The Rockets were also without Mbah a Moute and had yet to sign Gerald Green or Joe Johnson. And the Thunder still had Roberson. Briante Weber had to log 18 minutes that night for God's sake. I'm not saying the Thunder couldn't make the Rockets work a little to advance to the next round should the two teams meet. But this idea that they're on the same level is absurd. If the Rockets are healthy, it ain't even close.
Except home runs drive in runs, increasing the chance of winning. Barry Bonds put up the highest OPS of all time in 2004, with an OPS of 1.422. There is nothing about a tenth rebound or tenth assist that makes it objectively better than a 9th or an 11th.
Well, this is a hard one to create conclusions from. When your best player has a great game, one would expect that to correlate highly with wins. That it's sooo high is a bit surprising. Then again, I wonder what the Rockets record is when Harden has a triple double the last 2 years? I can definitely recall at least 1 triple double with a loss, but I don't recall all that many. It's probably just something that's obvious. There are also stats that show they have a better record when he has less than x FGA per game, for example. If you plot the correlation from this year, that's definitely true... the trend line for wins/win margin goes down (less and less likely to win the more shots Russ takes).... though its not a "strong" correlation.
Exactly. What is the Thunder record when Westbrook is close to a triple double in the 4th quarter and he goes hunting for stats? These are the close games the Thunder have lost in crunch time because either Westbrook is jacking bricks, being too passive looking for assists, or crashing the boards for rebounds instead of getting back on defense.
If he hits a trip dub it's usually including assists, and assists = other players are making shots = more likely odds to win. The real question is would they win MORE games with him not ignoring perimeter defense to chase rebounds to get triple doubles. Would they win MORE games with him doing a better job of getting his teammates involved, because since he's been on this trip dub run the team seems to be underperforming record wise even though he's had plenty of help (this year and last). They are a slightly above average team with him putting up these numbers even though he's had plenty of help.
I wonder how many triple doubles he would get if his big men didn't let him grab all those uncontested rebounds. Notice most of his trip-dubs have 10-12 rebounds. That kind of tells you that 10 rebounds is a goal he sets out to achieve every game.
This is an illogical case of results oriented analysis. Westbrook plays a certain style where he dominates the ball and tries to be the primary ball-handler on every possession - this results in most potential assists go through him. He doesn't play positional defense / contest shots in hopes of getting rebounds, etc. So it pumps up his individual stats at the expense of his team. Obviously sometimes his teammates will be hitting shots, and his opponents just miss shots and he gets a bunch of uncontested rebounds and assists, in those cases he's most likely to win and as a correlation (but not causation) he'll likely get a triple double. But his style also creates a ton of games where the opponent can hit more shots because they are uncontested, or they defend his predictable, ball dominant style very well and his teammates are out of the flow and can't hit shots. So in these cases, they're losing a ton of games, and as a correlation (again, not causation), he's probably not getting a triple double. However, the common cause of BOTH of these scenarios, is his playstyle, which is the exact same whether he gets triple doubles or not. The overall result is less wins than if they played together as a team with a more balanced style. And this year proves the "his teammates suck" argument has been clearly debunked as we look at how his former teammates (Oladipo, Kanter, Sarbonis) are doing and how his current teammates (George, Melo) did before joining him.
Brewer, a career 28.2 percent 3-point shooter, is hitting an unsustainable 42.9 percent from 3 in eight games with the Thunder
I have been saying this over and over again for a while now....the KEY to dealing with OKC is curtailing Steven Adams. And his offensive rebounding.
Adams is clearly more important to them than Melo is. Anyone can see it when they play, even without looking at the numbers.
Brewer will come back to earth and OKC fans will hate him. I loved Corey the person, but oh boy I do not miss his undisciplined defense and his patented 1 on 4 fast breaks. I'll always appreciate what he did for us in 2014-2015 but holy **** he was trash a lot of the time he spent with us.
the thing is, they arent winning because of his shooting, its having his energy, hustle and defense. you may think he his defense is undisciplined, but when you put him with athletic guys like westbrook, george, and adams, he is being extremely disruptive. he is the only guy who can run with westbrook. he sprints out every time and its stetching defenses long ways then puts them in a scramble and its leading to easy baskets. as crazy as it seems, the thunder are a different team with brewer starting. their starting lineup can match up with anyone. i do not want the thunder in round 2. i am hoping they can get the 3 seed from the blazers.
I remember Brewer was red hot when he first came to Houston. People thought that he was a good 3pt shooter. I was telling them that Brewer had never shot better than 30% from 3 in any season of his career.
OKC has him like Ariza in the corner, since that's the easiest 3 it should improve his numbers. If he gets pushed away from there I can see him back to his normal numbers.
Brewer's regression to the mean has begun...1 for 6 from 3 last night. They lost by 1 point. Welcome to the real Corey Brewer OKC.
This choke job will be the catalyst for the Thunder's meltdown at the end of the season. They have 30 losses right now, tied with Pelicans and Spurs. Upcoming schedule: Heat, Blazers, Spurs, Nuggets, Pelicans, Warriors, Rockets, Heat -- all playoff teams. Thunder were gift-wrapped a win by the refs with the stupid ejections against the Raptors, but that's it. They will lose quite a few of these games. I say they go 3-5. That would put them out of the playoffs for good. Thunder Schadenfreude is about to reach extreme levels of pleasure.
