The Bulls aren’t looking good but might their odds be a little better than 10%?  The playoff odds machine looks at past history for calculating the likelihood of future outcomes.  At this point in the season, however, the good teams may be resting the stars and the bad teams could be in outright tank mode.  So, let’s look a little closer and see what the teams have going forward to see if there is more hope for the Bulls:

Bulls Schedule

-4/3:  Charlotte

-4/6:  Milwaukee

-4/8:  Cleveland

-4/9:  @ New Jersey

-4/11: @ Toronto

-4/13: Boston

-4/14: @Charlotte 

Raptors Schedule

-4/3:  @Philadelphia

-4/4:  Golden State

-4/6:  @Cleveland

-4/7:  Boston

-4/9:  @Atlanta

-4/11: Chicago

-4/12: @Detroit

-4/14:  New York 

Chicago’s schedule features only a few gimmies.  Milwaukee and Charlotte are in a race to get to the six seed, which is a key seed as that team avoids certain death against Orlando and instead gets a decent shot at upset against Atlanta or Boston.  Boston also has some incentive to play hard in order to stay out of the four seed and Cleveland in round two (assuming Boston can even beat the whomever gets the five seed).  The schedule shows, however, that the Bulls have exactly one easy win (New Jersey) and the hope that the Cavs stop playing their stars for the rest of the regular season.  

Toronto has a bit easier road with Philly, Golden State, Detroit, and New York on the schedule.  Toronto also has common opponents with Chicago of Boston and Cleveland.  Boston and Cleveland might pack it in and rest there stars until the playoffs but there will be no benefit to  Toronto or Chicago because the teams will get the same easy common opponent.  So looking at the schedules closely, the Bulls look to be in quite serious trouble and the odds machine is absolutely correct.  The only road here for the Bulls is to beat Toronto head-to-head on April 11th and hope that the Raps have a really bad loss to one or two non-playoff teams as well.  At the very least, the Toronto/Chicago game will be the last meaningful game of the regular season. 

2.    More Eight Seed Stuff:    Out West, there is no eight seed race at all.  Currently, the Grizz are the nine seed and are 6.5 games out.  It seemed to me quite rare to have a nine seed so far out of the playoff picture.  This is a function of how good the top eight are in the West but I was wondering how close a nine seed typically comes to the playoffs.  For fun, here’s the list of how close the nine seed was to the eight seed each season since the NBA went to the expanded playoff format in 1983-84 (the numbers below represent how many games out the nine seed was from the eight):           

Season    East    West

1983-84     7           1

1984-85     2           5

1985-86     1           3

1986-87     9           1

1987-88     0*         3

1988-89     2           1

1989-90     1           4

1990-91     6          10  

1991-92     0*         1

1992-93     0*         3

1993-94     1           9

1994-95     1           2

1995-96     1           3

1996-97     2           2

1997-98     1          14

1998-99     1           0*

1999-00     1           4

2000-01     5           2

2001-02     1           5

2002-03     5           1

2003-04     1           1

2004-05     0*         1

2005-06     2           3

2006-07     5           2

2007-08     1           2

2008-09     3           2 

*Denotes that the nine seed tied the eight seed in record but lost in the tie-breaker. 

As can be seen above, the Grizz’s spread 6.5 game spread from the eight seed is rare but not super rare, as we’ve seen a five game spread every other year this decade. Interestingly, there are quite a few huge spreads (1997-98, 1990-91, 1986-87).  These huge spreads are usually due to some truly awful bottom teams in those conference.  Indeed, the 1997-98 eight seeded Rockets were only 41-41 but the nine seed Kings were a poor 27-55 and the West featured five teams with 20 wins or less (including the 11-win Nuggets and the 17-win Clipps).

1984-85:  2 (Kentucky made Sweet 16)

1985-86:  4 (DePaul, Cleveland State, and LSU made Sweet 16)

1986-87:  4 (Wyoming made Sweet 16)

1987-88:  3 (Richmond and Rhode Island made Sweet 16)

1988-89:  6 (Minnesota made Sweet 16)

1989-90:  4 (Ball State made Sweet 16; Loyola Marymount made the Elite Eight)

1990-91:  6 (Connecticut and Eastern Michigan made Sweet 16)

1991-92:  2 (No low seeds made the second round)

1992-93:  4 (George Washington made Sweet 16)

1993-94:  3 (Tulsa made Sweet 16)

1994-95:  5 (No low seeds made the second round)

1995-96:  4 (Arkansas made Sweet 16)

1996-97:  3 (Tennessee-Chattanooga made Sweet 16)

1997-98:  5 (Washington and Valparaiso made Sweet 16)

1998-99:  5 (Missouri State made Sweet 16)

1999-00:  1 (No low seeds made the second round)

2000-01:  7 (Gonzaga made Sweet 16; Temple made the Elite Eight)

2001-02:  6 (Southern Illinois made Sweet 16; Missouri made Elite Eight)

2002-03:  3 (Butler made Sweet 16)

2003-04:  2 (No low seeds made the second round)

2004-05:  4 (Wisconsin-Milwaukee made Sweet 16)

2005-06:  6 (Bradley made Sweet 16; George Mason made the Final Four)

2006-07:  2 (No low seeds made the second round)

2007-08:  5 (Villanova and Western Kentucky made Sweet 16)

2008-09:  5 (Arizona made Sweet 16) 

In the past 25 years (we exclude 2009-10 as the tourney is still going on), we see the following trends: 

-Of the 600 low seeds,  101 have made it past the first round (roughly 17%). 

-Of the 600 low seeds, 30 have made it to Sweet Sixteen (5%)

-Only four low seeds have made it to the Elite Eight (0.7%)

-Only George Mason has made it to a Final Four (0.2%)

-The first low seed to make it to the Elite Eight, Loyola Marymount, was probably the most memorable.  In fact, the team has been celebrated since this is the 20th anniversary of their impressive showing behind future lottery pick Bo Kimble and the team playing in memory of star Hank Gathers (who died tragically from heart problems during the conference tournament a few weeks before the NCAA tournament). 

-There aren’t too many pros out of these Elite Eight/Final Four group.  Loyola Marymount had only Bo Kimble, who washed out after a few seasons.  Temple had no pros (a no frills team led by Lynn Greer), Missouri had one pro (Kareem Rush), and George Mason had none.  Just in case your curious, George Mason’s top scorer, Jai Lewis, currently is playing ball in the Philippines. As for the other big names on that George Mason team, Tony Skinn is in Italy, Lamar Butler is in Turkey, Will Thomas is in Belgium, and Folarin Campbell  is in Germany. 

Another question is how accurate NCAA seeding is in predicting results.  In this case, I was curious to see if the higher seeded underdogs (11s and 12s) did score better than their lower seeded brethren.  Given that no 16-seed has ever won a tournament game (not including play-ins), it seems that this may be true but let’s map it out and see how true it really is.  Below is a list of the number of times each seed from 11 through 16 seeds were able to get past the first round, second round, and further:

Based upon the raw numbers, a 12-seed is actually slightly more likely to win in Round 1 than an 11-seed.  Moreover, nearly 50% of 12-seed upsetters go on to win in Round 2.  The 11-seeds are weaker in Round 2 (only win about 30% of Round 2 games) but make up almost all the teams to make deeper runs.  The NCAA seems to seed the 13-16 teams very well, as the number of upsets slowly fade by seed from low (13 seed), to lower (14 seed), to virtually nil (15 seed), to nil (the 16 seeds). 

The only four teams to make the Sweet 16 that were higher than 12-seeds were (any future NBAers are noted next to the team in parentheses): 

-1985-86 Cleveland State (Clinton Smith had a cup of coffee with Golden State)

-1987-88 Richmond (No NBA players.  Incidentally, the only NBAer of note from the school is Johnny Newman)

-1996-97 Tennessee-Chattanooga (Johnny Taylor had a short career in the late 1990s)

-1997-98 Valparaiso (Bryce Drew) 

So, only Drew had any NBA buzz.  He ended up varying between 12th man and useful back up point during his six-year career.  Drew is back at Valpo as an assistant coach now.  

Overall, we see that seeding does matter.  The chance to breakthrough is very low for the lowest of the low.  So, enjoy the upsets because as random as the whirlwind of the NCAA single elimination program seems to be, the good teams tend to avoid upsets most of the time and the chance of a low seed going near the title is a once a quarter century occurrence. 

2.    NCAA vs. NBA:    Every year around this time, the inevitable question comes out whether the college games is more fun to watch than the pros.  I find myself watching the NBA game more, even in March (I watched Portland/Dallas over the Sweet 16 most of the night).  Still, the question is obviously a subjective one.  I hate to re-print my views but below is a column I wrote back 2007, using an interview from baseball genius Bill James and his appreciation of his Kansas Jayhawks.  The research is three years old but still holds mostly true.  Anyway, here it is: 

I may be a little late getting into it but  a few weeks ago Bill James, the first stats-related pragmatist writer in baseball (and the inspiration for countless other baseball and sportswriters in print and on the Web today), made some interesting observations with respect to the NBA in a baseball-related interview at SheaFaithful.com about the NBA that drew some interest.  In discussing the ramifications of an ostensibly .500 St. Louis Cardinals team winning the World Series in 2006, James stated:  “I’m not a great fan of the Wild Card. But it is tremendously important, for the health of the sport [baseball], that the best team doesn’t always win. That’s the real problem with the NBA. . .the best team is going to win in the long run, and everybody knows it. The season becomes a long, crushing battle in which, ultimately, you have no chance to escape justice. . .as opposed to college basketball, which is vastly more exciting, simply because you never know who will win, and therefore have to do everything you can do to maximize your chance. In the NBA you don’t really HAVE a chance to win, if you’re not one of the two or three best teams, and everybody knows this on some level. . .therefore, why play hard, why dive for the ball on the floor, why fight for the rebound, why sacrifice your body to score a point, when you ultimately can’t win. No sport can survive if the best team always wins.”  

Henry Abbott over at True Hoop, examined the remarks and while conceding that the NBA has been dynastic for much of its existence did not necessarily buy the premise that the NBA presents an inexorable coronation of the top regular season team each year.  Abbott wrote: “[i]s Bill James really right? Just to make sure, I’d like him to prove it. I’d like him to identify those two or three teams at the beginning of every NBA season for us. Did he really pick Larry Brown’s starless 2004 Pistons? Last year’s Miami Heat?” 

I may be a bit untimely on this subject but I thought I’d throw in my two cents.  Before I do so, I think we should acknowledge that James’ remarks were somewhat off-the-cuff and it really isn’t fair to dissect them to the highest level of scrutiny.  Still, our particular place exists for no other reason but to delve into the minutia of sport, so let’s take a closer look at the statement anyway.  In a nutshell, here are James’ premises:

-The best team (or one of the top three teams) always wins in the NBA

-You need variety and surprise to draw fans and to have a health league/sport

-College basketball is more entertaining than the NBA because it is much more unpredictable

-Because the ultimate outcome is a foregone conclusion, NBA players don’t play as hard as they might otherwise or as hard as NCAA players 

With the proviso that James’ clearly wasn’t intending to state divine law, let’s examine each premise and see if they hold up to scrutiny… 

-The best team (or one of the top three teams) always wins in the NBA

Without really checking, this seems to me to be pretty true.  How many times have one of the top three teams NOT won title?  Putting aside Pythagorean records and all that, let’s see take a look: 

-2005-06 Miami Heat

-2003-04 Detroit Pistons

-1994-95 Houston Rockets

-1977-78 Washington Bullets

-1974-75 Golden State Warriors

-1968-69 Boston Celtics 

Yup.  In 51 years, a non-top three team has only won six times and even some of these teams weren’t a huge surprise.  By contrast, here are all the non-top three MLB teams that have won the World Series since the Wild Card was adopted in 1995: 

-2006 St. Louis Cardinals

-2003 Florida Marlins

-2001 Arizona Diamondbacks

-2000 New York Yankees

-1997 Florida Marlins

A bit more frequent than the NBA to be sure.  This is particularly true since only eight teams make the playoffs in baseball versus 16 teams in the NBA.  Of course, very few of these teams were actually considered big upset stories, with the exception of the 2003 Marlins and the 2006 Cardinals.  

-You need variety and surprise to draw fans and to have a health league/sport 

This is a bit of an open-ended premise.  How do you define variety or surprise?  Clearly the same team shouldn’t win every year, yet baseball has a history of repeat contenders and pretenders almost as often as the NBA.  In addition, success is also hard to define.  The conventional wisdom was that the NBA succeeded when it had uberstars and successful major market teams.  Ratings don’t mean everything about popularity but they do represent something of a snapshot of fan interest.   In that vein, here’s a look at the the NBA Finals and World Series as far back as I could find them:

Obviously, it’s hard to say what you can learn from ratings because so many factors can go into any single rating draw.  Do these championship ratings reflect overall popularity of the sports or just the popularity in the cities that made the title round?  Also, how do we account for the general downward trend toward in network television viewership?  We do know, at the very least, that the variety of teams in the title series hasn’t actually helped ratings.  In the NBA, viewers seemed to follow Michael Jordan around, and Magic and Bird to a lesser extent.  In MLB, the Cardinals surprising win brought the worst ratings of of any World Series since 1968.  Again, we don’t really know how to weigh cause-and-effect here but we certainly can’t call St. Louis’ win a boon for baseball’s popularity. 

-College basketball is more entertaining than the NBA because it is much more unpredictable 

This is a legitimate school of thought but it is entirely subjective in its origin.  I won’t run through all the NCAA tournament results but it’s fair to say that we have seen a shocker or two more than in the NBA Playoffs.  On the other hand, you don’t always get the sense that the best team won reached the Final Four or won the tournament.  There is a balance between the best team always winning and the best rarely winning.  If upsets happen too often, the legitimacy of the title is undermined. 

I personally enjoy both the NBA Playoffs and the NCAA tournament.  My preference, however, is towards the NBA Playoffs, though it can’t match the frenetic nature of a large single-elimination tournament.  This choice is not necessarily based upon the format as much as it is on the fact that the NBA game is played at a much higher level and the game is not dictated as much by the a very close high school/college three-point line.  It’s theoretically possible that if the NBA had a 30-team single-elimination tournament that I’d might prefer such a format to the present 16-team, multiple seven-game series format.  Still, my gut does tell me that there is a sense of satisfaction to the results of the NBA Playoffs because the sample size is fair and results are, more often than not, rational. 

-Because the ultimate outcome is a foregone conclusion, NBA players don’t play as hard as they might otherwise or as hard as NCAA players 

This is the only part of his statement where James loses me.  Talking generally, I can’t really think of much evidence that NBA players play less hard than NCAA players.  In watching NBA versus NCAA game you can’t assume that NCAA players are playing harder because they have a better shot of winning a title.  There are a myriad of factors that motivate players and professionals (money, legacy, sticking in the NBA) and winning title, while important, is only one of them.  Indeed there are plenty of players on the Memphis Grizzlies who need to play well to ensure that they have an NBA career in 2007-08, even if the team’s ownership might not mind a swoon for the next couple of weeks. 

I can understand liking the college atmosphere, which has a certain zealous charm that the NBA game usually does not.  The NBA is a business and its players are playing hard too.  Tim Duncan wasn’t any less stolid in college than he is as a pro.  Likewise, Rasheed Wallace was as much a screaming nut at North Carolina as he is as a pro 11 years later.  

But let’s assume, for the sake of argument, that college players are screaming and diving more than their NBA counterparts.  Does that mean they are playing harder?  James, himself, might admit that perceptions and assumptions about who is playing harder can be illusory.  In his 1982 Baseball Abstract, he addressed this very question when he juxtaposed popular spastic Red Sox third baseman Butch Hobson with the Royals’ smooth center fielder Amos Otis: 

“Nobody will ever convince me that Butch Hobson has gotten out of his talent anything like what he had the potential to be.  Everything about him–his batting style, his defense, his baserunning–is gung ho.  And ill considered.  The only thing he knows about defense is run hard toward the ball and throw it as hard as you can throw it.  That kind of play just does not provide a fertile ground for the development of refined skills.  Two years ago I saw a game in Kansas City in which the fans lustily booed Amos Otis, who had only given them about ten good years, because in one inning he pulled away from two balls that he might have caught….The Kansas City fans will never forgive Amos for being a percentage player, but the Yankees would score only one run in that inning, and Otis would drive in two runs before the night was over and the Royals had won.  And some people will always admire Butch Hobson because, come hell or high water, he always tried for everything.  But I’m not among them.  My favorite player is Amos Otis.” 

Obviously, James’ point in the Hobson essay was somewhat different than the one we are discussing.  But there is a common notion about playing hard and its worth to the game that pervades both situations.  In both cases, the knee jerk assumptions miss the big picture about who is actually imparting a more nuanced (and valuable) game.  Again, you can reasonably prefer the college game and the nature of whacky regional rivalries but to assume NBA players aren’t playing with as much intensity as college players just doesn’t hold water.  

Finally, as for the question of what is good for the NBA, the league’s growth comes from finding great players and great teams and not from free-for-all formats.  Fans will watch the Magic Johnson Lakers play the Larry Bird Celtics every year or Michael Jordan Bulls go for a title just as they will watch the Yankees or Red Sox every year, provided the teams play good entertaining games.  Sure an occasional upset spices things up but the core of any good playoff is excellent teams.  Any concerns about the inevitable nature of the NBA affecting popularity or integrity of the players efforts are unfounded.

But the team is really defending well.  Amazingly, young players James Harden and Jeff Green have both been tough defensively, as have role players like Thabo Sefolosha and Nick Collison.  The end result is that OKC has gone from 20th in defensive efficiency in 2008-09 to 6th this season.  It’s not clear where exactly the extra defensive oomph is coming from.  Delving into the numbers, OKC is up a block a game from last year.  Statistically, the Thunder don’t have any incredible shot blockers but the rookie Ibaka is the best blocker and an improvement upon previous options.  Throw in tough defense from Jeff Green and Harden and a full season of Sefolosha and it’s clear that the Thunder don’t really have many weak defensive players in the rotation, with the possible exception of Nenad Krstic (who is hardly a bad defender).  Finally, a full season of coach Scott Brooks clearly helps.  Defensive systems make a huge difference and Brooks gets a ton of credit for the Thunder’s improvement.

The scary thing about OKC is that there is a lot of room for improvement.  OKC was an awful offensive team in 2008-09 (29th) but have moved up to an adequate 18th this season.  Even a modicum of improvement from Green and Harden (which is a reasonable expectation given his youth) and signing a good scorer at any non-Durant position and this team could be in business going forward. 

Forgetting about the next few seasons, the interesting question at hand is whether the Thunder can be a playoff threat.   Traditional lore seems tell us that young teams don’t generally make a playoff impact.  This is particularly true because the Thunder’s playoff situation is very fluid.  They are currently a five-seed and looking at a tough match up with the Jazz.  Realistically, OKC has a shot of playing almost any one in the West depending on who surges or fades with final month or so of the season.  So, it’s hard to say what will happen.  For fun, here is the Thunder’s record against the playoff teams of the West: 

-Vs. Lakers: 0-3

-Vs. Nuggets: 1-2

-Vs. Mavericks: 1-2

-Vs. Jazz: 3-0

-Vs. Spurs: 1-2

-Vs. Suns: 1-1

-Vs. Blazers: 1-1

    Total: 8-11 

While the sample sizes are small, OKC has a tepid record against the best of the West.  Moreover, they have the worst conference record of the top right Western teams, which is not the best indicator either.  This all seems to tell us that a deep playoff run is not in the cards for 2009-10 (unless the end with Utah in the first round). 

2.    Young Winners:    Another interesting aspect of the Thunder is that it is quite rare to find a successful team with that is so young.  I thought I’d take a look to see how many teams won 50-games with a top three core under 25 years old and no players of consequence over 29 (Nick Collison’s age) to see how other such teams did in the playoffs and beyond.  Not many teams fit neatly into the definition but here are the teams with 50 or more wins that were relatively young: 

-1979-80 Hawks (50-32): This team doesn’t quite fit into what we were looking for but were young.  They had a core of young players:  Fast Eddie Johnson (24 and is NOT the sixth man who played well for the Suns and Kings), Dan Roundfield (26), John Drew (25), and Tree Rollins (24).  It was a classic Hubie Brown job squeezing a nice run out of a deep team.  They lost in their first playoff series to the 76ers 4-1 and fell apart the next season (31-51) before the team dumped Drew for the rights to Dominique Wilkins.  But players around 25 aren’t really that young and are much older than what we’ve seen from OKC.

-1987-88 Bulls (50-32):  This is perhaps the best match for the Thunder.  The Bulls first good team with Michael Jordan.  MJ was only 24 but was putting up 35 ppg.  The rest of the roster was also young: Charles Oakley (24), Sam Vincent (24), Brad Sellers (25), Scottie Pippen (22), and Horace Grant (22).  The only older vets were Dave Corzine (31) and Rory Sparrow (29).  Like the Thunder, the Bulls were defense first (3rd in efficiency) but were much more efficient on offense (9th).  The Bulls took out a good Cavs team in Round 1 before falling to the Bad Boy Pistons 4-1.  Like this year’s Thunder, the Bulls had a star and were expected to gradually improve but it was surprising to see them jump to 50 wins so quickly.  Still, the Bulls were not a playoff stranger, having lost in the first round as an eight-seed the previous two seasons.  The Bulls, of course, went on to be a dynasty but it took a few more years and the development of Pippen and Grant.

-1985-86 Rockets (51-31):  The Rockets were the next big thing with the Twin Towers of Ralph Sampson (25) and Hakeem Olajuwon (23) leading the way.  The next two regulars were also on the young side (Rodney McCray was 24 and Lewis Lloyd was 26).  But this team did have some vets: (Robert Reid was 30 and John Lucas was 32 but was kicked off the team for drug issues after starting 65 games).  The Rockets famously upset the Lakers and went to the NBA Finals before losing to the Celts in Houston’s second playoff appearance with this core.  Sampson’s knee injury helped derail this team but before the Hakeem Rockets returned to title contention in the 1990s.

-1988-89 Knicks (52-30):  Before he struggled in Boston, Rick Pitino was considered a hero in New York for turning around the Knicks, who were awful for years previously.  In 1987-88, Pitino snuck the Knicks into the playoffs as an eight seed before they lost to Boston.  The next season, the Knicks pressing style led them to a division title with a promising young team: Patrick Ewing (26), Charles Oakley (25), Mark Jackson (23), Gerald Wilkins (25),  Johnny Newman (25), and Rod Strickland (22) was a nice core.  The only older players were Trent Tucker (29) and Kiki Vandweghe (30).  The Knicks made it to the second round before losing to the MJ Bulls 4-2.  Pitino ditched New York for Kentucky after the season and the Knicks fell back into playoff fodder until Pat Riley’s arrival.

-1993-94 Orlando Magic (50-32):  Orlando was teeming with young talent between Shaquille O’Neal (21), Penny Hardaway (22) and Nick Anderson (26).  They did have more vets than OKC does though with Scott Skiles (29) and Jeff Turner (31).  The Magic were swept out of the playoffs by the Reggie Miller Pacers.  Orlando followed up with a Finals appearance in 1994-95 and the team only slumped after Shaq bolted for L.A. in 1995.

-1977-78 Portland Trailblazers (58-24):  Portland was hardly a surprise team, as they had won the title in the previous season.  But people forget just how young Portland still was with a core of Lionel Hollins (24), Johnny Davis (22), Bob Gross (24), Maurice Lucas (25), and, of course, Bill Walton (25).  Walton’s broken foot ended this potential dynasty and caused Portland to get knocked out of the playoffs too.  (The only reason the 1976-77 title team is not listed here was because they just missed winning 50 games).  

So, what have we accomplished by looking for other young teams?  Besides the fun stroll down memory lane was also learn that there have been very few good young teams and that none of the other teams on the list are quite as young as OKC is now.  Hell, very few of these teams had one player under 24, let alone the three that the Thunder rely on. I am skeptical that OKC’s youth is a total roadblock to playoff success but we are watching a very rare feat from the Thunder.

                                                        2008-09            2009-10

-Offensive Rating:         103.5 (28th)         110.2 (7th)

-Defensive Rating:        109.5 (21st)         110.5 (27th)

-PPG:                               93.9 (29th)         104.0 (4th)

-OPPG:                            99.3 (14th)         104.2 (25th)

-Pace Factor                    90.1 (20th)            93.6 (10th)

-Attendance Per Game:  12,680 (30th)      12,685 (30th)

The Grizz have changed their style drastically.  The putrid offense of 2008-09, which involved O.J. Mayo and Rudy Gay chucking has become faster and more efficient (though the chucking hasn’t exactly stopped).  There has been sacrifice of in defense (from bad to terrible) but this is easily counter-balanced by the offensive improvement.  Mayo and Gay are both improved a little bit (though Mike Conley hasn’t been much better).  The real improvement has come from Marc Gasol (who went from good to very good) and newly acquired Zach Randolph, who is playing as well as any time since 2006-07 and is huge upgrade over Darko Milicic and Hakim Warrick.

On the downside, Memphis doesn’t appear to have gained any attendance by this improvement.  Attendance takes a while to catch up with improvement on the court/field but one would’ve helped at least some improvement so far.  Also, while we applaud the Grizz for getting back to respectability ,there is also a risk that this is just a modest blip on the radar.  The playoffs seem unlikely.  The Grizz are now 10th in the West and have to fight the Thunder, Hornets, Jazz, and Rockets for the seven or eight seed.  Also, the Grizz are still in a tough spot in terms of decision making.  Gay will be demanding a big contract and the Grizz aren’t usually willing to pay big contracts, let alone to someone like Gay who is not clearly worth near-max money.  On top of that, it is hard to think that Randolph will continue to play this well long-term. 

So how can this team improve, instead of staying as a near-playoff team or regressing?  The only realistic in-house hope is that Hasheem Thabeet develops into a defensive presence, where the Grizz have much room for improvement.  Thabeet has shown some promise in that front (blocking 3.9 shots per-36 minutes and putting up a respectable PER of 16.1, though he is clearly a limited offensive player and fouls way too much).  The other possibility is that the Grizz might want to trade Mayo or Gay (both offense-only scorers with high perceived value) for another defensive player or a point guard.  Gay is more likely to be traded because he’s about to become quite expensive.  There aren’t a ton of names that pop up right now but, short term, Andre Miller would be a nice solution but he is not a lasting long-term one. 

In sum, the Grizz should be happy about 2009-10 so far but there is significant planning to be made and Memphis should not be shy about fan backlash if they trade a player like Gay, since it could help the team and there isn’t much in the way of fan following anyway.  More importantly, being satisfied with the current accomplishments and not making any moves will likely guarantee regression next year. 

2.    Tracing Lucas:    Early this week, John Lucas brought us back to the heady days of the early 2000s when he told AOL Fan House this week that the Cavs had intentionally tanked the 2002-03 season to position themselves to draft LeBron James in the summer of 2003.  Lucas said that while he was coach “[t]hey trade[d] all our guys away and we go real young, and the goal was to get LeBron and also to sell the team.”  In the same article, the Cavs owner at that time, Gordon Gund denied the charge. 

Is Lucas’ accusation true?  As far as I recall, the general consensus was that the Cavs were absolutely tanking.  Of course, the question is two-prong: (1) were the Cavs tanking (probably)? and (2), if so, did Lucas manifest any ambivalence towards this plan at the time?  But let’s go back to 2001-02 and examine how evident it was.  In order to understand the Cavs’ thinking in 2002-03 we have to go back to the forgotten days B-LBJ (Before LeBron).  The pre-LeBron Cavs were not a pretty sight.  After the potential dynasty of the early 1990s flamed out due to injury (Mark Price and Brad Daugherty), age (Larry Nance), and a bad trade (Danny Ferry for Ron Harper), the Cavs spent the rest of the 1990s trying to re-establish the team and fill a new arena.  Mike Fratello made a respectable team in the mid-1990s that made the playoffs but was quite painful to watch (the old snail-paced team behind Terrell Brandon, Bobby Phills, Chris Mills, Tyrone Hill squad).  The Cavs then started over by trading Brandon and Hill for Shawn Kemp in 1997.  Kemp combined with youngsters Derek Anderson, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, and Brevin Knight.  The team had promise and made the playoffs in 1997-98 but fell apart when Kemp gained weight and his drug problem manifested itself and Ilgauskas couldn’t stay helpful.  In the meantime, the Cavs attendance, which was fourth in the NBA in 1994-95 had slowly declined to average by the late 1990s and was near the bottom of the league in 2000. 

By 2001-02, the Cavs were a weak 29-53, hadn’t broken .500 since 1997-98, and hadn’t won a playoff series since 1992-93.  The 2001-02 roster was filled with a few promising young players , notably Andre Miller (age 25, 16.5 ppg, .454 FG%, 4.7 rpg, 10.9 apg, 21.8 PER), Ilgauskas (age 26, 11.1 ppg, .425 FG%, 5.4 rpg, 17.4 PER but coming off of two years of injuries), and Ricky Davis (age 22, 11.7 ppg, .481 FG%, 3.0 rpg, 2.2 apg, 15.9 PER) and some decent filler veterans like Lamond Murray, Wesley Person, and Tyrone Hill. 

Miller was considered a pretty good guard approaching free agency.  In fact, at about this time John Hollinger thought so much of Miller that he called Miller a “star” and one of the top 15 players in the NBA (Miller was also on the cover of Hollinger’s first Basketball Prospectus book, which came out that year).  The rest of this bunch was, at best, useful.  This leaves an ugly situation.  The Cavs were a bad team, with little talent or fan following, and Miller was apparently demanding a maximum contract.  Sports Illustrated did a nice feature on the Cavs’ war room during the 2002 draft and how Lucas and GM Jim Paxson planned to deal with the roster.  Paxson attempted to trade Miller for Lamar Odom and a draft pick that they hoped would be Caron Butler (the deal fell through and the Cavs ended up drafting bust DaJuan Wagner).   Miller was traded later in the summer for Darius Miles, who was only 20 a promising prospect.  Person and Murray were also traded for spare parts (a finished Nick Anderson, 13th man Michael Stewart, and a pick).  When Murray was traded, he wrote an editorial in the Cleveland Plain Dealer and called the Cavs “a house on no foundation” and accused the team of tanking the coming season for LeBron. 

Lucas, who sounded a bit despondent this week about the firing from 2003, was less so when interviewed in 2002 about the team’s prospects for the 2002-03 season.  Lucas told Sports Illustrated during training camp that Ilgauskas could “score 20 points a night” and that Miles “could be a Jordan-type player.”  Lucas did reveal some concern about the season and said that “[y]ou just hope management is patient.”  Well, the Cavs weren’t very patient and Lucas was fired in January 2003 with an 8-34 record (worst in the NBA).  Paxson said that he fired Lucas because “[w]e were not making the kind of progress that we should be making at this point of the season.”  I couldn’t find any article and I have no recollection of any incidents that would’ve precipitated Lucas’ firing, though Miles had an awful season and youngsters Wagner and Chris Mihm were not developing at all.  I’m not sure if the failure of the young players to develop was an element to the firing but we do know that neither of these three really panned out as viable NBA regulars. 

It’s quite obvious the Cavs were tanking at the time and the SI quote from Lucas also reveals that Lucas was at least a little worried that he would be a casualty of the plan to do so.  So, we have to conclude that Lucas was 100% accurate on all fronts when he spoke this week.  He executed the plan and was executed himself as a result.  Of course, that’s how this tanking stuff usually works.  Just ask the coaches for the 1992-93 Mavs, the 1996-97 Celts, the 2002-03 Nuggets, and the 2009-10 Nets.

With an older team, there is a tendency to believe something similar could happen this year too.  KG, Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, and Rasheed Wallace are all approaching 35.  Let’s take a look at how hard Doc Rivers have been monitoring these four this season so far versus the past two years: 

Paul Pierce

-2007-08: 35.9 mpg, 19.6 ppg, .464 FG%, 5.1 rpg, 4.5 apg, 17.4 PER

-2008-09: 37.5 mpg, 20.5 ppg, .457 FG%, 5.6 rpg, 3.6 apg, 17.7 PER

-2009-10: 35.3 mpg, 18.0 ppg, .481 FG%, 4.4 rpg, 3.8 apg, 19.0 PER

Ray Allen

-2007-08: 35.9 mpg, 17.4 ppg, .445 FG%, 3.7 rpg, 3.1 apg, 14.9 PER

-2008-09: 36.4 mpg, 18.2 ppg, .480 FG%, 3.5 rpg, 2.8 apg, 17.3 PER

-2009-10: 35.5 mpg, 15.5 ppg, .460 FG%, 3.0 rpg, 3.0 apg, 14.8 PER

Kevin Garnett

-2007-08: 32.8 mpg, 18.8 ppg, .539 FG%, 9.2 rpg, 3.4 apg, 23.0 PER

-2008-09: 31.1 mpg, 15.8 ppg, .531 FG%, 8.5 rpg, 2.5 apg, 21.2 PER

-2009-10: 30.6 mpg, 15.3 ppg, .569 FG%, 7.5 rpg, 2.5 apg, 20.8 PER

Rasheed Wallace

-2007-08: 30.5 mpg, 12.7 ppg, .432 FG%, 6.6 rpg, 1.8 apg, 17.2 PER (with Pistons)

-2008-09: 32.2 mpg, 12.0 ppg, .419 FG%, 7.4 apg, 1.4 apg, 14.9 PER (with Pistons)

-2009-10: 20.6 mpg, 9.6 ppg, .388 FG%, 3.9 rpg, 0.8 apg, 15.5 PER

So far, Pierce is shooting quite well, which is making him a little more effective than usual.  Allen’s shooting spike of last year seems to have ebbed back to his merely effective playing of two years age.  KG’s minutes have been really carefully monitored.  He’s still quite good but a we can see a little decline from the previous two seasons both in minutes played and in per-minute production.  As for Sheed, offensively, he’s basically only a three-point shooter at this point offensively (averaging 9 threes per-36 minutes this season).  Rivers has been riding Pierce and Allen hard as usual, if not quite as hard as last season.  KG and Allen falling back to earth a little bit has been counterbalanced by Wallace’s presence (a huge improvement over guys like Mikki Moore and Brian Scalabrine) and the fact that Rondo and Kendrick Perkins continue to improve. 

The streak should continue at least three more games.  The next game to watch is Boston’s Christmas day game in Orlando.  Boston is 1-3 against the top teams in the NBA this year so far, with losses against Phoenix, Atlanta, and Orlando (and an opening night win against Cleveland).  Winning some games against the tougher teams will go a long to proving Boston as the favorite to win the East.

2.    Spurs Woes:    Another old favorite, however, has struggled this year.  The Spurs have signed Antonio McDyess and Richard Jefferson in an attempt to squeeze another title run out of the Tim Duncan based team.  So far, things haven’t been good.  The Spurs are only 12-10 and are shockingly mediocre defensively (105.7 defensive efficiency, 13th in the NBA).  There are significant factors to indicate that the Spurs should pick up their pace a bit:

-The Spurs are under performing their Pythagorean W-L, as they have scored/outscored opponents to rightfully be a 14-8 team.

-Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili have been hurt and Duncan is playing as well offensively as ever.  Once they are all healthy and playing full minutes, the Spurs should look much better.

-Outside of the loss in Chicago, the Spurs have no really bad losses, with losses coming against Boston, Denver, OKC (which is a good team this year), Phoenix, and Utah.  Moreover, the rest of December looks very favorable.  The best teams they have to face are Portland (struggling with injuries), Milwaukee, and Miami before Dallas and the Lakers pop up in mid-January.  In fact, the Spurs’ SRS rating is better than last year’s and in line with the 56-win team of 2007-08.

-DeJaun Blair is playing like a potential offensive star to pair with Duncan.  Blair has played only 14.4 mpg but he should take minutes from McDyess, who has really struggled.  In fact 82games.com indicates that the Spurs are much better with Blair on the floor (0.0 point differential) then when McDyess plays (Spurs have been outscored by -9.1 ppg so far).

The one scary indicator, however, is the decline in the defense.  The Spurs 105.7 defensive rating is consistent with the decline that has occurred in each of the last five years.  Fortunately, the offense has also picked up the pace, with its best rating since 1994-95, even though McDyess and Richard Jefferson have both struggled.  Still, the Spurs are predicated on defense and should be able to defend better without yielding too much on offense.  I’m not sure what the problem.  Sure, Bruce Bowen is gone but he is not the player he was and the team defense was already in decline with him the last two years.  Perhaps, this is occuring because of the aging of TD and Manu (who are both playing quite well offensively).  If that is the case, there really isn’t much San Antonio can do but embrace their new identity as an offense-first team.  So I still expect the Spurs to be in the 50-win ranges by the end of the year, though they don’t have the same bite if they don’t defend like they used to.

3.    Spirits Post Script:    Last week, we examined the Spirits of St. Louis deal with the NBA to get television revenues in perpetuity.  One of the issues we looked at was what the value of this right would be if the NBA would ever consider buying the Spirits out with up front money.  We noted that it was tough to value this right, that rests of the NBA continuing to rise in value.  At this point, the right is worth about $24 million per year, with the only risk to the Spirits that the NBA loses value or that the ABA teams all fold.  These risks are quite remote and the buyout would have to be quite high to even get the Spirits to listen.

Just for fun, I ran the case by an expert on valuation.  He looked at the raw public data, which is admittedly limited, and took a stab at the fair value of a buyout right now.  He estimated that the Spirits’ contractual right to revenues is worth nearly $400 million, assuming the revenues never increase off of the current television contract.  If we assume slow steady growth (a fair assumption), the present value is actually about $675 million.  His guess is that a fair buyout number is probably about $500 million.

My feelings is that it is way too early to count the Cavs out.  They will be a title contender this season.  While it is unlikely they win 66 games again, remember that both the 2006-07 and 2007-08 teams were serious playoff threats, going to the NBA Finals and taking the champ Celts seven games respectively.  Another factor to consider is that it is very hard for a team to improve on a 66-win season.  Last year, we reviewed the issue of how teams follow up on seasons after they won 64 games or more the year before.  We found that not a single team matched its win total from the previous season (though they all ended up being at least pretty good).  The point is that perfection (or close to perfection) is impossible.  It may seem to our memory that the past legends were always absolutely dominating the NBA.  Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, and Shaquille O’Neal were usually very good but their teams, even when contending, were not always transcendent.  History tells us that the Cavs should break 50 wins this season but some decline shouldn’t be taken too seriously. 

Putting historical trends aside, the limited data that we do have so far does indicate that scoring is an issue here.  In particular, Mo Williams has been only decent and should improve and Zydrunas Ilgauskas is also likely to improve over his really poor start.  The real question is whether they can get more scoring from the two guard slot.  Anthony Parker, Delonte West, and Jamario Moon need to score a little more for the Cavs to start blowing out teams regularly again.  If not, outside help is needed.  It is a little ironic that Allen Iverson would be an absolutely perfect bench spark for the Cavs if he was willing to accept such a role but that is unlikely to happen.  Cleveland should keep its eyes open to see what scorers become available on the cheap during the season.

2.    Danilo Galinari’s Shooting:  Good news for the Knicks, Galinari isn’t a bust.  He’s not a star but Galinari can shoot and apparently will do so often.   Galinari has one of the more extreme stats lines we’ve seen.  He has averaged 17 ppg but is shooting a ton of threes (about 9 per game) and he’s hitting them too (24-55 for 44% so far).  He can’t really rebound or pass (or create non-three point shots) but for a raw 21-year old he looks like he has some NBA talent.  The Knicks just hope his game rounds out a little more and that he’s not the second coming of Matt Bullard or Brad Lohaus.  The Knicks, by the way, are shooting a ton of threes as a team (leading the NBA with 193 through six games) but making them at an abysmal percentage (28%) which is why the aren’t really winning any games. 

Is there any way Galinari can keep shooting threes at this rate?  Probably not but if he does, he will shatter the record set by George McCloud (678 threes attempted for 8.6 per game for the Mavs in 1995-96).  It should be noted that D’Antoni’s offense is a pretty good place to get that chance as his team’s consistently out three-pointed his opponents over the years.  Here’s a review of D’Antoni’s teams and their three point ranks over the years, along with each team’s three point leader: 

-1998-99 Nuggets, 922 three attempts (18.4 per game, second in NBA), leader Chauncey Billups (5.2 3PAs per game)

-2004-05 Suns, 2,206 three attempts (26.9 per game first in NBA), leader Quentin Richardson (8.0 3PAs per game)

-2005-06 Suns, 2,097 three attempts (25.6 per game, first in the NBA), leader Raja Bell (5.6 3PAs per game)

-2006-07 Suns, 1,966 three attempts (24.0 per game, second in the NBA), leader Raja Bell (6.4 3PAs per game)

-2007-08 Suns, 1,764 three attempts (21.5 per game, fifth in the NBA), leader Raja Bell (5.9 3PAs per game)

-2008-09 Knicks, 2,284 three attempts (27.9 per game, first in the NBA), leader Al Harrington (6.5 3PAs per game) 

Like Q-Rich with Phoenix, Gallinari is clearly in the designated three gunner role and the Knicks’ lack of conventional scoring weapons should keep with ample opportunities.  Indeed, if the Knicks keep their team shooting pace, they will beat last year’s three attempt mark (they are on a pace to shoot 2,638 for the season).

 In addition to the defense issue we noted above, there are other problems with this kind of list.  First and foremost, positional definitions are quite slippery.  Was KG a small forward or a power forward?  Was Tim Duncan a power forward or center?  The fact is we make approximations that can often yield results we don’t love.  That being said, we still have some interesting results here: 

-For the most part, the huge stars like MJ, Magic, and Bird did dominate their positions.  Jordan was in control whenever he played but Magic and Bird didn’t quite dominate as long.  Indeed, Magic and Bird, on occasion, were outplayed statistically by Gus Williams and Adrian Dantley respectively. 

-Power forward in the early 1980s was the weakest single position at any time in the last 30 years.  Before Barkley and Malone, Marques Johnson and Dan Roundfield led the league. 

-Most unlikely PER leaders by position?  Clearly Roundfield is in the discussion.  A couple of nice but underappreciated points like Brandon and Cassell were surprising too.  The most surprising has to be a tie between Cedric Ceballos of 1995-96 and Ilaguaskas of 2005-06.  The Ilgauskas year was more about the lack of great centers than about Big Z playing out of his mind.  

Ceballos, on the other hand, didn’t quite get credit for how well he played in 1995-96.  The NBA had a bunch of great small forwards then (Pippen, Hill, Schrempf, Elliott) and Ceballos was in their class for a short time.  This career year wasn’t out of the blue, as Ceballos had great rate stats as a role player in Phoenix and he was very good in his first year in L.A. in 1994-95.  Still, Ceballos was able to score at a high volume with remarkable efficiency and he boarded and didn’t turn the ball over to boot.  In fact, Ceballos peak with the Lakers (1994-95 and 1995-96) compares favorable to franchise legend James Worthy, who was a similar player.  But Worthy is a Laker playoff legend and Ceballos is more remembered for going AWOL late in the 1995-96 season.  

Ceballos was angered when Magic Johnson’s comeback ate into his shots and minutes.  To express his anger, Ceballos left the team to go water skiing in Arizona and refused to take phone calls from coach Dell Harris.  Ceballos, saw his minutes and playing time erode a little, culminating in two 2-point games in March, which led to the water skiing issues.  Ceballos eventually did make it back to the Lakers and had a fairly solid playoff series against the Rockets (Houston took the series 3-1). 

In retrospect, one might think that the incident is what ended Ceballos’ time in L.A..  It probably didn’t help but they brought him back for 1996-97.   This time, Ceballos struggled playing with new acquisition Shaq.  In eight games with the Lakers in 1996-97, Ceballos has 11 ppg on 41% shooting.  The Lakers decided they needed more of a complementary player who did the little things and dealt Ceballos back to Phoenix for Robert Horry.  Ceballos scored a lot in limited minutes for the Suns (15 ppg in 27 mpg) but he would never get another shot to score like he did with the Lakers.  He played only four more seasons before bouncing to Europe.

Of course, this whole theoretical debate only reveals how silly it is ascribe a particular value to any random 10-year period.  There is no “right” answer to the question of when an NBA seasonal decade starts.  Still, there is something about decades that piques all our interests and that interest compels us to forward.  With that in mind, let’s take a look at the theoretical team of the 00s and assume that the decade starts in 1999-00 if only because that starting point means the decade finished and we can actually review it in its entirety.

Starting in 1999-00, the decade has been run by two teams, the Spurs and the Lakers.  The Spurs went to three finals and have gone 3-0, while the Lakers have been to six finals and gone 4-2.  On the Spurs’ side of the ledger they’ve been a contender for virtually the entire decade (except 1999-00 when and 2008-09 and they had significant injuries and lost in the first round).  The Lakers were a bit more boom bust, with a three-year lull from 2004-05 through 2006-07 where they were a fringe playoff team.

The Lakers averaged 53 wins a year in this ten-year period while the Spurs were at 58 wins per season.  Even in the Spurs’ two seasons with first round exits, they won at least 53 games while the Lakers had two 40-something win seasons and bottomed out at 34 wins in 2004-05.  Head-to-head, however, the Lakers dominated the Spurs, winning four of five series where they met (including the series where Derek Fisher hit that crazy  fade away buzzer beater in 2003-04).  This match up dominance is mitigated by the fact that the Lakers weren’t even good enough to face the Spurs when San Antonio hit its stride in the middle of the decade.  So, how do we choose?  Again, there really is no wrong answer.  The Spurs were the better team on a year-to-year basis but, to me, the Lakers’ six Finals appearance and wins over very good Spurs teams have to give the Lakers the nod.  Indeed, you did get the feeling the Spurs only one the title in years when the Lakers weren’t hitting stride.  Again, it’s close but the Lakers are the team of the 00s, assuming that the 00s begin in 1999-00 and end in 2008-09.  The result could be different if you think the 00s begin in 2000-01.  In this case, it’s even tighter and whomever does better in 2009-10 would probably take the decade title.

2.    More on the 00s: Speaking of the 00s, what about our all-decade team?  This is a fun exercise and shouldn’t yield too many surprises.  As a prefatory note, we are deferring to players who played most of the decade.  LeBron James has been the best player from 2006-07 to the present but he he missed half the decade, so if a player wasn’t quite as good but played ten years, that player will probably could trump him.  So, let’s take a look:

-PG, Jason Kidd: One of the tougher match ups is Kidd versus Nash.  They’ve played nearly as many games as each other and Nash is offensively efficient (16.2 ppg, .494 FG%, 9.1 apg) but we still go with Kidd.  He actually has fewer turnovers per minute than Nash by a good amount and was a great defender and rebounder, while Nash hasn’t been a great defender.  This defensive/rebounding edge slightly tips the scales in Kidd’s favor.

-SG, Kobe Bryant: In 2004-05, the Kobe/McGrady debate was a near dead heat and T-Mac was probably actually ahead.  Since then, Kobe has lapped the field and is the clear best two-guard of this decade.

-SF, LeBron James: LeBron didn’t play the whole decade (only 472 game while competition played about 200 more), but he’s been so good it’s impossible not to take James as the small forward.  If we didn’t choose LBJ, we would be faced with a bit of a quandary.  Kevin Garnett is a plausible pick if the team went with a big front line (KG, Tim Duncan, and Shaq).  If you wanted to be truer to the 00s and the trend of going smaller, the only “small” small forward candidates are McGrady, Vince Carter, and Paul Pierce, all of whom have remarkably similar stats for the whole decade but plenty of black marks on their record:

-T-Mac’s recent decline and unilateral decision to have surgery to submarine a trade last year.  Also in the background was war with Orlando in 2003-04 were he seemingly quit on the team.

-VC has the famous feud in Toronto with Sam Mitchell where he sulked his way out of town.

-Pierce had moments of stupid trash talking and his famous press conference where he sarcastically wrapped his face in bandages like a mummy to emphasize that the refs had missed that he had been fouled in order to contest his ejection in a playoff game against the Pacers in 2004-05.

Despite these incidents, all three players have been, for the most part, gamers and I don’t think we can really say any of the three have had such big problems to exclude them from the comparison.  For the hell of it, here are the stats of the three for the last ten years:

McGrady does the most (scoring, boarding, and passing) but has missed the most games.  Pierce has durability and rebounding but turns over the ball a lot more.  VC is the middle ground candidate between T-Mac and Pierce in most respects.  If forced to choose, we’d take McGrady because he was just so good when he was at the top of his game but there really is not much difference at all here between the players.

-PF, Tim Duncan: Duncan’s not really a power forward and Kevin Garnett actually has better raw numbers but sometimes you just have to go with the gut.  Duncan’s ability to defend was great as was KG’s, though their defensives strengths were and are quite different.  Significantly, Duncan was a serious low post presence on both ends.  He blocked more shots per game than Garnett (2.3 bpg to 1.6 bpg in fewer mpg) and, most critically, could score a basket in the crunch time in the low post (TD also averaged over two free throws per game more than KG in fewer mpg).  If we slot Duncan’s as a center, KG is the clear power forward pick, with Dirk Nowitzki close behind.

-C, Shaquille O’Neal: As with LeBron, Shaq’s weaknesses is his lack of games played.  O’Neal was around for the whole decade but he’s missed a lot of time and has declined quite a bit the last five years.  I would probably take Duncan over Shaq for the decade at center (if forced to choose) but I would prefer to take Shaq over Garnett (and slot Duncan at power forward) based upon O’Neal’s dominance from 1999-00 through 2002-03 when he was the best player on the planet by far and was probably as good as anyone ever in the NBA in the non-Michael Jordan Division.

3.    Leaders of the 00s: Finally, in case, you are curious, here are the statistical leaders of the last decade:

Decade Per Game Leaders (minimum 400 games)

Points Per Game

1.  Kobe Bryant, 28.2 ppg

2.  Allen Iverson, 28.1 ppg

3.  LeBron James, 27.5 ppg

4.  Tracy McGrady, 24.4 ppg

5.  Carmelo Anthony, 24.2 ppg

Rebounds Per Game

1.  Dwight Howard, 12.5 rpg

2.  Kevin Garnett, 12.1 rpg

3.  Tim Duncan, 11.7 rpg

4.  Ben Wallace, 11.2 rpg

5.  Marcus Camby, 10.8 rpg

Assists Per Game

1.  Jason Kidd, 9.2 apg

2.  Steve Nash, 9.1 apg

3.  Stephon Marbury, 7.4 apg

4.  Andre Miller, 7.4 apg

5.  Baron Davis, 7.3 apg

Steals Per Game

1.  Allen Iverson, 2.2 spg

2.  Ron Artest, 2.1 spg

3.  Jason Kidd, 1.9 spg

4.  Baron Davis, 1.9 spg

Doug Christie, 1.9 spg

Shawn Marion, 1.9 spg

Block Per Game

1.  Theo Ratliff, 2.7 bpg

Marcus Camby, 2.7 bpg

3.  Ben Wallace, 2.3 bpg

Tim Duncan, 2.3 bpg

5.  Andrei Kirilenko, 2.2 bpg

Jermaine O’Neal, 2.2 bpg

Shaquille O’Neal, 2.2 bpg

Turnovers Per Game

1.  Allen Iverson, 3.6 topg

2.  Steve Francis, 3.5 topg

3.  Gilbert Arenas, 3.3 topg

LeBron James, 3.3 topg

5.   Kobe Bryant, 3.1 topg

Paul Pierce, 3.1 topg

Carmelo Anthony, 3.1 topg

Jason Kidd, 3.1 topg

Not too many surprises on the per/game leaders,  I was a bit surprised to see Marbury still up the list on assists and that Ratliff’s blocks hadn’t fallen since he became a deep bench player the last few years.  Otherwise, everything is as expected.  Let’s now look at the totals for the decade…

Decade Totals Leaders

Points

1.  Kobe Bryant, 21,065

2.  Allen Iverson, 19,154

3.  Dirk Nowitzki, 18,699

4.  Paul Pierce, 17,812

5.  Vince Carter, 17, 341

Rebounds

1.  Kevin Garnett, 9,288

2.  Tim Duncan, 8,998

3.  Ben Wallace, 8,477

4.  Shawn Marion, 7,384

5.  Shaquille O’Neal, 7,029

Assists

1.  Jason Kidd, 7,029

2.  Steve Nash, 6,885

3.  Andre Miller, 6,020

4.  Baron Davis, 4,902

5.  Stephon Marbury, 4,808

Steals

1.  Allen Iverson, 1,521

2.  Jason Kidd, 1,472

3.  Shawn Marion, 1,362

4.  Baron Davis, 1,292

5.  Kobe Bryant, 1,246

Blocks

1.  Tim Duncan, 1,785

2.  Ben Wallace, 1,772

3.  Marcus Camby, 1,562

4.  Jermaine O’Neal, 1,436

5.  Shaquille O’Neal, 1,431

Turnovers

1.  Allen Iverson, 2,451

2.  Paul Pierce, 2,375

3.  Jason Kidd, 2,330

4.  Kobe Bryant, 2,326

5.  Steve Nash, 2,288

This list essentially corresponds with the per/game list as few of the players accumulated lots of stats in only a few games.  LeBron, Dwight Howard, and a couple of the players that missed a few games fell off the list.  Now, the most interesting list is the per/48 minute list, which probably best reflects the players abilities.  Here we go…

Decade Per-48 Minutes Leaders (minimum 400 games)

Points Per 48

1.  Kobe Bryant, 34.3 p/48

2.  LeBron James, 32.6 p/48

3.  Allen Iverson, 32.2 p/48

4.  Carmelo Anthony, 32.1 p/48

5.  Shaquille O’Neal, 32.0 p/48

Rebounds Per 48

1.  Reggie Evans, 16.8 r/48

Dwight Howard, 16.8 r/48

3.  Dikembe Mutombo, 16.6 r/48

4.  Marcus Camby, 16.5 r/48

5.  Ben Wallace, 16.1 r/48

Assists Per 48

1.  Steve Nash, 13.0 a/48

2.  Jason Kidd, 11.9 a/48

3.  Brevin Knight, 11.7 a/48

4.  Andre Miller, 10.2 a/48

5.  Baron Davis, 9.9 a/48

Steals Per 48

1.  Brevin Knight, 3.2 s/48

2.  Ron Artest, 2.8 s/48

3.  Doug Christie, 2.7 s/48

Darrell Armstrong, 2.7 s/48

Emmanuel Ginobili, 2.7 s/48

Blocks Per 48

1.  Shawn Bradley, 4.7 b/48

Theo Ratliff, 4.7 b/48

3.  Adonal Foyle, 4.5 b/48

4.  Marcus Camby, 4.1 b/48

Greg Ostertag, 4.1 b/48

Turnovers Per 48

1.  Steve Francis, 4.5 to/48

2.  Steve Nash, 4.3 to/48

Gilbert Arenas, 4.3 to/48

Eddy Curry, 4.3 to/48

5.  Allen Iverson, 4.1 to/48

Jerry Stackhouse, 4.1 to/48

Carmelo Anthony, 4.1 to/48

All of a sudden things look a little different.  The list confirms Kobe’s scoring dominance and reminds just how good Shaq was.  We also get a few funny names like Reggie Evans (the rebounding machine) and Brevin Knight, Doug Christie, and Darrell Armstrong for steals.   Shawn Bradley, for all his weaknesses, was a great shot blocker too.  Finally, we are reminded just how much of a gunner Steve Francis was, amassing tons of turnovers and still not really getting much in the way of assists.  Even worse, however, is Eddy Curry.  How the hell is it for a low post player who does not take anyone off the dribble to be turning the ball as often as the most ball dominant point guards in the NBA?  No stat exemplifies just how ugly Isiah’s rule in New York was.

I’m not under the misimpression that Iverson’s a star but he is an interesting player at an interesting time in his career and I am also interested where he ends up.  He’s not a star but he still has some value and he is still perceived to be a star by the casual fan (if not by most teams).  Also, Iverson does not seem to accept the fact that he’s no longer the star.  These tensions create a fascinating scenario where a player’s demands and baggage are larger than his actual value, yet the player is not likely to compromise because the decline in value is a relatively new development and runs contrary to his decade long star appeal.  

At this point in his career, Iverson could fill the following roles: primary scorer (but inefficiently on a bad team) or a scorer off the bench or role player for a good team.  Based upon his time with the Pistons, it’s clear that Iverson will not lightly accept the latter role, though he probably does not want to be on a crappy team either, even as a primary scorer.  So where should Iverson go?  The answer probably lies somewhere in between, a team that is likely to be decent but still is desperate for shot creation in the starting lineup.  To assess this situation, I looked for teams with (1) with a chance to be competitive in 2009-10, (2) an opening at guard,  (3) problems creating shots, and (4) problems scoring (which is somewhat different than shot creation).  Teams falling into that description are Charlotte, Philadelphia, New Orleans, and Miami.  Because of past history, we have to eliminate Philly from the list.  This leaves us with Charlotte (quite possible with the Larry Brown connection, though Charlotte has been tight with the money), New Orleans (doubtful because they are not looking to spend money), and Miami (a perfect Pat Riley contract, where he overpays for an aging superstar just to take a shot).

Where will AI ultimately end up?  Without the benefit of any inside information,  Miami seems like the perfect spot to best balance his interests of being a main scorer but also doing so on a decent club.  He also apparently is talking with a few crappy teams too (Memphis and the Clippers) and has not ruled out retiring if the offers are not acceptable.  It should be fun to see how this ends up.

2.    Fun With Summer League: One of  the fun little past times of the summer is to review the summer league rosters to see what old random names are still on the fringes on the NBA.  This year, we have fewer of such names because the NBA teams have chosen to field fewer summer league teams because of the economic problems in the NBA and the world this last year. With that proviso, here’s the interesting names we’ve found:

James Lang: Lang was drafted in the second round in 2003 out of high school.  He was cut by the Hornets in December 2003 without every playing a game.  Lang’s only NBA experience was 11 games with the Wiz in 2006-07.

Smush Parker: Parker had worked his way back into the NBA with the mediocre Lakers of 2005-2007 vintage.  Miami gave him a nice two year deal in 2007-08 and he promptly played really poorly, got suspended for a legal issue, and was cut before the first year ended.  He played in China in 2008-09 and we probably won’t see him in the NBA again.

Nikoloz Tskitishvili: The ultimate foreign bust (30% career shooter), Tskitishvili hasn’t been in the NBA since 2005-06.  He’s been trying to play summer leagues for a few years now.  He’s still only 26 but has shown nothing as an NBA player yet.

Yaroslav Korolev: Drafted by the Clipps at age 18, he played only 34 games over two season and has been out of the NBA since 2006-07.  He showed even less than Tskitishvili (28% career shooter).  He is less heralded of a bust than Tskitishvili because he wasn’t quite as high a pick.  Korolev’s also even younger than Tskitishvili (22) and has been playing in Russia for a few years.

Mickael Gelabale: Gelabale was a defense specialist for the Sonics in 2006-07 and 2007-08.  He wasn’t great but was useful as a bench player.  He blew out his ACL in late 2007-08 and spent much of last year rehabbing and played a few games in the NBDL at the end of the year to see what he could do.  He played reasonably well (16 ppg, 4 rpg on 50% shooting in six games) and should get another NBA chance next season if he’s healthy.

Earl Barron: This seven-footer was a twelfth man for the Heat from 2005 to 2008, where he didn’t do anything particularly well but developed enough to keep his role as a decent backup.  He spent 2008-09 in Italy, where he was offered a reported $2 million.  Barron was let go in the middle of last season and spent the rest of the year in the NBDL, where he wasn’t great (9.9 ppg, 7.2 rpg on .415% shooting).

Matt Freije: This Vanderbilt product has had two cameos in the NBA.  The problem is he really can’t shoot (he didn’t break 30% in either of his tenures in the NBA) and he wasn’t shy about trying anyway, shooting almost two threes per game and making only .224%.  His hustle style, however, does well with coaches.

Stephane Lasme: the NCAA leading shotblocker from UMass had a cameo with Miami in 2007-08 when they were tanking the season.  He spent 2008-09 with Partizan Belgrade and played pretty well.

Sixth Man:  We noted in our pick of Jason Terry over Nate Robinson, that this award generally goes to a player on a good team because of a perception that the a bench player would have more impact on a good team, than a team that was perpetually behind.  We actually received a decent amount of emails that disagreed with that this theory.  Without taking a position on the issue one way or another, let’s take a look at each Sixth Man and see if this is true:

-1982-83:  Bobby Jones, 76ers (65-17, won title)

-1983-84:  Kevin McHale, Celtics (62-20, won title)

-1984-85:  Kevin McHale, Celtics (63-19, lost in NBA Finals)

-1985-86:  Bill Walton, Celtics (67-15, won title)

-1986-87:  Ricky Pierce, Bucks (50-32, lost in 2nd round)

-1987-88:  Roy Tarpley, Mavs (53-29, lost in conference finals)

-1988-89:  Eddie Johnson, Suns (55-27, lost in conference finals)

-1989-90:  Ricky Pierce, Bucks (44-38, lost in 1st round)

-1990-91:  Detlef Schrempf, Pacers (41-41, lost in 1st round)

-1991-92:  Detlef Schrempf, Pacers (40-42, lost in 1st round)

-1992-93:  Clifford Robinson, Blazers (51-31, lost in 1st round)

-1993-94:  Dell Curry, Hornets (41-41, did not make playoffs)

-1994-95:  Anthony Mason, Knicks (55-27, lost in 2nd round)

-1995-96:  Toni Kukoc, Bulls (72-10, won title)

-1996-97:  John Starks, Knicks (57-25, lost in 2nd round)

-1997-98:  Danny Manning, Suns (56-26, lost in 1st round)

-1998-99:  Darrell Armstrong, Magic (33-17, lost in 1st round)

-1999-00:  Rodney Rogers, Suns (53-29, lost in 2nd round)

-2000-01:  Aaron McKie, 76ers (56-26, lost in NBA finals)

-2001-02:  Corliss Williamson, Pistons (50-32, lost in 2nd round)

-2002-03:  Bobby Jackson, Kings (59-23, lost in 2nd round)

-2003-04:  Antawn Jamison, Mavs (52-30, lost in 1st round)

-2004-05:  Ben Gordon, Bulls (47-35, lost in 1st round)

-2005-06:  Mike Miller, Grizz (49-33, lost in 1st round)

-2006-07:  Leandro Barbosa, Suns (61-21, lost in 2nd round)

-2007-08:  Manu Ginobili, Spurs (56-26, lost in conference finals)

Of the 26 winners, only one, Dell Curry, won the award without being on a playoff team.  In fact, only in the five-years stretch from 1989-90 to 1993-94 has the winner come from teams at or near .500 (Curry, Schrempf twice, and Pierce).  In fact, a scan of the voting records show virtually no support for non-playoff sixth men outside of Curry.  Parenthetically, Curry was probably the best candidate for the 1993-94 award, though Armen Gilliam had as much of a claim for the playoff bound Nets. 

-Most Improved:     In assessing this award, it hits you that silliness of the award.  We don’t know if the criteria is improvement from mediocrity to good player or from star to superstar or whether a surprise improvement matters more than an expected one.  We can infer that the award is meant to be for a surprise performance but at the end of the day, who really cares?  Indeed, many of the awards are forgotten (Don MacLean, Alan Henderson) or were not necessarily that impressive to begin with (Isaac Austin, Bobby Simmons).  Really, the award was instituted mostly because its predecessor, comeback player of the year went too often to a rehabilitated drug/alcohol abuser.  For what it’s worth, there were six comeback players of the year (from 1980-81 through 1985-86) and here is the lowdown on each:

-1980-81, Bernard King, Golden State:  King barely played in 1979-80 for Utah, which I believe was related to substance problems.  King never relapsed and was great for the rest of his career until knee injuries hit.

-1981-82, Gus Williams, Seattle:   Williams sat out 1980-81 in salary dispute with management that ended up back in town a year later, no worse for wear.

-1982-83, Paul Westphal, New York:  After struggling with injuries his first year in New York, Westphal came back and played an 80 game slate, albeit as a part-timer (10 ppg, 5.5 apg in 24.7 mpg).  He would play one more season before retiring.

-1983-84, Adrian Dantley, Utah:  Dantley came back from a major injury to resume his career.

-1984-85, Micheal Ray Richardson, New Jersey:  Richardson is the famous relapser that may have cause the award to disappear.  Richardson, had a very public relapse the next year that ended his NBA career and embarrassed the NBA.  While attitudes have changed as to how to treat addicts in terms of stigma, to this day, it is clear that the NBA has very little tolerance for drug use, as we’ve seen quite a few players bounced quickly and summarily.

-1985-86: Marques Johnson, L.A. Clippers:  Johnson didn’t miss any time with drug issues but after Milwaukee traded him to the Clippers it came out that Johnson had secretly gone to rehab.  He struggled his first year in L.A. in 1984-85 (16.4 ppg, .452 FG%, 5.9 rpg, 14.3 PER) but bounced in 1985-86 (20.3 ppg, .510 FG%, 5.5 rpg, 18.9 PER).  Unfortunately, Johnson promptly blew out his knee in 1986-87 and never really played again (this ironically ocurred when the Clipps lost Norm Nixon in that off-season with a severe knee injury too).   

While drugs certainly where an issue with the comeback award, only Richardson ended up making his award look bad.  Nevertheless, the NBA decided that calling attention to the issue was not a great idea.  Hell, Chris Andersen would be an excellent candidate for the old award this year.  I understand the changes by the NBA office but frankly a return to the comeback award would be a little more fun. 

-MVP:    There is really not so much to say about the MVP this year or in past years, as this award is always well covered.  I though, instead, with the help of Basketball-Reference.com’s  awesome database, we could look at a few of the funnier MVP votes.  By votes, I don’t mean ultimate results but players whom some individual voters deemed MVP worthy.  We can’t hit them all but here are a few highlights: 

-1979-80:  While Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (24.8 ppg, 10.8 rpg, 3.4 bpg) took the award handily, Julius Erving, George Gervin, and Larry Bird, all had several first place votes.  None of this is too shocking but somehow, Tiny Archibald (14.1 ppg, 8.4 apg) and Dan Roundfield(!) (16.5 ppg, 10.3 rpg) each gut some first place votes.  Tiny’s vote was particularly odd since Bird was clearly the best player on the team.

-1980-81:  Somehow, someway, Phil Ford (17.5 ppg, 8.8 apg) and Kelvin Ransey (15.2 pg, 6.9 apg) both got a first place vote, which is more first place votes than Magic Johnson received.

-1981-82:  Larry Bird (22.9 ppg, 10.9 rpg, 5.8 apg) lost out in a close vote to Moses Malone.  The weird thing here is that while Bird had 20 first place votes, some voters felt Robert Parish (19.9 ppg, 10.8 rpg)  was the better player, as he received four first place votes.

-1983-84:  Did you know that Jeff Ruland received a first place vote for a team that went 35-47?   Ruland had a very good year but there was no basis for him to get that type of vote.

-1988-89:  The award voting had fewer sloppy votes after 1984 but there are still some oddities.  For example, Magic and MJ had most of the votes but Patrick Ewing (22.7 ppg, 9.3 apg) had eight first place votes when Hakeem Olajuwon (24.8 ppg, 13.5 rpg) had a better season and only two first placers.  In fact, Ewing never outplayed Hakeem year-by-year.  Even so, consistently a few voters would give Ewing some first place votes over Olajuwon. 

-2000-01:  Shaq has rarely received fair treatment from the voters.  His loss to Allen Iverson in the 2000-01 voting is one thing but the margin of vote was nuts.  AI had 93 first place votes to only seven for Shaq (who finished behind Tim Duncan too).  Shaq was better than both players by a fair amount, though his feud with Kobe Bryant obviously hurt him.  Still, there is no way Shaq should’ve fallen that much.

-2002-03:    In another odd development, Ben Wallace (6.9 ppg, 15.4 rpg) received a first place vote, when the field included Shaq (27.5 ppg, 11.1 rpg), Garnett (23.0 ppg, 13.4 rpg), and Duncan (23.3 ppg, 12.9 rpg). 

-2003-04:   We love Peja Stojakovic (24.2 ppg, 6.3 rpg) but his getting a first place vote over KG (24.2 ppg, 13.9 rpg, 5.0 apg) is astounding.

There are plenty other odd choices over the years but I thought the above choices were particularly without merit, with Ransey being the most weird.  The bottom line is that MVP voting has some holes around the margins.  I assume the weird results occur because of local influences.  The end lesson is not to take the voting too much to heart.  Mistakes happen and that doesn’t change who objectively was the best.