a .536% TS% versus AI's .518% TS% as well.  

But he never won it and never took his team to the conference finals so by definition is a star.Nique wasn't on the dream team nor was he thought of as the 50 greatest players of his time....Enough of Nique...If Luka gets passed the Clipper this year, then I'll have to crown him.

[Spud2nique]

1 hour ago, AHF said:

Horford was a stud role player. 

Oh good god nobody wake up Supes. It’s just too much for a Thursday.  

[Peoriabird]

Guess who is on that top 50 list from 2017...You guessed it. AI

https://theundefeated-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/theundefeated.com/features/nba-50-greatest-players-remix/amp/?amp_js_v=a3&amp_gsa=1&usqp=mq331AQFKAGwASA%3D#aoh=15967363428079&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From %1%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Ftheundefeated.com%2Ffeatures%2Fnba-50-greatest-players-remix%2F

[kg01]

13 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

Oh good god nobody wake up Supes. It’s just too much for a Thursday.  

@NBASupes doesn't have time to weigh in on these petty squabbles.  

[AHF]

Just now, Peoriabird said:

Guess who is on that top 50 list from 2017...You guessed it. AI

https://theundefeated-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/theundefeated.com/features/nba-50-greatest-players-remix/amp/?amp_js_v=a3&amp_gsa=1&usqp=mq331AQFKAGwASA%3D#aoh=15967363428079&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From %1%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Ftheundefeated.com%2Ffeatures%2Fnba-50-greatest-players-remix%2F

I know he was.  Also know Nique was robbed in not being part of it.

https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2583763-what-have-analytics-taught-us-about-the-original-50-greatest-players-of-all-time

I don't actually argue AI isn't a superstar.  I think he qualifies.  I just argue Wilkins has a better case than he does.  Just because AI got to play against a weak East and Nique finished 2nd in MVP voting (which itself is a discussion around problematic votes and the underrating of people like Shaq who was more deserving than AI that year) isn't enough to persuade me otherwise.  At a minimum, I don't think there is a clear line between them like you do.

[JayBirdHawk]

43 minutes ago, bird_dirt said:

There haven't been any News or Notes Updated on this thread for at least the past dozen pages. 

Why do I keep clicking on it hoping to see something new?

Can threads be renamed? If so, I'd like to suggest "AHF vs Peo: The making of a super star."

Here's something for you to chew on. Trae has a solid paint cluster and the top of the key.

 

 

[Spud2nique]

In about 45 minutes, Kawhi Leonard and Paul George will show Luka what superstars look like. Good luck Luka! He might cry today with his dumb face tan. God I wanna slap that kid right across the face! I’m crazy like that!

[Peoriabird]

1 hour ago, Spud2nique said:

In about 45 minutes, Kawhi Leonard and Paul George will show Luka what superstars look like. Good luck Luka! He might cry today with his dumb face tan. God I wanna slap that kid right across the face! I’m crazy like that!

I can barely listen to the game because the homer continuously gush over Doncic like he had 30 points in the 1st quarter or something.

[NBASupes]

7 hours ago, Spud2nique said:

Oh good god nobody wake up Supes. It’s just too much for a Thursday.  

In Jamaica. You right about this one.

[Spud2nique]

1 hour ago, Peoriabird said:

I can barely listen to the game because the homer continuously gush over Doncic like he had 30 points in the 1st quarter or something.

Thank you Clipps!

-Spud’s wallet 

 

GAME TIME! Bye Mavs 

HOOKAH DONKEYKICK ?  

[JayBirdHawk]

How to create the ultimate NBA season

Quote

However, the biggest reason for the quality games is that the bubble largely eliminated bad teams from the mix. By the trade deadline and All-Star break, NBA teams know who they are and they plan accordingly for the rest of the season. Playoff contenders are fighting for seeding or playoff spots. Non-playoff teams turn to youth, with a focus on pingpong balls in the draft lottery. That means there are a lot of non-competitive games over the season’s last two months.

 

Regular season

The regular season would start at the beginning of the third week of October. It would last for 62 games and end in mid-February at the All-Star break. That’s 3.6 games per week over 17 weeks, which is roughly the same pace as a normal season. The breakdown of the 62 regular-season games:

• Three games vs. each team in the same division = 12 games

• Two games vs. each team in the same conference = 20 games

• Two games vs. each team in the opposite conference = 30 games

In this scenario, every team still plays everyone at least two times per season, home and away. That means East Coast fans don’t miss out on their once-a-year visit from the Los Angeles Lakers, and West Coast fans still get to see Eastern Conference teams once.

 

In this proposal, we’re making the All-Star break three weeks long from mid-February to early March. It’s not enough to truly heal everyone, but it’s enough time for players to get a real break and rest up for the stretch run.

All-Star break

Another benefit of the bubble? Players are fresh and healthy for the most part. Now, you can’t plan a four-month long break into every season, and here’s to hoping we never have to again. But what you can do is lengthen that midseason break. As it stands now, the All-Star break lasts for roughly a week. You know who that’s not really a break for though? Anyone taking part in All-Star Weekend. Those players, coaches and staffers usually leave right from a game to the All-Star city and stay there through the weekend. They then get a couple of days off before returning to their team in the middle of the next week.

In this proposal, we’re making the All-Star break three weeks long from mid-February to early March. It’s not enough to truly heal everyone, but it’s enough time for players to get a real break and rest up for the stretch run.

Lottery games

The other eight teams will head to the lottery games. Those teams will see their records reset to 0-0. These eight teams will play each other three times apiece for a total of 21 games.

Yes, this means the lottery-game teams will play 83 total games. The good news is that another game brings more revenue into the league, which helps everyone. And by having these teams play each other three times, you break any ties. The extra home game will be decided by best record through the regular season.

Here’s where things get interesting. Teams are playing lottery games to win. Whoever has the best record after the 21-game contest gets the most pingpong balls in the lottery. The proposed breakdown:

• Best Record – 45% chance at winning the lottery

• Second Place – 25%

• Third Place – 13%

• Fourth Place – 7%

• Fifth Place – 4%

• Sixth Place – 3%

• Seventh Place – 2%

• Eighth Place – 1%

What do you guys think about such a plan?

 

https://sports.yahoo.com/how-to-change-the-normal-nba-season-to-ramp-up-excitement-181420857.html

[macdaddy]

15 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

How to create the ultimate NBA season

What do you guys think about such a plan?

 

https://sports.yahoo.com/how-to-change-the-normal-nba-season-to-ramp-up-excitement-181420857.html

I don't like it.  I get it's to try to eliminate tanking which it would do.  But then you have no one delibrately tanking so the worst team probably really is the worst team and would never have a shot as the best lottery chances because they are so much worse than a team that just barely missed the playoffs.  

[AHF]

32 minutes ago, macdaddy said:

I don't like it.  I get it's to try to eliminate tanking which it would do.  But then you have no one delibrately tanking so the worst team probably really is the worst team and would never have a shot as the best lottery chances because they are so much worse than a team that just barely missed the playoffs.  

Let me challenge that.  I do think it would eliminate tanking for the last chunk of the season.  But I don't think it would eliminate tanking.

Imagine a scenario where the craft class includes LeBron James, Tim Duncan, Hakeem / MJ, etc.  Now look at the middle of the pack NBA teams.  

This proposal says that top 11 teams in each conference are playoff eligible and not lottery eligible.  This year you have:

Charlotte Hornets 23-42 (9)

Washington Wizard 24-44 (10)

Chicago Bulls 22-43 (11)

New York Knicks 21-45 (12)

Detroit Pistons 20-46 (13)

Atlanta Hawks 20-47 (14)

Maybe this season wouldn't erupt in huge tanking due to the unusual notion that there are no true potential superstar standouts but do you really think all these teams wouldn't throw every game they could to ensure they are in the mix for LeBron, etc.?  

The proposal enhances this in several ways:

1. First, teams that are actually pretty good have a competitive advantage to get the top pick and better lottery odds.  So tanking to artificially ensure you aren't among the top 11 teams is more effective than what tanking gets you today.  You can completely control the outcome unlike today where another team can lose more than you and take it out of your hands.
2. Second, the PR hit isn't nearly as bad as tanking today.   You don't have to be the worst team to reap the maximum reward, to the contrary the worst team gets punished.  You simply need to be among the bottom 4 in your conference.  You could get in the lottery tournament with a markedly better team than anyone organically losing that many games and you get the positive press impact of your team beating up the worst of the league and maybe finishing a feel-good 23-8 during the lottery tournament or something after going more like 20-42 to "earn" your spot.
3. Third, 45% is almost a coin flip.  That is a huge incentive.  Much more powerful than the worst teams get today.  So imagine a team like the Memphis Grizzlies.  They are competitive and have emerging star talent.  They are 2.5 games away from qualifying for the lottery tournament under this scenario even though they would be in the playoffs today.  But if they just tank for the months of January and February, they now get in a matchup where Ja Morant can suddenly get healthy and lead to a 45% chance to add LeBron James!  Is giving up a first round sweep (which actually could end up with them not getting a spot in the play-in phase) worth a coin flip chance at LeBron James or Shaq or Duncan, etc.?  I'm going to say a lot of GMs would answer that with a resounding "yes."  This becomes doubly the case if they do the draft like today where you can only fall a certain number of slots so that the default where you only do the lottery for like 3 spots is that you win the lottery tournament and now you have a 45% chance at LeBron but are guaranteed to have a pick where you could draft Bosh or Wade or Carmelo even if the odds break against you.

So I don't think it would eliminate tanking.  I think it would shift tanking to the middle of the road teams and to the December - February time frame.  While those teams might be less inclined to tank by nature, the incentives through the benefit (45% chance, more control over lottery position) and costs (bad PR, fan morale from losing) are actually stronger in favor of tanking than in today's game.

The impact of a player like Shaq is just so big that I can't imagine you wouldn't have a bunch of teams tanking it up when the next Shaq or LeBron, etc. is in the draft pool and that would be much more subject to balance-shifting shenanigans than today's format.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

On 8/7/2020 at 1:06 PM, JayBirdHawk said:

How to create the ultimate NBA season

What do you guys think about such a plan?

 

https://sports.yahoo.com/how-to-change-the-normal-nba-season-to-ramp-up-excitement-181420857.html

 

I don't hate this, because it does pretty much force teams to take every game before February like it's life or death.  It places much more importance on those first 3.5 months of the season, because you have to be ready to play from the jump.  And if you don't have your act together by Christmas, your playoff chances pretty much go out the window.

I'm not a fan of all of the bad teams playing each other in the final part of the season.  For one, that would be a MAJOR revenue hit for those teams.  Outside of hardcore fans of that team, what incentive would it be to go out and watch games vs all non-playoff competition?  This season, these were the Hawks last 10 home games.  Bold Green = Already played

• Memphis
• Charlotte
• New York
• Cleveland
• Oklahoma City
• Washington
• New Orleans
• Charlotte
• Detroit 
• Cleveland

While this doesn't look like a great home slate ( which it isn't ), Hawks fans were at least interested in a few of these games.   Attendance was at 96% for the Memphis game with Ja Morant.  85% for Charlotte.  And 91% for the Knick game.  For the rest of the way, all of the game with the exception of Oklahoma City, and especially New Orleans ( which might be a sellout with Zion ), would probably be below 90%.

So what would attendance look like if this system in place, and the Hawks had to play these 7 teams for the next 21 games, with 3 of these teams being played twice at home?

• Cleveland
• Detroit
• New York
• Golden State
• Minnesota
• San Antonio
• Phoenix

Do fans come out for the final 1/4 of the season just to see the young Hawks play?  Or do casual fans stay at home because the Hawks aren't in the playoffs, and the superstars have already come through town?  Do any of these games draw 90%+ attendance, if fans know that the Hawks are completely out of the playoffs? 

Of course, WE would all watch, and might even go to some of the games. And we would watch because we would want to see the continued development of the young guys. But even I wouldn't be interested in watching all of these games with me knowing that the Hawks are out.  What I would be interested in, is seeing how the Hawks fared against the current playoff teams.

Here was our remaining road schedule for 2019 - 2020

• New Orleans
• Philadelphia
• Golden State
• Sacramento
• Utah
• Charlotte
• Milwaukee
• Toronto

Watching our young guys battle the playoff level teams, even in a loss, would be much more satisfying to me, than seeing the Hawks run through the bad teams ( if we were good enough to do so ).

That's why I would only be interested in seeing these games vs non-lottery teams, if it were set up as part of a Draft Lottery Tournament.  Ditch the ping-pong balls, and let the teams decide where they are slotted.  I want those games to mean something more significant than just playing for a set amount of ping-pong balls.

And like I've always said, I would much rather for a top pick to go to a borderline playoff team, or an up and coming bad team . . . than to go to the worst team in the league.  The truly bad teams simply need too much all at once.  That's why honestly, a guy like James Wiseman would be great for the Warriors ( who were only bad because of injury ), than going to the Knicks ( who need everything right now ).  

 

So my compromise would be this:

- Play the 82 game regular season schedule, as is

- Playoff spots 1 - 7 in each conference get a 2 week break.

- Adopt the bubble rule:  If the 9th place team is within 4 games of the 8th spot, they go into a 2 game series to determine the spot.  If the 8th place team wins one of the two games, they get the spot.  The 9th place team has to win both games.  And in a non-bubble situation, I'd even set it where both games are played at the 8th place teams home court.

- Have the remaining playoff teams play in a Draft Lottery Tournament. I don't care how they set it up, just as long as the finalists get the #1 and #2 picks in the lottery.  

[Spud2nique]

So the Wizards are eliminated yet they are still hosting the Bucks on Tuesday in the bubble.  WTF kinda is that? Lol. I’m sorry I hate these new rules. You get 22 team in the bubble and set up a weird play in format. 
 

If Adam Silver was a player he’d be the dude the dribbles around himself with fancy megs and flashy but the substance is missing. What is this I hate it.

[macdaddy]

On 8/7/2020 at 2:50 PM, AHF said:

Let me challenge that.  I do think it would eliminate tanking for the last chunk of the season.  But I don't think it would eliminate tanking.

Imagine a scenario where the craft class includes LeBron James, Tim Duncan, Hakeem / MJ, etc.  Now look at the middle of the pack NBA teams.  

This proposal says that top 11 teams in each conference are playoff eligible and not lottery eligible.  This year you have:

Charlotte Hornets 23-42 (9)

Washington Wizard 24-44 (10)

Chicago Bulls 22-43 (11)

New York Knicks 21-45 (12)

Detroit Pistons 20-46 (13)

Atlanta Hawks 20-47 (14)

Maybe this season wouldn't erupt in huge tanking due to the unusual notion that there are no true potential superstar standouts but do you really think all these teams wouldn't throw every game they could to ensure they are in the mix for LeBron, etc.?  

The proposal enhances this in several ways:

1. First, teams that are actually pretty good have a competitive advantage to get the top pick and better lottery odds.  So tanking to artificially ensure you aren't among the top 11 teams is more effective than what tanking gets you today.  You can completely control the outcome unlike today where another team can lose more than you and take it out of your hands.
2. Second, the PR hit isn't nearly as bad as tanking today.   You don't have to be the worst team to reap the maximum reward, to the contrary the worst team gets punished.  You simply need to be among the bottom 4 in your conference.  You could get in the lottery tournament with a markedly better team than anyone organically losing that many games and you get the positive press impact of your team beating up the worst of the league and maybe finishing a feel-good 23-8 during the lottery tournament or something after going more like 20-42 to "earn" your spot.
3. Third, 45% is almost a coin flip.  That is a huge incentive.  Much more powerful than the worst teams get today.  So imagine a team like the Memphis Grizzlies.  They are competitive and have emerging star talent.  They are 2.5 games away from qualifying for the lottery tournament under this scenario even though they would be in the playoffs today.  But if they just tank for the months of January and February, they now get in a matchup where Ja Morant can suddenly get healthy and lead to a 45% chance to add LeBron James!  Is giving up a first round sweep (which actually could end up with them not getting a spot in the play-in phase) worth a coin flip chance at LeBron James or Shaq or Duncan, etc.?  I'm going to say a lot of GMs would answer that with a resounding "yes."  This becomes doubly the case if they do the draft like today where you can only fall a certain number of slots so that the default where you only do the lottery for like 3 spots is that you win the lottery tournament and now you have a 45% chance at LeBron but are guaranteed to have a pick where you could draft Bosh or Wade or Carmelo even if the odds break against you.

So I don't think it would eliminate tanking.  I think it would shift tanking to the middle of the road teams and to the December - February time frame.  While those teams might be less inclined to tank by nature, the incentives through the benefit (45% chance, more control over lottery position) and costs (bad PR, fan morale from losing) are actually stronger in favor of tanking than in today's game.

The impact of a player like Shaq is just so big that I can't imagine you wouldn't have a bunch of teams tanking it up when the next Shaq or LeBron, etc. is in the draft pool and that would be much more subject to balance-shifting shenanigans than today's format.

Well you brought up additional issues that i didn't consider which would just make it worse.  But the fact remains that a truly bad team is almost guaranteed to be out of the top 10 draft slots because they will finish last in the lottery tournament.  Which will make it very hard for a terrible team to dig out.  

 

[AHF]

1 hour ago, macdaddy said:

Well you brought up additional issues that i didn't consider which would just make it worse.  But the fact remains that a truly bad team is almost guaranteed to be out of the top 10 draft slots because they will finish last in the lottery tournament.  Which will make it very hard for a terrible team to dig out.  

 

Totally agree.  The positive is that teams in that position will have a big incentive to actively participate in free agency, etc. to make their team as good as it can be.  Nobody will want to bottom out a roster to rebuild because if you do that you'll end up with the worst pick.  Maybe the worst teams in the league would end up much closer to the middle of the pack in a best case world.  But I think the problem of a truly hopeless team is real and that could get exceptionally ugly when you have a situation like MJ's early Bulls teams not making the playoffs and getting the #1 overall pick because they win the tournament while dregs of the league have to settle for the low lottery picks and hope for better results next year.

[JTB]

Someone please.......

http://insider.espn.com/nba/insider/story/_/id/29616344/next-moves-atlanta-hawks-do-42-million-cap-space