Most believe that NBA title contention is likely limited to Boston, Cleveland, and the Los Angeles Lakers. I was just checking out Basketball-Reference’s cool playoff probability reports, which essentially confirm all of our hunches on this point. As of right now, each team of these teams has about the same chance of winning the title (with Cleveland a little bit higher on the totem pole). Moreover, each team is projected to win at least 63 games. Assuming everyone stays healthy, all three teams should be playing well until the end of the season if only because home court will definitely be on the line all season long.
Quick Thoughts
1. The Things We Say: We’re not too interested about what’s going on this All-Star Weekend. We don’t loath the show but frankly it’s just not that much of a priority for us. That being said, the NBA All-Star weekend is probably the most interesting of such events (for whatever that’s worth). Rather than get too much into the All-Star show, I thought we’d reflect on a few of the interesting happens of the past week, some of which can be filtered through some quotes that I found interesting:
NBA Draft Update
After two of stronger, deeper drafts ever, the 2009 draft is going to be fairly normal. There are no can’t miss stars and the best player, Blake Griffin, is more of a hard worker than a great athlete. This is mainly due to a weak freshman class. The sophomores who stuck around from last years’ incredible class are by themselves a more impressive group than the ‘09 freshmen. That means the winners from the 2009 draft are going to be players who stayed in school for another year, because they’ll be making more money and will have the security of coming in as higher draft picks. The losers will be the teams with multiple picks in round one who will find the pickings pretty slim after the lottery. That’s Minnesota and Oklahoma City.
I listed 60 players in sort of a tiered system. It’s not really a mock draft, but how I would rank the players at this point in time everything else being equal. These rankings are based on current stats, the player’s history and their size/athleticism/potential. It’s mainly about the stats though. These rankings are also very fluid and will likely change quite a bit as the season gets into the tournaments. Don’t expect many, if any of these players to improve their stock, but there are some who will decline. This includes NCAA players only. I’ll bring the international players in on this later.
Quick Thoughts
1. All-Star Stuff: Nothing gets me less excited than the All-Star game and the surrounding All-Star picks and controversies. As we’ve said before, we rarely catch more than a few moments of the whole weekend. Still, we do feel compelled to give our take the usual controversies. The most obvious problem with the rosters is the fact that Allen Iverson is starting. AI has been a bit above-average this season and nothing more but his popularity, at this point, seems to transcend performance. Jon Machora of the Detroit Free Press had an interesting interview with Jeff Van Gundy on the Iverson issue. Van Gundy gave a response to the larger issue: “I mean the fans vote, so I think the bigger question is: Should the fans have the vote? And I think the answer to that question is absolutely not. I think All-Star selections mean too much to the players to leave it in the hands of just the fans. I think the fans should have a part of the vote, but I think the players should have a vote, I think the coaches should have a vote, and I think the fan vote should be limited. It’s too easy to skew it by just stuffing ballots for people.”
The Alonzo Mourning FAQ
Usually when an inner circle Hall of Fame-type player retires, we take the opportunity to examine his career closely with one of our FAQs. Well, Alonzo Mourning just recently retired and he’s not quite good enough to be inner circle material. Still, Zo has both an interesting personal story and he was a very good player and we’re interesting enough to plunge forward to see what we can learn about him personally and as a player from a close examination of his career.
Transactions 12/16-1/19
Charlotte Bobcats
1/16 Traded Matt Carroll and Ryan Hollins to Dallas for DeSagana Diop
Taking this trade from a Larry Brown perspective, it makes some sense. Brown loves defense and does not necessarily appreciate shooters who don’t defend like Carroll. But look a bit closer and this makes no objective sense. Yes, Diop can block shots and defend but he can do nothing else (.379 FG%, 4.5 pts/36 minutes) and his boards and blocks aren’t even that astounding. In terms of actual need, the Bobcats are 9th in defensive efficiency and 27th in offensive efficiency. A non-offense guy like Diop might not actually really fill a hole.