Revisiting Boston’s odds to win the Atlantic

2014 NBA Season, Boston Celtics, Stats December 10, 2013 Leave a comment
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Paul Keleher | Flickr

About a month before the season, LVH SuperBook at Las Vegas released their 2013-14 NBA Division odds as well as over/under win totals for each team.

While the win totals provide for plenty of discussion five weeks into the season, betting the correct side of the over/unders yields only so much of a return on the initial investment (unless you can do a parlay). Going far against the odds when picking division winners, however, could mean loads of winnings if everything comes to place. Let’s take a look at the one division where that could most likely happen: the Atlantic.

Once again, odds are according to LVH SuperBook:

Brooklyn Nets: 4-7

New York Knicks: 3-2

Toronto Raptors: 10-1

Boston Celtics: 60-1

Philadelphia 76ers: 500-1

Boston currently holds a three-game lead over Brooklyn and New York. That’s nothing at this point, especially when Boston’s goals this season are likely different from the two favorites coming into the season, but it makes you wonder if anyone put a wager on the Celtics’ hopes in the Atlantic as a joke (ahem, Bill Simmons?) then recently started following it closer than expected because you never know.

Currently, John Hollinger’s odds of the Celtics winning the Atlantic are 62.4 percent, something I don’t agree with since it doesn’t seem to take into account recent transactions and how much of an impact the 2014 Draft has on certain teams. Toronto, for instance, has a 63.2 percent chance of making the playoffs (26.5 percent to win the division).

I’ll bet against that when they just traded Rudy Gay, which is addition by subtraction but still; Toronto will make another move soon. Kyle Lowry seems to be the latest Raptor on the block, but we could see more players shipped in the near future. The same could be said for Boston, but probably not until they get a feel for what the team is like with Rajon Rondo.

The odds are sure to change after this week. Boston plays at Brooklyn tonight and hosts New York on Friday, the latter in an eight-game stretch where seven are at home. We might even see Boston on top of the Atlantic for the rest of December, one of the bigger surprises this season probably to both fans and those who bet in their favor.

Also, if you were wondering, Portland was 10-1 to win the Northwest.

LeBron James and the Heat look young again while I age myself

90s, Miami Heat, Minnesota Timberwolves, Reminiscing December 8, 2013 Leave a comment

Sometimes aging is smooth and graceful, like realizing I’m only 24 and have plenty of life left in me. Other times it’s a rude awakening, like stressing out over crazy things like responsibilities while being reminded of more enjoyable times, like the first time I watched a basketball team chasing a three-peat make their stop in Minneapolis.

There’s very little I remember about the time the 1998 Bulls came to Minnesota, likely because I was playing basketball with a five-foot hoop, one with an oval-shaped cardboard backboard and an Orlando Magic logo slapped on it my dad squeezed into the basement a couple years earlier. The space to chuck bricks at it to the point it looked like I was trying to mash a hole was something like 10 feet wide and 15 feet long. To the left of the hoop were the house’s furnace and firewood which represented out of bounds along with wherever the carpet near it ended. The right right side of the basement featured a couple steps leading to a worn out couch and a television I watched basketball from when I wasn’t bouncing off the walls with energy, which was basically never.  

That’s probably why I remember very little from that game 16 years ago between the Bulls and Timberwolves. Outside of watching basketball, roughly 99% of my freezing Minnesota winters from 1996 to 1999 – first grade through fourth for me – were spent shooting hoops in the basement or playing NBA Live 95, 97, or 98 after school. Having the flu didn’t stop me from any of those hobbies, and especially not after Michael Jordan’s ‘Flu Game’ during the ’97 Finals. I still remember the times I labored from my bed to the basement, humming the theme song of NBA on NBC only for my legs to feel like Jell-O a few minutes later. It was never a good idea to create my own flu game, but I couldn’t help it.

The little I remember from the time the Timberwolves beat the Bulls, though, like Stephon Marbury celebrating by heaving the ball into the stands, will stick with me for as long as I’ll live. Marbury and the fans acted like they won the NBA Finals that night, but I can’t blame them. After that game, Eight-Year-Old Me thought Minnesota escaped the cellar of the West for good and became a contender.

Here are some highlights of that game:

Even though this season’s Wolves and the one of ’98 were looking to put years of rebuilding behind them, not much was alike in regards to what actually happened during their games. The crowd last night was mostly dead and so was I. The gravitational pull of recliner left me with no urge whatsoever to stand up and pass time between dull moments by exercising. I chose instead to stare blankly at what appeared to be a payment plan for college loans, while other times I scrolled Twitter and online discussion forums about visual snow. It even took me midway through the second quarter to realize the last time I saw Minnesota host a team chasing its third championship was when I was four feet tall. In 2002 I was glued to the PlayStation 2 when the Lakers paid themselves a visit, and I was playing online poker both times the 2011 Lakers won at the Target Center.

Like the enthusiasm, the result of the game wasn’t close to what it was like in ’98. A youthful Kevin Garnett and Stephon Marbury had the luck of playing a Bulls squad missing Scottie Pippen while last night’s Heat were at full strength and Minnesota was missing Kevin Love. If that sounds like a recipe for a blowout, you would be right. LeBron and Dwyane Wade ended the Heat’s two-game losing streak by doing LeBron and Wade things. After their 21-point victory, Wade video bombed LeBron, giving an accurate summary of the game:

That’s what I’ll remember most about last night. Neither lasting memory from the Timberwolves playing host to the ’98 Bulls or ’14 Heat were highlights from the actual games.

After watching Stephon Marbury celebrate Minnesota’s victory over Chicago by heaving the ball into the stands, I celebrated by shooting hoops in my basement and pretended I was Kevin Garnett with my newfound energy, banging a ball against my head and pretending to be a seven-foot freak of nature. 16 years later, 24 Year-Old Me lounged in the recliner long after the Heat mopped the floor with the Love-less Timberwolves. The time I should’ve spent trying to get back into shape, or anything really, was instead wasted wondering if Wade would ever videobomb LeBron while dressed as an elf. I dozed off shortly after, waking up four hours later and tweeting in my foggy, half-asleep daze about the need for an all-you-can-eat French fry buffet.

For more Timberwolves memories, check this out.

Fantasy basketball history: 1982’s best wasn’t Larry Bird or Magic, but Don Buse

Fantasy Basketball, RotoMonster December 6, 2013 Leave a comment

Basketball

We’re going back nearly 30 years, to 1982 when the MVP was Moses Malone and the careers of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson were just getting started. The same can be said for a few stats and elements of the NBA. Steals and blocks were eight years old but turnovers became official as late as 1978. The three-point line came even later, making its appearance in the 1979-80 season. 

Don Buse, a point guard for the Indiana Pacers, took advantage of all of those, save for blocks. He led the NBA in steals in 1977 (67 more than second-place Slick Watts), was rarely ever turnover prone, and in 1982 led the league in made threes (73). All of those relatively new statistics made him the best fantasy basketball player for ’82’s 9-category leagues, according to RotoMonster, narrowly beating out Larry Bird, Julius Erving, and Alex English. In 8-category ones, Buse was 10th.

Bird, Erving, and English were better contributors across the board but they all hurt themselves in 9-cats with their turnovers, something only Buse and Kyle Macy were positives in when looking at the top 10 players of ’82. That, and three-point shooting was nowhere close to a category several players contributed to. You could get scoring, rebounding and plenty other stats in later rounds of the draft but miss out on Buse, who made more threes than 19 of the 22 other teams in the league, and that category was all but lost.

That’s not to say Buse was an obvious draft pick for those who played fantasy basketball in the ’80s. (You’re pretty awesome if you did.) His #1 ranking in ’82 is sandwiched between two finishes outside the top 100, according to RotoMonster. Fantasy basketball would’ve been interesting back then, a time when the league had seven less teams than today. You could probably draft five Lakers or Celtics and, since five of each team were often ranked in the top 60, you would fare pretty dang well.

But you might miss out on hidden gems. In 1982, that was Don Buse.

For another post about players who came out of nowhere in fantasy basketball, check this out.

Kyle Korver and everyone else who’s made six threes this season

2014 NBA Season, Atlanta Hawks, Stats December 5, 2013 Leave a comment
Photo: Mark Runyon |

Photo: Mark Runyon | BasketballSchedule.net

Kyle Korver has been terrific out of the gates, making nearly 52 percent of his threes on over five attempts per game. Fantasy basketball-wise, the Hawks’ starting small forward (or shooting guard, depending on the night) is ranked in the top 50 for both eight and nine-category leagues, according to Basketball Monster.

Korver went off last night against the Clippers, shooting 6-for-9 on threes to help the Eastern Conference nab a rare win over a team out West, but just how many players have made six or more threes in a game this season? I took a look, via Basketball-Reference. At first, I wanted to list every time an active player made six threes in their career, but that totaled to about 800. That, and Basketball-Reference uses the term “active” a little loosely since Tracy McGrady, among others, is still listed as that.

Anyway, take a look at this year’s six threes club. I also included minutes, home/away games, win-loss results, and some others just to look at the differences between each player listed:

Player Six-threes games Total       games Home/
Away		 Win/
Loss		 Minutes per game 3PM per game 3PA per game Points per game
Klay Thompson 4 19 2-2 4-0 39.3 6.5 10.3 26.8
Ryan Anderson 3 9 1-2 3-0 40.0 6.7 10.7 31.0
Arron Afflalo 2 18 2-0 1-1 37.5 7.5 10.0 33.0
Bradley Beal 2 13 0-2 1-1 41.5 6.0 7.5 30.0
Stephen Curry 2 16 0-2 0-2 40.0 7.5 12 33.5
Gerald Green 2 19 1-1 1-1 33.5 6.0 9.0 20.5
Kyle Korver 2 16 1-1  1-1 35.0 6.0 7.5 22.5
James Anderson 1 19 1-0 1-0 44 6 8 36
Trevor Ariza 1 13 0-1 0-1 38 6 11 28
Aaron Brooks 1 17 1-0 1-0 25 6 7 26
Jose Calderon 1 19 0-1 0-1 33 6 8 21
Jamal Crawford 1 19 1-0 1-0 30 6 11 21
Mike Dunleavy 1 16 1-0 0-1 48 6 10 23
Paul George 1 19 0-1 0-1 38 7 15 43
Danny Green 1 18 0-1 1-0 23 6 9 24
Andre Iguodala 1 13 0-1 1-0 33 7 11 32
Joe Johnson 1 18 1-0 0-1 44 8 10 34
Wesley Johnson 1 18 0-1 1-0 33 6 7 27
Damian Lillard 1 19 0-1 0-1 42 6 12 32
Jeremy Lin 1 16 0-1 0-1 49 9 15 34
O.J. Mayo 1 18 1-0 1-0 33 6 7 28
Chandler Parsons 1 18 1-0 1-0 27 6 6 21
Derrick Rose 1 10 1-0 1-0 31 6 11 20
C.J. Watson 1 18 0-1 1-0 30 6 7 18
Shawne Williams 1 16 0-1 1-0 31 6 11 20
 Totals/Averages 35 414 15/20 22/13 36.0 6.5 9.7 27.4

Unsurprisingly, a team with a player who’s made six threes has won just under two-thirds of those games. More interesting is how often those threes were made on the road. You’d expect some role players off the bench who are listed here to perform better at home. Maybe they do and the three-point outburst is just an outlier. We’ll see if that’s true as the season progresses.

Also worth noting, 8.5 percent of total games by those players have involved making over six threes. Should that frequency remain the same, someone on that list will make six threes on Friday night at the latest. Let’s see who that is, or if another player will join the club exclusive to only…25 players. That’s kind of a big club through just five weeks and it’s obvious what the password is to get in, but whatever. It’s great to witness three-point barrages and there’s still four months left for them to happen.

Lance Stephenson remains unpredictable

Indiana Pacers December 4, 2013 Leave a comment
Mark Runyon | BasketballSchedule.net

Photo: Mark Runyon | BasketballSchedule.net

I’ve been posting little things about the Pacers lately, so I’ll try not to go overboard with them. I can’t resist talking about Lance Stephenson though.

Lance Stephenson’s progression, along with a couple other Pacers in their starting lineup, is one of the main reasons I’ve enjoyed watching Indiana this year. Their starting shooting guard has gone from rarely playing two seasons ago to a key, important cog. It’s a nice story by itself, considering how great the odds were against him carving out a solid career in the NBA when he was drafted 40th overall in 2010.

The all-around numbers are there for Stephenson: 12 points, 6.7 rebounds, 5.1 assists, all nice upticks from last year. He’s also had more time with the ball in his hands, 2.6 minutes compared to 1.5 last season, the latter stat according to a piece on him from Grantland. It made me draw a comparison to a higher-paid shooting guard.

Lance Stephenson is Bizarro Tyreke Evans.

But even with the improved stats, Stephenson is still as unpredictable as last season, in my couch potato opinion. Granted, I don’t watch every Pacers game just like I don’t catch every game from every team minus the Minnesota Timberwolves, but I never know what to expect from the Indiana’s starting shooting guard whenever I happen to be watching them.

Stephenson’s unpredictability still leaves two sides of him: Good Lance and Bad Lance. Both are entertaining because neither seems all that conventional. Given how badly he misses some of his shots, I assume he shoots with his eyes closed and more than a few plays he’s made have led to “noooo…YES!” moments like what I wrote about Corey Brewer recently. And ever since Stephenson brushed off his teammates multiple times in the Eastern Conference Finals to take LeBron James one-on-one, I assumed he didn’t have ice in veins but mustard instead. It’s like he was in the film 300, waving off the Spartans so he could take on the Persians himself.

That confidence might not have worked out well nearly six months ago but, like Paul George and Roy Hibbert, you could sense Stephenson was going to make a bang the following season.

And he seemed like an early candidate for Most Improved Player of the Year through the first eight games, averaging about 14 points, six rebounds, and six assists. His turnover rate was only slightly up from 2013, which was even more of a positive when his usage rate went from 15.2 to 19.5 and the total number of assists he accounted for while on the floor nearly doubled, according to Basketball-Reference. He even had a triple double against Memphis with 13 points, 12 rebounds, and 11 assists while turning it over just once. Stephenson’s progression seemed very encouraging, except for the fact it raised his value six months from now.

But the shooting splits through the first eight games remained bizarre in typical Stephenson fashion: 47.9 percent from the field, 51.4 from three and…42.9 percent from the line. That doesn’t exactly add up.

And then came Bad Lance, who’s just as entertaining as Good Lance but nowhere near as efficient. In the next 10 games, Stephenson shot 10.5 percent from three on nearly two attempts per outing, creating one of most hot-cold shot charts in the process. His offensive rating went from 111 through the first eight games to 93 over the last 10, but he made 72 percent of his free throws and recorded yet another triple-double.

But the turnovers and assists went up and down, respectively, with the turnover rate in the last 10 games up to 24.3 percent and the assist rate at about 20, according to Basketball-Reference. If those rates happened all season they would put Stephenson in similar company as awkward wings like Gerald Wallace and guards like D.J. Augustin.

But that hasn’t been the case all season and at 16-2, Indiana has been fine regardless of whether Good Lance or Bad Lance shows up, the frequency of each nearly split in half.

Sooner or later, though, the Pacers will need the more efficient version on a consistent basis.