Game Thread GAME# 44: BLAZERS @ HEAT - MARCH 25, 2021 - THURSDAY, 4:30, TNT & NBCSNW

He never won COTY, did he?

 

This drives me nuts.
How does LA close out games? Give lebron the ball and everyone clear out. Nets? Harden/Kyrie, one on one and they make a play. Giannis? Ball at the top and make a play. What did they do with Kobe? Jordan? I get caring “how it looks” when a team wins. But to isolate it to Portland is ridiculous. The cute comments and pictures about Stotts just giving Lillard the ball and that’s his plan- no shit- that better be his plan. That’s what coaches do. Get the ball to their best player and let him win the game. This isn’t high school. Will they lose in the playoffs, yes. They don’t defend well enough. But the “Stotts gets bailed out again” is dumb.

 

LA doesn't have the 30th ranked defense in the league. but im glad you're happy i guess. no one is sitting here rooting for losses. my general attitude in real life changes when we lose. i hate it. But the way we're winning is going to get us swept in round one.

 

I am never unhappy with a Blazers win.

 

Exactly, you can run all kinds of analytics and statistical modeling, but the most accurate metric to predict a result and quantify a team’s quality is simply margin of victory/net rating. Right now the Blazers are 20th in the league with negative net rating of about -1.0; simply put, they are giving up more points than they are scoring. When they play good teams they get blown out and they are eeking out wins over bad teams that Dame is single handedly pulling out with his greatness. You run this with enough instances over time and the numbers will catch up to you.

So wins are great, but the way you win does matter.

 

what a shitty fan you must be for thinking this.

 

The same way he was unplayable two years ago?

 

I guess with one arm he must play better defense.

 

Huh?

 

But if you take the set of players we've been playing with Nurk & CJ out, that's roughly what our net margin should be... using advanced stats as a metric. It's more about who we've been playing not how we've been playing. Surprise, shitty defenders yields shitty defense. Hood & Trent --> Powell & more Little, will improve our defense and our offense. Nurk will improve our defense. Things are looking up.

 

Dunleavy actually coached a great year. He was fired because he changed after winning it and lost his team the following year.

 

Good stuff y'all. Loved the stotts insanity bit Eric.

 

You know the way you lose matters also obviously if you are going to take that metric and make it a tell all (It's Not At All).
They win 3 games by 3pts 5 pts 4pts. and then lose one game by 20 points on the fourth game in 6 nights and the second of a B2B guess what?
There metric as you have explained it has them -8 margin of victory rating but they are still 3-1. So they are giving up more points than they are scoring.
Sorry what you have come up with here is utter trash.

 

When this came out yes. Orlando was the 2nd of a B2B and with after a game against the Heat that i figured would have Butler.
Circumstances change quickly. Also just because Orlando is a mess right now don't think those are not NBA players. The Blazers still need to come out and play a game.
Another issue was we didn't know exactly when CJ or Nurk would be back?
Another win on the road is always a good thing.

 

Haha funny. Maybe take statistics 101 before you call it trash. I make my living off statistical modeling and predictive algorithms.

Answer this question. How many of those below .500 teams that you beat by 3pts, 4pts and 5pts will you face in the playoffs genius???

 

My response was hypothetical. How about we take the wins against the 76ers 4 pts, Dallas 3 pts, and the Pelicans 2 pts. All probable playoff teams. then we take the loss to the Mavs by 40.
What you are doing is trying to make a living off statistical modeling and I'm actually building the model and bringing home a paycheck.

 

You obviously don’t know how statistics work so there’s no point in continuing here.