Something I came up with (probably not original) to guage how much each individual team has improved. Each team gets +1 for beating a team that finished with a better record last season and a -1 for losing to a team with a worse record last season. San Antonio has no chance of improving since it had the best record last season, while Chicago can only be improved. I came up with it to give us a weekly idea of our improvement and potential playoff chances. Here are the results after the first week of play (through Monday, November 5th): <TABLE><TR><TD>Golden State</TD><TD>+2</TD></TR><TR><TD>Denver</TD><TD>+1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Houston</TD><TD>+1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Minnesota</TD><TD>+1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Sacramento</TD><TD>+1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Seattle</TD><TD>+1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Dallas</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>Memphis</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>LA Lakers</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>LA Clippers</TD><TD>-1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Utah</TD><TD>-1</TD></TR> <TR><TD>Portland</TD><TD>-1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Phoenix</TD><TD>-2</TD></TR><TR><TD>San Antonio</TD><TD>-2</TD></TR></TABLE> Since I've got the numbers, through 11/8, it's: <TABLE><TR><TD>Golden State</TD><TD>+2</TD></TR><TR><TD>Houston</TD><TD>+2</TD></TR><TR><TD>Minnesota</TD><TD>+2</TD></TR><TR><TD>Denver</TD><TD>+1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Dallas</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>Memphis</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>LA Lakers</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>Portland</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>Sacramento</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>Seattle</TD><TD>-</TD></TR><TR><TD>LA Clippers</TD><TD>-1</TD></TR><TR><TD>Phoenix</TD><TD>-2</TD></TR><TR><TD>San Antonio</TD><TD>-2</TD></TR><TR><TD>Utah</TD><TD>-2</TD></TR></TABLE> Anything interesting to date? I think the fact the Sacramento remaining at the same level is interesting considering Webber is gone. Once they get Webber back, they should be improved over last year. Minnesota appears to be improved. I wouldn't have thought that considering their roster is much the same. Despite Denver's poor record, they have a position index number. Given their early schedule, and the loss of McDyess, they aren't doing as poorly as their record would indicate. And Houston, as ugly as it has looked, has beaten Phoenix and Philly, two teams ahead of them to earn a +2 in the index. Sure, Iverson wasn't playing, but neither was Mo Taylor. Anyway, I think this is an interesting index to keep up with throughout the season and should be a good way to filter out the "strength of schedule" skew.
That's really neat. Maybe we should come up with an index that takes into account differences between a really good team last year and an only marginally better team last year. But ultimately, it won't capture significant differences in any individual team from year to year, like Philly (assuming, for instance, Iverson never coming back) sucking it up this year, so that from the standpoint of the present season, a win on Philly doesn't really indicate improvement from last year. But this isn't meant to be a criticism, just me thinking out loud. Really great idea; it'll be interesting to see how the numbers stack up later in the season.
The thing about Minn, is that everyone said they were crazy for getting Joe smith back, but what it does is allow Garnett to play the 3, which deadly. Plus when they bring in woods and run that zone, its crazy. I saw some of their game against the bulls and they had 39 assist and scored 127pts! Thats insane, but they play good passing basketball. They don't really hit slumps because they don't launch 25 3's a game. No matter how open that shot is, its still 23ft as opposed to 15-17ft.
They added Joe Smith, Lorenzo Woods and kept Felipe Lopez and Chauncy Billups. They are deeper than you'd think for being hit with those sanctions. Plus Saunders knows how to use the zone to their advantage.
