At the start of each football game a coin is tossed to determine who will receive the opening kick-off. Let’s imagine if instead of just one team calling heads or tails the fans in attendance were also asked to make a call. And let’s further imagine that if you make the correct call, you get to stay. But if you are wrong, you have to leave.
Okay, now let’s do a bit more imagining. Let’s say 80,000 fans are in attendance – and since fans know it is a fair coin (equally likely to be heads or tails) — about 40,000 make the wrong call. So these fans exit the building. After they are gone, let’s imagine we play the same game again. This time, about 20,000 fans are incorrect and they depart. And then we play it again, and again, and again… After three tosses we are left with about 10,000 fans. After seven tosses there are about 625 fans. After twelve tosses we should still have about 40 people left in the stands.
Now what have these 40 people learned? These people have just called a coin flip correctly twelve consecutive times. Clearly these people are incredible at this game.
If we play the game one more time, though, we should expect about 20 more to depart. What will these departing fans have learned? Well, clearly they just didn’t match-up with the 20 who got the 13th call correctly. And they better go home and figure out why that particular match-up didn’t work if they ever wish to see another football game.
The above scenario was adapted from Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s book Fooled by Randomness [(2005): pp. 165]. This book argues that people often have problems understanding randomness. And what it says is relevant to how people see the NBA playoffs.
Orlando Better than Cleveland?
Consider the Eastern Conference Finals.
In the regular season the Cleveland Cavaliers had the best won-loss record and posted the highest efficiency differential (offensive efficiency minus defensive efficiency) in the league. In fact their mark of 9.74 was the fifth best in the NBA since 1973-74.
In the first two rounds of the playoffs the Cavaliers performed as expected by sweeping both the Pistons and Hawks. And then in the Eastern Conference finals they met the Orlando Magic.
The Magic took six games to eliminate the 76ers in the first round. And in the second round – against a Celtic team that did not have Kevin Garnett – the Magic took seven games. Entering the series against the Cavs, few people expected the Magic to win. And when we look at these two teams, no one should have expected a Magic victory. Certainly everyone should have thought it was possible for Orlando to win. But the expected outcome –given the quality of the two teams – is that Cleveland should win.
Despite this expectation, though, the Magic did win. Consequently we are now hearing explanations for how this happened. One specific story is that the Magic match-up so well against the Cavs. After all, in the regular season the Magic beat the Cavs twice.
When we look at the Cavs season, though, we see that the Washington Wizards – the very worst team in the Eastern Conference – also beat the Cavaliers twice. Other than Cleveland, the Wizards only had two victories against Sacramento, Minnesota, and New Jersey. So Cleveland was the only winning team the Wizards beat more than once. From this evidence I guess we should now conclude that the Wizards match-up well with Cleveland as well.
Of course, there’s another possibility. The Magic won the first game of the Eastern Conference Finals by one point. In the fourth game the Magic prevailed in overtime. Had the Cavs won either game this series would have had probably had a Game Seven in Cleveland. Now it’s possible the Magic could have won seventh game as well. But that would not have been the likely outcome.
Perhaps another way to think about this is to imagine Cleveland and Orlando played this series 10,000 times. Given this number of trials we would expect to see every possible scenario appear at least once. And given the quality of the teams at the onset, the most frequent outcome in our 10,000 trials is Cleveland winning. But Orlando winning in six games would also show up in our trials. If we considered all 10,000 outcomes, though, we would end up concluding Cleveland was the better team. In reality, though, we didn’t get 10,000 trials. All we got was one. And that one trial had Orlando winning. From this one trial people are concluding that Orlando – who was clearly not as good during the 82 game regular season – is actually better than Cleveland.
Let me repeat what I said a few days ago:
It’s important to remember that despite what you hear on television, the playoffs are not really designed to identify the best team. The Drunkard’s Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by Leonard Mlodinow (a wonderful book) contains the following passage relevant to any discussion of predicting the winner in a best-of-seven playoff series.
“…if one team is good enough to warrant beating another in 55% of its games, the weaker team will nevertheless win a 7-game series about 4 times out of 10. And if the superior team could beat its opponent, on average, 2 out of 3 times they meet, the inferior team will still win a 7-game series about once every 5 match-ups. There is really no way for a sports league to change this. In the lopsided 2/3-probability case, for example, you’d have to play a series consisting of at minimum the best of 23 games to determine the winner with what is called statistical significance, meaning the weaker team would be crowned champion 5 percent or less of the time. And in the case of one team’s having only a 55-45 edge, the shortest significant “world series” would be the best of 269 games, a tedious endeavor indeed! So sports playoff series can be fun and exciting, but being crowned “world champion” is not a reliable indication that a team is actually the best one.” (p. 70-71).
The small sample we see in the playoffs imposes an element of randomness on the outcome. This randomness makes it interesting, but it also makes decision-making complicated. Already we are hearing how the Cavaliers need to change their roster to compete with the Magic in the future. In fact, the people who are running the Cavaliers are making such statements.
But I don’t think this is the lesson to be learned from the Eastern Conference Finals. The lesson to be learned is that in a small sample of games an upset can occur. It’s possible for a good team like the Magic to defeat a great team like the Cavs. Just as it was possible for a very bad team like the Wizards to win two games against Cleveland in the regular season. And just as it is possible –given the set-up of the imaginary scenario outline above – for 20 people to call a coin toss correctly 13 times in a row.
The True Hoop Stat Geek Smackdown
Okay, just to be clear. The playoffs are not a scientific test that will tell us the identity of the best team.
That being said… heading into the NBA Finals I am still holding on to the top spot in the True Hoop Stat Geek Smackdown. For the Finals I am taking the Lakers, and if LA does win then I am the winner.
If Orlando wins, though, Jeff Ma finishes in first. Ma has picked Orlando to win the Finals in seven games. Does this mean that Ma believes Orlando is the best team? Not according to Henry Abbott. As Abbott notes, “In essence, every single stat expert thinks the Lakers will win this series.” Abbott goes on to note, “As Hollinger and Berri have both picked the Lakers, Jeffrey Ma is the only person besides Berri with a chance to win. Once again, he (Ma) writes, “I find myself in the unenviable position of making a pick simply to be contrarian and hoping for the best.”
Let’s summarize. We have a contest to see who has the best approach to picking winners in the NBA playoffs. It’s possible for Jeff Ma to win this contest, but only by going against his approach. So if Orlando wins, does this mean Ma’s approach is the best? How can that be when Ma’s approach clearly says before the series starts that LA is the better choice?
Given these questions – and with tongue firmly planted in cheek – I am going to have to lodge an official protest with the True Hoop Smackdown management. If Orlando does prevail (and as we saw in the Eastern Conference Finals, that’s certainly possible) I will follow the lead of Norm Coleman (who is apparently willing to go to the Supreme Court to prevent the funniest senator in the history of Congress from taking his seat) and do whatever I can to prevent Ma from being declared the winner.
Let me close by making two observations. First, much of what I just said about small samples and randomness was noted in the comments on the last post. Secondly, if the Lakers do prevail and I am the winner, then I take back everything I just said about randomness and the playoffs. Clearly, if you have the right model (and of course I do), then the playoffs are very predictable (by the way, that was a joke also).
– DJ
The WoW Journal Comments Policy
Our research on the NBA was summarized HERE.
The Technical Notes at wagesofwins.com provides substantially more information on the published research behind Wins Produced and Win Score
Wins Produced, Win Score, and PAWSmin are also discussed in the following posts:
Simple Models of Player Performance
What Wins Produced Says and What It Does Not Say
Introducing PAWSmin — and a Defense of Box Score Statistics
Finally, A Guide to Evaluating Models contains useful hints on how to interpret and evaluate statistical models.
Wages of Wins Journal 
Benny
June 3, 2009
Sure, to achieve statistical significance you may need to play 23 games or more to decide who is clearly the better team…
but both teams understand that they need to win in a 7 game series. Thus is the nature of sport. Both teams are expected to bring their best performances.
In addition, teams make coaching adjustments to better match up against each other throughout the series. They play each other differently from game to game.
Also, the Wizards may have snuck up on the Cavs in the regular season, but we must assume that Cavs brought their best level of preparedness to this series.
Had LeBron not hit a buzzer beater in game 3, and had a heroic 4th quarter in game 5, then this series could easily have been a 4 game sweep.
Cavs had difficulty matching up with Orlando. This was evident in the playoffs and in the regular season. A coin flip is different because the process at achieving the outcome (flipping the coin) is the same every time.
But 2 teams playing each other in a playoff series is like a chess match. Once you start figuring out your opponent’s tendencies and strategies, you adjust.
Remember, Cavs may have been the better NBA team throughout the season, when you rank teams on a scale based on Off/Def efficiency, but that’s not what decides their fate. They needed to be better than the Magic not on a scale, but when pitted against each other. They clearly were not.
simulator
June 3, 2009
One question I’d like to see answered, but there probably aren’t enough data : How much do match-ups matter?
The only way to find out is if we have a large number of games played between two teams in a single season (since teams change from year-to-year).
If indeed there are effects of match-ups (I think that there are), then the question of who’s the better team between two teams is not as straight-forward.
Michael
June 3, 2009
How odd, I have literally just bought ‘Fooled by Randomness’ by Nassim Taleb. It came yesterday in a set it with ‘The Black Swan.’ I take it its a good read then?
As for the True Hoop challenge, congrats on being the front runner. I have a feeling Orlando may take this one (mainly because Howard is such a beast) but that is only based on my subjective opinion!
Evan
June 3, 2009
Taleb is the greatest, as long as you don’t take every single word literally.
ps. Prof, you’re better when you don’t add political comments.
Evan
June 3, 2009
ps. perhaps far afield, but Taleb is betting that we will experience deflation or hyperinflation. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20603037&sid=aniHRyYnpBDM&refer=home
Todd
June 3, 2009
Bravo on a great post Dr. Berri. I really enjoyed it. One thing I would note is that it looks like Hollinger blew his chance to win by not selecting the Ma strategy. I guess nobody’s PERfect.
Ray
June 3, 2009
With all due respect to the model and randomness and all that jive, I think Cleveland just ran itno a damning matchup. I thought Orlando would take Cleveland to the wire before the series started. Who could guard Howard? Nobody could. Z got absolutely torched. Turkoglu being guarded by Delonte? I love Delonte, but he’s giving up 8 inches to Hedo. That’s scary enough for a 7 game series, but Pietrus played like a man, and helped shorten the series. I believe that if they played 100 games, Orlando would win 55 or 60.
Kobe Bryant's Robotic Cousin
June 3, 2009
Ray — get real. It’s purely coincidence that Dwight Howard’s FG% went from 55% on 16 ppg against Boston to 65% on 26 ppg against Cleveland. It has nothing to do with the individual and team defense he faced; just a mere blip on the radar.
horsecow
June 3, 2009
Great post, although I still love watching the imperfect, random playoffs.
One things Steve Nash said in an interview recently applies here: the NBA really ought to give the team that finishes with the best record in the league more of a reward. When you think about it, that’s a more significant achievement (statistically speaking), and should have a commensurate reward — maybe a $5 million dollar luxury tax allowance for the next year, or a higher draft pick?
John G
June 3, 2009
Teams are not coins.
Zach
June 3, 2009
I think that the only thing that can be said about the playoffs with absolute certainly has just been said by John G.
PJ
June 3, 2009
Yeah, I have to say, Professor Berri, this is not your best post. The target moves a few times — you mention point differential, e.g., but fail to observe that while Washington beat Cleveland by 4 and 3 points, Orlando won their two games against Cleveland (they lost a third, by four points) by 11 and 29 (!). You mention Orlando’s close wins in the series, but not Cleveland’s first victory, which was arguably the most improbable result of all, given the difficulty of LeBron’s game-winner.
Could Cleveland win a seven-game series against Orlando? Sure. But match-ups do matter, and the six playoff and three regular season games suggest that Orlando is more likely to win such a series.
On the match-ups theme: I can think of at least one especially big reason a depleted Boston team took Orlando to seven games. His name is Kendrick Perkins. Watching him guard Howard, and then watching Ilgauskus and Varejao and Wallace try, you couldn’t help but think about the importance of match-ups. Since Boston could cover Howard with one man, they didn’t need to rely on double-teams, and thus didn’t constantly leave shooters open, like Cleveland did.
Phil
June 3, 2009
Prof Berri,
Most analysts pointed to Howard, Lewis and Turkgolu having matchup advantages. Surely, a more comprehensive analysis (from a WP perspective) would be to test if their WP rose against Cleveland in the playoffs and regular season.
An adjustment would be necessary as Cleveland is better than the average team, but that’s about it. 10 games is a reasonable sample size to draw some estimations from.
Ray
June 3, 2009
(I feel stupid for making a serious address to a ridiculous screen name. Here goes.)
Kobe Bryant Robotic Cousin (see how stupid that sounded?),
I hope you’re being facetious. Dwight Howard’s FG% and scoring increase most certainly had something to do with Ilgauskas on him. Perkins is perhaps the best defensive center in the league. Ilgauskas is probably one of the slowest players in the league. Howard got easy shot after easy shot on Z.
JohnG is right. Teams are not coins. Orlando had advantages in places where Cleveland were disadvantaged. And I’ve been a believer in Mike Brown, but he didn’t make the adjustments to reduce the damage of Orlando’s advantages.
PJ
June 3, 2009
I think KBRC might have been joking, Ray.
The one support for Berri’s argument in this post, such as it is, might come from the FG%’s of Mo Williams, Delonte West, and Wally World. I haven’t checked, but I’m guessing they were lower than usual. Of course, Orlando did have one of the league’s best defenses, so even that is probably not simply random — but FG% does tend to fluctuate, if I’m not mistaken, more than other stats (which makes sense, given that sometimes the ball rims out, sometimes you get a lucky bounce, etc).
Michael
June 3, 2009
Ray has a point about Perkins. The guy is ridiculously strong. Gasol and Bynum however have no chance holding position against Dwight.
Ray
June 3, 2009
PJ-That’s what I’m hoping. I think that blip on the radar comment made it sound like he was being real. But I couldn’t tell, so I tried not to be too defensive. But yes Mo shot the ball very poorly. He had 1 really good game that inflated his % but other than thatt, he probably is the single biggest reason they lost that series. Shame on Mo.
Italian Stallion
June 3, 2009
Prof Berri,
If I understand the contest and standings correctly, it would appear that Jeff Ma has been quite logical in picking the Magic assuming the goal of any contest is to win. He cannot win by picking the Lakers. Of course, it does also suggest he does not have the best model. :-)
Evan,
I have made a substantial bet against deflation with my own net worth. I have been buying gold and silver for several years and have now begun buying agricultural, industrial, and energy commodities and other precious metals with all available extra cash.
The basic strategy in Washington has long been that expanding deficits and easy money can be used to solve the problems of a country suffering from excesses – typically too much easy money and credit previously. That worked fine when the excesses were small, but they have been built to such extreme in recent decades that they now involve a huge current account deficit and external debt.
The current/former adminsitrations and the current/former Federal Reserve chiefs have already demonstrated conclusively that they will print whatever amount of money it takes to avoid deflation. They say they can unwind it, but there is little evidence that governments, central bankers, or Wall St can avoid the lure of easy money and take a dose credit deflation, loss and the other associated adjustments to create a healthy economy now that we have totally fiat money and are not confined domestically or internationally by gold.
Eventually, the rest of the world is going to pull the plug on the US Dollar as the reserve currency. It will decline a lot and dollar priced commodities will rise. Even if that does not happen very soon, demand for such items will increase again as the bubble is reflated. There is very little new supply of such things available now and they won’t be available for a long time. IMO, commodities are a win big or win very big situation over the next 10 years. (no clue about the next few months)
Of course this has nothing to do with basketball, but as long as I have already annoyed many of you I thought I should at least repay you with some sound value oriented investment advice.
;-) Oh yea, Lakers in 5.
Ray
June 3, 2009
Italian Stallion with the smackdown of vast knowledge! MVP of the comment section for the day.
mrparker
June 3, 2009
Is this not a stat site where it is implicitly understood that there is a great correlation between point differential and wins/losses. After 4 games in this series 3 were decided by 1 point. Wouldn’t that suggest that either team could have come out 2-1 in those games? I don’t know how anyone could call this article into question.
Sam Cohen
June 3, 2009
While Professor Berri mocks the idea that the Wizards match up well with the Cavaliers because of the two regular season wins, I actually think that the success of the Wizards could be taken as more evidence that match-ups matter. In particular, the Wizards often play Antawn Jamison at the power forward position. Just like Rashard Lewis, Jamison often does much of his damage with jumpshots from out on the perimeter (or at least often starts his offense from there). That’s two teams with quick, perimeter-oriented power forwards that had more success than expected against Cleveland (with small sample size duly noted). Are there other power forwards that fit the same mold as Jamison and Lewis? And if so, did their teams do better than expected (point differential? wins?) against Cleveland?
Darrin Thompson
June 4, 2009
Deming said the same thing only about managers of people in industry. That they constantly tamper with their systems of work with no knowledge of variation and come to wrong conclusions more often than not about what is working, and what needs to change, and worse, who needs “talked to” about the quality or efficiency of their work.
Ganesh
June 4, 2009
Is it fair to say that the best “regular season” team doesn’t necessarily translate to the best “playoff” team? Great playoff teams have always had a good low-post scorer who could get buckets at a 60% clip. The only three teams that won championships without a dominant big man were the Pistons (bad boy and more recently) and Jordan’s bulls.
To be honest, after 10,000 trials, i feel like the Magic would come out on top more often than not, and probably in the same ratio as they won this series (66% to 33%). Now you can call this my survivorship bias, but in each game it felt like the Magic were in control.
brgulker
June 4, 2009
First, can you imagine an NBA Playoffs with a best of 10,000 game series? That would suck some serious you-know-what, no?
Second, I find it interesting that instead of taking the 10 games (was it 10?) that Cle and Orl played each other and applying the WoW’s metrics to those ten games, we get a discussion of randomness, samples sizes that are too small, and the like.
I only took one class in stats, and it was related to the social sciences, so I have only a basic understanding of what a ‘good’ sample size would be; but, I don’t think that dismisses my question — does it?
If we took these ten games, applied the WoW metrics, what would the result be? And what conclusions could we draw, no matter how tentative?
Third, I’m glad that the playoffs are comprised of 7 game series. How much would the playoffs suck if we did have a ‘big enough’ sample size so that the ‘better team’ always won? Seven games makes upsets possible, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Fourth, I don’t particularly like the way we’re using the phrase ‘better team.’ The nature of sports is that the ‘better team’ is the team who wins in any given competition (single regular season game or playoff series).
So is Cleveland better than Orlando right now? Only on paper. And only with respect to the rest of the NBA franchises. But, when the two teams have played each other this season, Orlando is the better team, because they have convincingly won the large majority of the games. Such is the nature of sport, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Fifth, it is a bit strange that prof would cite the close margin of the two games Orlando won without citing the close margin by which Cleveland won its two games — with a heroic, very improbable fade-away three pointer with one second left, and in overtime. Why is the former important to the discussion and the latter not? And why aren’t the two blowout games important? I’m asking honestly, not rhetorically. That does not make sense to me.
Tball
June 4, 2009
There were 3 games decided in the closing seconds. Two went the way of the Magic and one went the way of the Cavs. Those games could have gone all Cavs, all Magic, or two to the Cavs and one to the Magic. These possibilities exist even with the difficulty Cavs had defending Howard. If Lewis doesn’t hit his 3 with 14 seconds left, who knows how much that changes the rest of the series.
I don’t think anyone is saying the Magic didn’t earn their place in the Finals. I don’t think anyone is saying Howard’s performance is luck. But with imperceptable changes in performance (e.g., an extra missed/made free throw, a second foul called against Howard early in the game, etc.) outcomes can change. The Magic couldn’t stop LeBron, but they still won the series. The Cavs could have won the series without stopping Howard and they could have won the series with their current personnel.
If the coin comes up tails, it doesn’t mean the heads side is broken and needs to be refaced. If the Trailblazers win the lottery, it doesn’t mean Memphis lost the improper number of games. The Cavs current personnel may have given them a 55% chance to win this series and it just didn’t happen.
As a side note, I think it is generally bad game theory to be altering your personnel to match up better with one team. First, that team is going to make their own changes, so they are a moving target. Second, my making those changes, you may expose yourself to matchup problems against other teams (e.g., Celtics, Lakers, Hawks). You are better off simply constructing the best team possible and leaving the coaches to worry about matchups.
Westy
June 4, 2009
I think it’s worth noting that the Cavs compiled their regular season advantage in efficiency differential by being incredibly consistent. Outside of the Wizards, they basically took care of all the lower half NBA teams. As has been observed, however, they did somewhat struggle against the other elite NBA teams.
Orlando, on the other hand, was much more inconsistent. They had more losses to lesser teams, but did relatively well against the NBA elite.
I don’t think it’s too much of a jump to suspect that a good possibility might be the following:
Cleveland, while a very good team, does not have a peak game/series effort that matches Orlando’s. While they are much better on average due to their consistency, Orlando’s maximum possible level of play is actually higher despite their average during the regular season being lower due to their lack of consistency.
In essence, I think it’s at least possible that Orlando’s maximum level of play is higher than Cleveland’s if they are focussed.
Evan
June 4, 2009
Or Orlando is a team with more variance, seeing as how they shoot more 3s.
dustin
June 4, 2009
If you want to prove matchups matter, you need to PREDICT something. If someone wants to go on the record making a prediction for teams that “don’t matchup well” next year, go ahead.
Personally I think I’ll stick to point differential.
Zach
June 4, 2009
@ Westy,
You pointed out that the Cavs basically took care of the lower half. This is true. But they also basically took care of the upper half . Against the playoff teams + Phoenix (since Phoenix was a lot better than say, Detroit), the Cavs went 31-13, with an avg scoring margin of +5.6. Meanwhile, the Magic went 27-15 against the same set, with an avg scoring margin of +3.7. One might then say: “the Cavs went 3-6 against the “super-elite” and the Magic went 6-3″. But this is another very small sample and making claims based on it is data dredging. You (and this is not aimed at you specifically, Westy) can’t just arbitrarily draw the line at 59 wins because it helps you make your case.
It is POSSIBLE (as you said, Westy) that the Magic are just better at playing super-elite teams than the Cavs (14-8 v. 5-10 overall). But I think randomness is a much simpler, more elegant explanation.
All that said, the Magic won. That makes them winners (at least for now), and the Cavs losers (at least for now). And since Celtics couldn’t carry the water this year, Go Magic! Beat LA.
Evan
June 4, 2009
Beat LA is something I think we can all agree with…and all agree probably won’t happen.
Joe
June 4, 2009
THE DIFFERENCE IS, CLEVELAND WAS THE HEAVY FAVORITE AND THEY SHOULD HAVE BEATEN ORLANDO SOUNDLY. THE FACT THAT THE TWO FIRST GAMES IN CLEVELAND WERE SO CLOSE MAKE YOU WONDER IF THEY REALLY SHOULD HAVE BEEN THEH FAVORITES. THIS IS NOT THE SAME AS TOSSING A COIN. SURE, LOSING BY ONE POINT OR IN OVERTIME CAN BE ATTRIBUTED TO RANDOM CHANCE, BUT THE FACT IS CLEVELAND SHOULD HAVE NOT LET IT COME TO THAT, AND THATS WHY THEY SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN CONSIDERED FAVORITES. JUST BECAUSE YOUR MODEL WORKS AS MUCH AS IT DOES, ITS CLEARLY NOT 100% ACCURATE. I HAPPENED TO PICK THE SAME TEAMS AS YOU DID FOR THE STAT GEEK SMACKDOWN AND I DIDNT USE YOUR MODEL. I JUST UNDERSTAND THE GAME.
Westy
June 4, 2009
I agree Zach and Evan.
Alien Human Hybrid
June 4, 2009
We may be witnessing a randomly occurring streak- one where Orlando’s perimeter players shoot very well.
At the risk of stating the obvious, Orlando is a tough match for anyone if they hit their 3’s. And by anyone I mean any team in history. If a defense oriented team has a post presence that rebounds, blocks shots, shoot a very high percentage *and* perimeter players who are knocking down 3s at greater than 40% rate, they will likely be very successful.
When I look at Orlando they remind me of a hockey team with a hot goalie.
brgulker
June 4, 2009
I think we can all agree that Joe just hit one out of the park, fellas. Well said….err, shouted.
/sarcasm.
Rick Blaine
June 4, 2009
The Black Swan in the series was Mo Williams’ shooting being absolutely horrendous and personally costing the Cavs games 1 and 4, and almost blowing game 2.
If he just goes 7 for 19 in game 1, Cavs win. If he goes 6 for 15 in game 4, Cavs win.
When a team’s second-best player can’t throw the ball in the ocean in four games, that team will lose the series.
Ray
June 4, 2009
Rick Blaine, you nailed it. Mo ruined the series for the Cavs. Someone pointed out how only Jordan’s Bulls and the Bad Boys won without a great post player, and I think the Cavs solidified that claim. I think the fact LeBron got 66 wins and 2 playoff sweeps out of this team shows just how great he really is, but to really win championships (the most defining aspect of LeBron’s career) he’s going to need a big man. It may only take Carlos Boozer to get the Cavs where they need to be, but Mo Williams can’t be your 2nd best guy on a championship team.
As great as Jordan was, and he did buck the trend of winning without a dominant big man, he needed one of the best Small Forwards of all time. Compare Pippen with Mo Williams, and tell me how LeBron can compete with that. I love Mo to death, but he really should be the 3rd guy for the Cavs, and let a big man assume the role of LeBron’s sidekick (unless there’s another Pippen out there.)
jbrett
June 4, 2009
Dustin,
I’m not sure this is precisely on point for your comment about predicting bad matchups, but Charles Barkley has now picked Orlando twice to win series based on matchups; if they beat the Lakers, he’ll be 2 for 2.
Jonnie
June 4, 2009
Of course matchups are important in the NBA. Your analogy of a coin toss is really not the same thing. Basketball is more of an art than a science.
Mark
June 4, 2009
Capitalism doesn’t work anymore. The economy strayed from its roots of producing real tangible stuff and instead created securtized products which did nothing more than transfer wealth to Wall Street without creating anything of real lasting value.
kevin
June 5, 2009
So, mark, does that mean you’re picking Orlando then?
Clara
June 5, 2009
I agree many game match ups are important, but I think it is different with a game of basketball than just sitting there flipping a coin. This reminds me of an event that is coming up in the fall called the Sports Legends Challenge. Many legendary athletes will be there, but this time it’s all on the game of poker…they may be sports stars, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they will be good poker players. It’s like comparing apples to oranges. So which team were you rooting for?
dustin
June 5, 2009
I think we need a new letter:
“G. Basketball players are not coins”
Caleb
June 5, 2009
Are you really completely dismissing matchups? That’s silly. Predicting basketball based on efficiency differntials is limited by “randomness”, sure, but its also limited because matchups are not taken into account. Orlando may not be the better team against the rest of the league, but they are a team that can beat Cleveleand because they have certain matchup advantages. It is not a reach to make that conclusion after watching the series, or watching Orlando and Cleveland play in the regular season.
I also hate the “Orlando was hot” theory that has been expressed in the comments. They were “hot” because they were getting LOTS of open looks. A good 3-point shooting team should be expected to shoot 40% or more from 3 whenever the opposing team is giving up open shots because of. That’s not random either.
Ian
June 5, 2009
Cleveland had the better numbers in the regular season, which explains why statistical systems suggested the Cavs would win the series. The problem here is if matchups ever have any effect in basketball whatsoever, you’ll basically never see that effect in any team quality metrics.
Here’s a simple example. Let’s say there are three types of team in the league: Rock, Paper and Scissors. Rock essentially always beats Scissors, which almost always beats Paper, which almost always beats Rock. If the types of team are evenly distributed in the league, neither type of team should have a significant advantage in regular season stats.
Still, even if all the teams are equally matched in reality, some will perform better and some worse in any given season. Let’s say the best Scissors team wins 60% of its games, and the worst Rock team to make the playoffs wins 40%. Regular season statistics would suggest the Scissors team has the advantage in the matchup.
But really, Rock clearly has the advantage because it nearly always beats Scissors. You lose this information by averaging over it in your statistical metrics.
It’s something of a blind spot. If a statistical system really tries to take team matchups into account, it’s doomed to be swamped by the noise that happens because teams only play a handful of times in the regular season. If it doesn’t, you’re not going to be able to see if matchups ever do have an effect.
Clay Kallam
June 5, 2009
One thing that tends to happen in these kinds of discussion is a division into either/or — but, to be a little Zen, let’s transcend duality for a bit.
Yes, the swing of random statistics impacts the outcome of events. So, however, do human adjustments to situations. (From my limited understanding, that’s part of what happened in the recent economic meltdown. The formulae were great as long as no humans intervened in their functioning — or, as long as no one called in any debt on AIG.)
We’ve all seen enough playoffs to know this simple truth: The best team doesn’t always win, unless (and only unless) you define the best team as the one that wins the playoffs. If you define the best team by regular season wins or playoff+regular season wins, or by some arcane statistical mechanism, it’s clear that the best team does not win, and in fact probably won’t. The margin between the teams is simply not great enough to overcome one of the two factors (random statistical variation or human adjustment) in every game.
Which is why I really hate the mindset that the only thing that matters in a season is winning a post-season tournament, however structured. To me, 82 games is a much better indicator of quality than (at most) 28.
anon
June 5, 2009
I think the orlando cavs series (like dallas/golden state a few years back) illustrates a fundamental flaw in WOW’s assumptions. WOW says talent is all that matters and coaches are statistically insignificant. So a team that has a higher average wow than another team will always win over the course of a statistically significant number of games. However, in both the case of Orlando against the Cavs in recent seasons (and Golden State against dallas then), this does not hold. I don’t think seven is statistically significant. But I do think that Orlando would win over a statistically significant sample size.
The more important point is the statistically significant sample berri did regression on to come up with WOW is the regular season. And WOW tells us that the team with the highest average WOW will generate the most wins over the course of the season. This makes sense. Because teams see so much variety over the course of a season, talent can overwhelm strategy. But what we’re seeing in the playoffs is not randomness, but WOW’s inherent limitations. Orlando is not an aberration.
Zach
June 5, 2009
OK, it is late here in DC, so I probably shouldn’t post. But I’ll try to be reasonable.
@anon
“I think the orlando cavs series (like dallas/golden state a few years back) illustrates a fundamental flaw in WOW’s assumptions. ”
I think many people (anon just being a good example right now) forget that “WoW”, or wp48 more precisely, is just an explanatory and predictive tool. That is, it explains past performance and predicts future performance with a good degree of accuracy; it is not a crystal ball.
Identifying one or two (or many more) instances where the inferior team won does not indicate a flaw; in fact, a model that predicts with 80% or 90% accuracy in these cases is pretty good.
Dustin Stevenson
June 5, 2009
In diagnosing what Cleveland’s management should do, DJ disregards the fact that basketball players are human elements – thus they are affected by psychology, this is in fact part of what makes a team good. If Cleveland’s players (in part, perhaps, because they misunderstand randomness) believe themselves to be inferior it will impact their play and management should provide some other stimulous, a new player, to counteract this.
Likewise, to talk of a 10,000 game series as though it would clear anything up is misleading. Neither team is a closed system; they are both constantly receiving new information/material and thus changing. The teams that play the 10,000th game would both be very different teams that those that played the first game. The same is true of every game in between. If we think of 2 poker hands, one of 2 aces, 2, 3, 4 and the other of 3 kings, 7,8 – it is easy to see which is superior – if the hands are closed systems, the second hand will win every time. In the case of teams it is unlikely that over a one game period there would be a change that could be analogous to drawing a new card, but over 500 games? The changes the first team went through (even disregarding physical changes) could very well be like swapping an ace for a 5. Which then is the better hand?
anon
June 6, 2009
@Zach, if you read my post, i agree. WOW works well over the course of a regular season and is a strong model to predict which team will have the most wins and how many wins they will have (and, correspondingly, which team will do bad). The comments in this thread aren’t contesting that. They are contesting Berri’s dogmatism. He takes WOW to mean more than it should and he is zealous about it. Which makes some sense, after all, it is his statistical model. And he’s not alone in this. The adjusted +/- purists are just as dogmatic and dismissive of everything else. Both are useful and somewhat explanatory. But both have serious limitations. And matchups is a real limitation. If berri is going to write a post saying that his model says matchups are irrelevant and over 10,000 games cleveland would win, then people have a right to point out that he’s overstating the value of his system.
dberri
June 6, 2009
anon,
You are not stating my argument correctly. What I am arguing is that the outcome of the series does not establish Orlando is a better team than Cleveland. And the match-up story was an explanation offered after the fact to explain an outcome that reflects a random element in the playoffs. To illustrate my point, see how many people you can find who argued Orlando would win this series because of its “match-up superiority” before the series began. And of those people (assuming you can find some), how many have established empirically that match-ups are a causal factor that does predict outcome in the playoffs? My sense is most people offering the match-up story picked Cleveland when the series started.
By the way, there is a name for this behavior. It is called “hindsight bias”. Perhaps a post on that would be helpful.
coachbean
June 6, 2009
The quarter may be an arbitrary cutoff point but during the regular season Orlando won 8 of the 12 quarters against Cleveland. In the playoff series Orlando won 15 of the 25 quarters (if you count the overtime as a “quarter”). It seems if we increase the sample size by looking at sub-samples we again see indication of Orlando’s superiority.
uber_snotling
June 6, 2009
-Prof.
Your response to anon is an example of “the appeal to popular belief” fallacy common in philosophical arguments. It does not address the substance of the comments.
Orlando winning the series could be an example of the randomness affect you describe. It could also be an example of the match-up superiority hypothesis. However, given the sample sizes available (maximum of 9 to 11 games per season) it would be very difficult to make this a statistically testable theory.
I would note that even if the “match-up superiority” hypothesis is correct and Orlando was likely to win 2-of-3 games, the randomness of the 7-game series would still be true and Cleveland could still win. These two explanations are not mutually exclusive.
Ray
June 6, 2009
dberri,
I absolutely thought Orlando’s match-up problems would reign terror on the Cavs before the series. Everyone said Cavs in 4 or 5. I said Cavs in 7. I knew the Magic were gonna hit 3s (they did) but I didn’t predict Howard would hit 70% of his free throws, and I didn’t know Big Z, Andy, or Big Ben could be scored on every time. Throw in Howard’s play and whatta ya know? Magic in 6.
And I’m a Cleveland fan, so all I have now is being able to say “I told you so.” When the Magic were up 40 on the Cavs in their last regular season match-up, I started asking questions.
Ray
June 6, 2009
I meant Magic in 7… that’s poor proof-reading on my part. Sorry about that.
mrparker
June 6, 2009
dberri,
I was doing some vague looking into some random nba stats. It seems that missed fg < treb over the course of an nba season seems to be a pretty good indicator of ability to be champion. Only one year where at least one team fits this description did a team who did not fit that description win the championship(detroit 04). I suspect that team fit the description after the rasheed wallace trade.
I think that would lend some extra credibility to what Wow has already suggested.
Caleb
June 6, 2009
D. Berri… I think people are having a problem with your post and your responses because you seem to be completely dismissing the idea of matchups. Has it been empirically established that it was a matchup advantage that led to Orlando winning the series? Well of course not, and I’m not sure how one would even be able to go about establishing something like that. But empirical analysis is not always neccesarry. In fact, I find it a bit ridiculous that you don’t accept that player matchups have an effect in a playoff series because it’s never been emprically established. Let’s say there’s a Player A and a Player B…. Player A is taller, stronger, quicker than Player B and has an expansive skillset, but Player B has to do his best to defend Player A. Do we really need a study to tell us that this dynamic will result in an advantage for the team that employs Player A? I don’t think so.
I understand the comments about “hindsight bias, ” but the circumstantial evidence does indeed suggest that Orlando won because of decided matchup advantages. Orlando won the regular season series last season, they won the regular season series this season, and now they have won a playoff series against Cleveland. Could that all be “randomness,”? Yes, it could… but it seems more likely that Cleveland simply has trouble against Orlando because of specific matchups.
mrparker
June 6, 2009
I should clarify that I didn’t look back further than 2000 and that both Orlando and LA fit the description
Tyler
June 6, 2009
I’m fascinated by the statistical side of things, however I do think it’s simplification to relate outcomes to pure random probability. Basketball games are not a coinflip. Shots are random (not 50/50, but depending on the person’s skill, clearly random variance applies, no question. ). The outcome of close games is likely random. However, blow-out games, generally, are not. And a seven-game series, in my years of watching basketball, generally identifies the best team (or a team with a fatal flaw such as an injury or strategy).
I love the recent trend to adding complex, intuitive statistics to the game. However, when you focus only on the stats, you lose the full picture. I know that’s what you do, but when you stay entrenched in that position you start looking myopic. Orlando was the better team, demonstrated in 3 years of CLE-ORL matchups, because of the significant difficulties the ORL roster presented for Cleveland. That people’s statistical models didn’t show this, to me, has always shown a prediliction for regular-season models to forget that one-off matchups are much more about a team’s general abilities, while playoff series are more about a team’s specific abilities to target weaknesses and adapt strategy.
Congratulations, you’re quite likely to win the Smackdown. Don’t let it get to your head, haha.
Zach
June 6, 2009
I thought it would be useful to post the wiki on Fooled by Randomness:
“Taleb sets forth the idea that modern humans are often unaware of the very existence of randomness. They tend to explain random outcomes as non-random.
Human beings:
overestimate causality, e.g., we see Mosques in the clouds instead of understanding that there are just random clouds that appear to our eyes as Mosques (or something else);
tend to view the world as more explainable than it really is, i.e., we look for explanations even when there are none.
Other randomness misperceptions discussed:
Survivorship bias. We see the winners and “learn” from them, while forgetting the huge unseen cemetery of losers.”
I think it’s instructive because this comment thread certainly supports that the argument that many people are very resistant to the idea that randomness is a plausible explanation for unexpected events.
I also happen to think this is an important argument in case Cleveland’s management decides to overinterpret their loss and try to match up better (e.g. ditch the productive Varejao for a multi-talented but unproductive player like Al Harrington).
Jim Glass
June 6, 2009
I dont see what all the fuss is about here. A lot of people seem to grossly over-estimate by how much Cleveland was supposed to be better, and so think some sort of special explanation for the upset is necessary.
Cleveland won only 7 more games than Orlando out of 82, in conference only 3 more out of 52. That means they won 1 more game per 13 played, or per 17 — yet there was only a max of 7 games in the series. With such an objectively very small difference between the teams each game between them was basically a coin flip with a coin just slightly weighed against Orldando. Cleveland’s expected advantages was only one-half game or less out of seven.
Specifically, the full season W-L pcts give Cleveland an expected probability of winning a seven-game series of about 67% (about 63% by the confenence w-l %) which means Orlando had a good one-in-three chance of winning the series on the plain face of things — and one-out-of-three ain’t any kind of historic upset. (There are many more sophisticated ways of projecting expected w-l but they give very similar results.)
So “Orlando won with matchups” … duh, of course they did! They were a 59-win team, of course they had some matchup advantages. That doesn’t change the chance element of the series at all. Cleveland had advantages too, which go ignored when they lose. Fans see who won, then look backward and come up with your explanation of why they won. Orlando’s matchup advantages paid off! (Except in the two games they lost.)
But if the only thing different in the entire series had been that Cleveland won all the close games determined by luck, so Cleveland had won in six, nobody would be talking about Orlando’s matchup advantages — even though they would have been totally unchanged. They’d be talking about how the great Lebron dominated, etc.
And have no doubt that those close games are determined by luck. Sports fans are loath to think that games — especially crunch-time playoff games, and thus championships! — are determined by luck and chance, so they come up with beliefs like “great teams win close games, with character, guts, top coaching …”, but nothing could be further from the truth.
Vince Lombardi’s record with the Packers in games decided by 7 points or less was exactly .500. Bill Walsh’s with all his 49er championship teams was 43%. All baseball sabremetricians know one-run games have chance outcomes. As a Knicks fan back from the Red Holzman championship era of smart and great basketball, Isiah pretty much put me off the NBA so I haven’t followed it closely recently. But a few years back when I last checked the NBA for this, Detroit with the best record in the NBA was just a tad over .500 in close (5-pt or less) games, and Portland wtih the worst record in the league was very close to .500 too.
Great teams stomp on other teams, and split their close games when they don’t. Rotten teams get stomped on by other teams, and split their close games.
In a Cleveland-Orlando series, where the W-L differential between the teams is 0.085 — only 8.5 games per 100 — *every game* is fundamentally close. That is all the explanation needed for any outcome. Playoff series, as Billy Beane says about baseball, are basically weighted crap shoots. Then the fans and sportswriters afterward come up with all the dramatic rationalizations they want for what happened.
Jim Glass
June 6, 2009
“The nature of sports is that the ‘better team’ is the team who wins in any given competition (single regular season game or playoff series).”
This is exactly wrong. Ring Lardner knew “the race is not always to the swift … though that’s the way to bet”.
Upsets happen all the time, in the playoffs as well as the regular season. In baseball, the Cards won the World Series a few years back after an 82-win season. Were they the best team in baseball?
The nature of sports is that the goal is to win The Championship. You build as good a team as you can because that *increases your chances* of doing so. The best team has the best chance. But it does not guarantee winning.
The best team/competitor often doesn’t win, at Wibledon, the Super Bowl, wherever. It is reality-denying to ignore the role chance plays in these competitions, and so deny that “the best” may lose.
And it is no slight to The Champion to admit it is not the best team/competitor — because the whole goal of building a good team is to win the championship … and if you win the championship with the 2nd best or 3rd best team, no matter … you have **achieved your goal**!!
Believe me, if you are at tennis player who goes into Wibledon as the 16th seed and win it all, everyone will hail you as The Champion, nobody will think you are the best player in the world, that won’t bother you a bit, you’ll be proud as a peacock about it the rest of your life, and have every right to be.
It’s the same for the upset Champion in every other sport.
Brian Tung
June 6, 2009
One need only read the comments here to appreciate how difficult it is to understand randomness and statistical conclusions. Hell, I do it for a living and I don’t understand it nearly as well as I’d like.
I’m not even sure where people Berri is supposed to have “dismissed” matchups. All I see is him claiming that Orlando’s series win did not demonstrate that Orlando matches up better with Cleveland than vice versa. He specifically did not claim that Orlando does NOT match up better.
It’s a subtle point, but one I think must be understood to read this post properly: Just because something doesn’t happen to show that something is true doesn’t mean it isn’t; it just means it hasn’t been shown. I get the feeling that many people are inferring (incorrectly) that the result must be either all superiority, or all randomness, and that Berri is saying it is the latter. On the contrary, it is always a mixture of the two (in any interesting contest), and it is the latter that makes it impossible to reliably determine the former–at least in any timely fashion.
As an aside, I’m pretty sure that when folks like Barkley say that “the better team always wins a seven-game series,” they are not saying there’s something magical about seven-games series, as much as they’re defining “better” as “wins a seven-game series.” At least, that’s the way I’ve always understood them.
Brian Tung
June 6, 2009
uber_snotling: But I think Berri’s supposed “appeal to popular belief” was not used (or misused) in its ordinary capacity: to establish a position by appeal to its popularity. In fact, the popular belief Berri referred to is one he characterizes as over-simplistic.
Specifically, Berri’s side point (and it’s only a side point) was that lots of folks came up with the matchup issue only after the series was substantially over, not beforehand. That is evidence that it was largely a post hoc explanation.
Of course there were plenty of people to suggest matchup advantages for Orlando beforehand, but there were plenty to suggest them the other way, too. It’s the increase in the former after the series was over that is a reflection of people’s tendency to post-hockery.
Overall, there are not only matchup issues, but how those matchups are utilized and/or defended against that bear on the result of a series. These strategic decisions are not constant over the series, but may change dynamically from game to game. There are simply too many variables for anyone to reliably predict who will win a series. Sure, some people will have correctly predicted the winner of each series this year, but when you have so many people making predictions, is that a surprise?
And yet these people will almost universally think that they have the right formula. Berri’s point in the opening coin-flipping exercise was not that teams were coins–obviously they’re not–but that people see meaning in results, and skill in the ability to predict those results, even when the results have a large component of randomness in them.
shawn
June 6, 2009
I find it interesting in the portion where he states that “Had the Cavs won either game this series would have had probably had a Game Seven in Cleveland.” when speaking of the 2 games that Orlando won by close margins, yet fails to mention the fact that Cleveland won game 2 on buzzer beater.
Maybe you should also mention that other than game 5, in the 2008-2009 regular season and postseason, they faced one another 8 times, and Cleveland was losing at the 47 minute mark in all 8 of those contests, and only once was leading at the 47:59 mark. That might have a little more to do with the Cleveland-Orlando matchup than “coin-flips.”
Jim Glass
June 6, 2009
this comment thread certainly supports that the argument that many people are very resistant to the idea that randomness is a plausible explanation for unexpected events.
Yes, and this behavior although intellectually irrational is easily explainable both in evolutionary terms for people generally and for coaches and players in the sporting world in particular.
Say success is determined by a combination of things you do and can control, plus random events you can’t control — well, as it actually is. To maximize success of course you want to focus on the things you can control and forget the things you can’t, put the latter out of your mind. This is true even if the ratio of impact they have on your life is 10% what you do and 90% random chance. You still want to totally maximize what you get out of that 10%.
You don’t want to wander around distracted by all the random things that can do you in at any moment … how your success or (failure) is unfairly due to chance … how your rival’s success is due to dumb luck … etc. Wasting mental resources on such makes people more prone to failure — and thus more likely to be removed from the gene pool.
So natural selection has culled people to be largely blind to the randomness of life, and instead to see causation everywhere. Even, very often, where it’s not.
And pro football coaches never, never say to their teams, “You know guys, more than 50% of all NFL game outcomes are determined by random chance”, even though it is true.
I also happen to think this is an important argument in case Cleveland’s management decides to overinterpret their loss and try to match up better (e.g. ditch the productive Varejao…
Yes, while you want the players’ efforts focused entirely on what they can control, coaches and GMs had better know the difference between what they can control and what results from dumb luck.
If you are a coach you had better not punish/reward players for chance events, or you will be heading for problems.
I’m old enough to remember Vince Lombardi, and one of the curious things about him was that while he was so tough he would often tear his team a new one even after they won a one-sided game, after close loses he was supportive of his team. “Sometimes the clock runs out on you when you happen to be behind” was one of his sayings. If outcomes of close games indicated team character then Lombardi of all people would’ve raged after close loses — but it was about the only time he was philosophical. I mentioned he had a .500 career record in one-score games.
Similarly, if you are a GM and your team puts together a good record solely by winning more one-score games than anyone else in the league, you’d better not think “We’re really good, good teams win close games, this proves it, we can stand pat”, or you’ll be heading for a fall. And if your team puts together a top record in the league by stomping other teams all year, then gets eliminated from the playoffs in a tough, one-score game, against another good team, you’d better not think, “Damn, we have everything but character and leadership under pressure, so I’m going to fire the coach and shake up the line-up”, or you could be taking a knife to your own throat.
Andrew
June 6, 2009
The coinflip analogy rubs almost everyone the wrong way because it is so gleefully invested in producing randomness as a kind of determinism. Randomness in the NBA is nothing of the sort.
The coin flipper is divorced from the reason that the coin lands heads or tails, but that’s not so in the NBA. A shot goes in or out because of something that the shooter or the defender does. In order to understand basketball as a coin flip, we have to take ceteris paribus everything that makes the game interesting: intensity, athleticism, skill.
Even when game outcomes are random, it’s still important to acknowledge that players actually did make plays that won or lost the game. There is none of this in the coinflip analogy, so it’s no wonder most are seeing it as an unpleasant analogy.
Brian Tung
June 7, 2009
Andrew: But the lesson of the coin flipping analogy is not supposed to be applied to the coin (i.e., the teams or the games) but to those explaining/predicting the coin flips (i.e., basketball prognosticators and the like). The point is that because there are so many prognosticators, some of them are bound to perform significantly better than expected (some significantly worse, too). The point of the coin flip analogy is to illustrate that those people don’t necessarily know any better what’s going to happen. They MIGHT, but the fact that they got all the answers right is no real demonstration of that.
The anecdote of Fermi and the great generals is also applicable in this regard.
Andrew
June 7, 2009
Also, I’ll add, it seems foolish to dismiss the idea that matchups play an important role in the NBA. Let me illustrate:
A player shooting 50% over the course of a season just means that. It just means that if you take a random shot from the past season, half the time it went in. It obviously doesn’t mean that no matter what the player’s next shot is, it will go in half the time.
This seems important because certain types of shots go in a lot more often than others (assisted shots, uncontested shots, shots in the immediate basket area, etc.). If a team has defenders who give up more of those types of shots, or who foul more than other teams’ defenders, why wouldn’t that affect the probability of winning?
In the abstract, we can certainly conceive of a scenario in which this would happen. It seems that you’re arguing that the skill level of players who guard certain positions in the NBA is close enough to render matchup effects negligible compared to other factors?
mrparker
June 7, 2009
Can’t we all just cease with this battle of semantics. Alot of us are sick of hearing monday morning quarterbacks claim that they knew about the orl/clev thing ahead of time. We are sick of people acting like 3 one point games explain anything. Orlando who was a 60 something win team if everyone except Nelson was healthy was a pretty good team who had the disadvantage of not having home court.
On the other hand there are those who predicted that Orlando would win that series and there reason for that confidence was “matchups” and/or regular season. They want the credit for knowing what would happen.
The other side is unwilling to give that credit. There is no way of convincing any side of anything beside calling a 30 game rematch.
So, I propose that we all shut up about unless some other concrete examples are introduced proving or disproving one side of the argument.
Hate Flowers
June 7, 2009
In J.A. Adande’s latest piece on Lamar Odom at ESPN.COM, Lamar Odom reveals that he understands the economics of the game. When asked if he is playing for more money (Odom will become a free agent at the end of the season), here was his response: “If [money] was the case, I would just shoot; I would try to get 20 points,” Odom said. “Right now, it’s not really what’s important. What’s important is for us to win the championship. Everybody’s happy after that.”
John
June 7, 2009
Wow. The end of this comment section got really good in a hurry. Jim Glass and Brian Tung, please continue commenting on this blog if possible.
Prof. Berri,
This was an excellent post, both the content and because it was bound to generate at least some (new) interesting discussion. It’d be great if you could mix in more of these with the usual (excellent) analysis.
John Giagnorio
June 7, 2009
(I’m dropping JohnG as a handle after the other John G made that brilliant “basketball teams are not coins” remark)
Hate Flowers
June 7, 2009
Warren Buffet used this exact same example in his speech about “The Super Investors of Graham and Doddsville”.
His words are better than my attempt at paraphrashing, so I’ve copied and pasted the introduction:
“Before we begin this examination, I would like you to imagine a national coin-flipping contest. Let’s assume we get 225 million Americans up tomorrow morning and we ask them all to wager a dollar. They go out in the morning at sunrise, and they all call the flip of a coin. If they call correctly, they win a dollar from those who called wrong. Each day the losers drop out, and on the subsequent day the stakes build as all previous winnings are put on the line. After ten flips on ten mornings, there will be approximately 220,000 people in the United States who have correctly called ten flips in a row. They each will have won a little over $1,000.
Now this group will probably start getting a little puffed up about this, human nature being what it is. They may try to be modest, but at cocktail parties they will occasionally admit to attractive members of the opposite sex what their technique is, and what marvelous insights they bring to the field of flipping.
Assuming that the winners are getting the appropriate rewards from the losers, in another ten days we will have 215 people who have successfully called their coin flips 20 times in a row and who, by this exercise, each have turned one dollar into a little over $1 million. $225 million would have been lost, $225 million would have been won.
By then, this group will really lose their heads. They will probably write books on “How I turned a Dollar into a Million in Twenty Days Working Thirty Seconds a Morning.” Worse yet, they’ll probably start jetting around the country attending seminars on efficient coin-flipping and tackling skeptical professors with, ” If it can’t be done, why are there 215 of us?”
By then some business school professor will probably be rude enough to bring up the fact that if 225 million orangutans had engaged in a similar exercise, the results would be much the same – 215 egotistical orangutans with 20 straight winning flips.
Would argue, however, that there are some important differences in the examples I am going to present. For one thing, if (a) you had taken 225 million orangutans distributed roughly as the U.S. population is; if (b) 215 winners were left after 20 days; and if (c) you found that 40 came from a particular zoo in Omaha, you would be pretty sure you were on to something. So you would probably go out and ask the zookeeper about what he’s feeding them, whether they had special exercises, what books they read, and who knows what else. That is, if you found any really extraordinary concentrations of success, you might want to see if you could identify concentrations of unusual characteristics that might be causal factors.”
Basically, what I see is that the coin flipping example as applied to the Magic-Cavs will not do much to sway either side, as one side will maintain the results were highly random, and the other will claim that there were “unusual characteristics” that were causal factors (ex. matchups).
Ray
June 7, 2009
mrparker,
My team just lost when everyone was ready to crown them kings. What’s wrong with getting a little credit for calling the Magic? I gotta take some consolation somewhere.
mrparker
June 7, 2009
Ray,
I’m not saying anything was wrong with that. What I’m saying is that this argument is going anywhere. I’ll add something new. People can keep pointing to matchups all they want but matchups didn’t make Mo Williams go 29/76 for the series. That is 38%. He shot 46% for the season. Point guards according to 82 games.com shot 46% against Rafer Alston when they played the Magic this season who I’m assuming played most of the minutes against Mo Williams.
mrparker
June 7, 2009
All this got me thinking. D. West’s usg pct was 16. How many teams have a starting shooting guard who has that low of a usg pct? I can’t think of any teams that won championships with that kind of player.
LA had Kobe
SA had Ginobli
Detroit had Hamilton
Boston had Ray Allen
Before then there was Michael for 6 of 8 years and Houston had Vernon Maxwell for the first and Drexler for the second. Detroit had Dumars for their 2 and Lakers had Byron Scott in their glory years. You have to go back to the Celtic teams to find a low usage shooting guard but Danny Ainge still had 6 assist per 36(the same as Dennis Johnson).
I’m not saying that these players are good but I’m thinking they might be necessary to an offense consistent enough to make sure the best teams win when they should.
Daniel Suhr
June 14, 2009
I think the real issue here is how the Cavs came to get such a high differential. They never took nights off . They tried as hard as they could; and the Wizards games were rivalry games, with the Wizards really playing as hard as they could.
But to be clear, the Cavs inflated their season win scores by playing as hard as they could all season long.
The Lakers lost to bad teams over the course of the season but beat good teams. Would you rather have a team with 15 or so losses with those losses coming to good teams or bad teams?
Think about it.
The NBA requires effort and desire to win each individual game. The season is long, and the Lakers two stars both played into the final round of the Olympics.
Is it possible that the Lakers took nights off and dropped games to inferior opponents because they simply weren’t motivated enough to win?
misterchomps
June 19, 2009
Westy made an interesting comment and I wanted to see if anyone has studied the issue.
I have always thought that one mark of a great team is that it tends to lose games to bad teams. I know that sounds peculiar, and every television commentator says the opposite, but it seems to be true. Truly great teams play -better- against elite opponents, and lose to crummy teams when they’re essentially not paying attention.
I am a longtime Spurs fan and during the pre-Tim Duncan days, I could always tell that the Spurs were not a truly elite team (despite winning 56 games every year) because the Spurs would always beat hell out of the teams they were supposed to beat but be below .500 against the handful of true contenders. It made for a fun regular season but they got punked in the playoffs time and again.
Anyway, anyone else noticed this or know of a study in this regard?