After our wins against the Lakers and loss to the NOH, it got me thinking. If you're going to lose a regular season game, which would you rather lose to, a legitimate play off team or a weak team? Personally, I think I would rather lose to a weak team. If you lose to a play off team, there are questions in your mind as to whether you can compete, whether the team is out of their depth, and whether the team will fold under competitive pressure. While in theory it makes sense to lose more to a play off team, I just think that losing to a play off team is more a measuring stick than losing to a bottom feeding team. If you lose to a bottom feeding team like the Raptors, the Hornets or the Wizards, I find it easier to simply chalk it up to fatigue, occasionally dodgy officiating, or simply having an off night. It's less a question of whether the team is good vs whether the team is mortal. Anyway, interested in opinions and thoughts...
I'd rather lose to a non-playoff team like we did last night. If you can consistently beat or keep up with playoff teams, that means you're on the right path to success. These trap games, games where teams seem to overlook their weaker opponents and come out flat, are a matter of focus, although last night may have been due to tired legs as well. Team focus is fixable. When you have the youngest team in the NBA, things like this are bound to happen. As our team continues to gel and grow together, they will learn to never underestimate an opponent or look forward to the game after thinking this particular opponent will be an easy win.
With this team, bottom-tier. To add, with the 94 team, top-tier. I guess its a mindset, and where you're ranked.
I'd gladly lose to a bottom feeder over a potential playoff rival or match-up. We're going to need the top 8 in the west to have as few wins as possible. Who cares if the supersonics or pelicans rack up 30 of we are ahead in the playoff race.
Best to worst, all about playoff impact: Loss to Eastern teams Loss to very top or bottom Western non-division team (like Clippers or Kings) Loss to very top or bottom SW Divisin team (Spurs, NOH) Loss to midrange Western non-division team (Lakers, Minny) Loss to midrange SW division team (Dallas, I guess).
With a young team like us, I'd rather beat the strong teams (build the confidence) and lose to the weak teams (learn the lessons) than the other way around. For a contending veteran team, you don't want them to lose to bad teams because that would show that they are not focused enough or lack the killer instinct.
This is a very interesting thread and although initially I voted prefer to lose to playoff team, I think the posts so far have changed my mind. Winning against Memphis, Knicks, lakers, bulls, etc I think these wins have so far propelled us in subsequent games... I think losses to the likes of raptors and hornets just reminds the team and coaches of the need to stay focused, and won't really affect morale and confidence like a loss to Utah or Dallas or Portland would. The most regrettable losses this year have definitely been the overtime games to Portland and spurs.
Depends on the scale. For a single game, no doubt I'd rather lose to a weak team. However, given the choice between systematically being a regular team or a topsy-turvy team throughout the whole season, I'd rather have the stability. But for the specific instance, I'm not really concerned about either. New Orleans, as far as I'm concerned, was a schedule loss. No more, no less.
This is a great question. I had this come up last night after the game with a friend. I side with losing to bad teams as being more acceptable. But of course it's not that simple. How do we lose? Was it a back to back? a road trip? Who was playing and how did they play? In the case of last night I was okay with it. We beat the Lakers the game before and were on a win streak. We were going to lose eventually, and EG looked pretty good in the 4th qt. Teams always get hyped up to beat a good team, they play their hardest. It is much more indicative to me of how good we are when we play good teams. When we play bad teams I'm not as concerned as long as losing to bad teams does not become a trend.
Playoff impact and effort questions are why I'd rather lose to a crappy team. If we're beating playoff teams and losing to non-playoff teams, that means that we're good enough to beat playoff teams but don't bring 100% in games that aren't worth as much, which can be corrected more easily than talent can. If they're bringing effort and beating playoff teams in the regular season, you can assume they can do that in the playoffs, etc.
I find the games against lower seeded teams like NOH, Wizards or Bobcats etc is more of a dangerous trap game. I think a lot of times, good teams often lose to the lower seeded teams is because they often overlook their opponents. These types of games are trap games and I don't really blame the Rockets for losing last night because it wasn't effort that made them lose but its just an off night. No one could hit an open shot or get into rhythm. Only James Harden was playing well but James and the Rockets all looked a step slow. Most of their shots last night were short, which is a sign of tired legs.
This. The old Francis teams would drive me crazy the way they get all hyped up to beat the Lakers and then go lose to the Clippers, Bucks, and Warriors and miss the playoffs. There are more fodder teams out there than contenders. If you can't focus long enough to take care of your daily business, all your effort beating the Lakers is wasted. Good, veteran teams are formidable every night, whether they are into it or not, tired or not, underestimating or overestimating. They don't fall into traps. So, I'd rather have the team that has the workmanlike attitude that doesn't ever let up and doesn't let bad teams win. Because those teams pluck the low-hanging fruit, and end up getting some of the higher fruit too.
The heat beat the wizards by 28 points this week, they beat the heat back in December. It was the thunder that recently lost against the wizards
Would prefer Rockets to lose to lesser teams. So that it does not affect their confidence, etc. But I also want the Rockets to learn some lessons from the loss yesterday. I know the tiredness and officiating were huge factors. And it doesn’t mean I think the Rockets won’t beat the Hornets next time. I think they better, and they will. But assuming the calls don’t go our way, assuming the 3PT shots don’t fall, and we can’t dominate the glass, what do we do? Assuming the other team plays defense quickly, energetically, and disrupts our flow, how do we get it back? These are important things to figure out before we play OKC on Feb 20, or even meet the Clippers next week.
Losing to a playoff team further hurts our playoff chances/seeding. I'm assuming we're talking about WC teams here because, honestly, the East doesn't stand a chance against us.
I'd rather not have knee-jerk reactions and enjoy the fact that we have won about 10 more games than expected!
It seems the players of some of the best teams also don't mind as much losing to a real bad team. The wizards got their first win of the season against Heat. And on this Monday, they beat the Thunder. The Hornets beat the Spurs right before us. The Bobcats recently beat the Bulls in their home.
