SmeggySmeg: the way the lotto works though they work downwards (13 to 1) so the remaining teams' opportunities are drastically different as they remain in the loop. Whoa... the algorithm would be a blast. If anyone figures it out (the hard part), I'll write the code for a sort of calculator to be run from today's site (if you care for anything like that today).
Achebe: What do you mean they work downwards??? In my example Worst team has most chances 200 in 1000 and best team has least chances 5 in 1000 and in my example the rockets were in between with 100, which appears firly straight forward and was just illustrating the the percentages for 2nd and 3rd picks will change. I am not sure what you mean On the second point i am not sure it will be worth the effort, all the rocks can hope for is if they don't get the first pick that the team with the worst record does and if we don't get the second pick the team remaining in the lotto with the worst record gets the second pick. Smeg
OHHHH I'm hamming all of this up Sorry, I've been working too much lately... For some reason I was drawing up memories where the last two teams would sit there, and after the other team chose, the other guy would go ecstatic. Thanks though (man this stuff is unduly complex). For some reason, I read aelliot's post to mean that the first 3 picks were exclusive to those first 3 teams. Anyway---- I'll leave now and check some blood sugar, etc. before I post again.
Smeg, That was my thinking as well, but the percentages that are listed (copied straight from the '99 draft percentages off of nba.com) are percentages at the outset before the lotto starts. I would agree with you though that logically, after they choose the #1 pick, the percentages would change. This is obviously true, because the team that got the #1 pick has 0% chance of getting the #2 pick as well. I don't know exactly how they perform the lottery, and that could affect the percentages. Here are a couple of ways that i was thinking: 1. They could choose the #1 pick by releasing one lotto ball. Then they would remove all of that team's remaining balls from the hopper and draw for #2. Then remove all of team #2's balls and then draw for #3. 2. They could just release an ample supply of balls and go with the first 3 balls that come out in order ignoring duplicate balls. ex: (4) (4) (4) (4) (5) (5) (3) (6) (6) (1) Moving from left to right: #1 pick-Team 4 #2 pick-Team 5 #3 pick-Team 3 Does anybody know for sure the method used to remove the balls and assign the top 3 picks? [This message has been edited by today (edited March 02, 2000).] [This message has been edited by today (edited March 02, 2000).]
It makes no difference whether you remove the balls or not (other than the length of time the draw takes. Just because there are extra balls in the lottery that are no longer valid doesn't change the odds. Without getting into the precise figures, say team 1 has 100 /1000, team 2 has 50 / 1000. If team 2 comes out first, then team 1 does have 100 / 999 left in, but since 49 of those balls who result in a re-draw, they can be ignored, and therefore team 1 would have 100 / 950 valid balls. To be honest, they probably leave them in, but who knows? Statistically, it makes no difference.
WARNING! WARNING! THE FOLLOWING IS JUST LIGHT HEARTED RIBBING NOT TO BE TAKEN TOO SERIOUSLY! Not bad for an Aggie... ------------------ The truth is out there.
They select the choices from 1st pick down to 3rd. This means that a team's actual chances for the 2nd pick do change depending on who gets the first pick. The nba.com probabilities are done prior to the lottery, so of course they don't know who will get the first pick. What they are showing is the overall probability of that team getting the 2nd or 3rd pick. Here's a link to the an example of how they're calculating Team #6 (our current position) chances of getting the 2nd pick: http://aelliott2000.tripod.com/lottery_tm6_pk2.html [This message has been edited by aelliott (edited March 02, 2000).] [This message has been edited by aelliott (edited March 02, 2000).]
okay, this may be one thing I can handle effectively there are 14 balls, not a 1000. they pull groups of 4 balls to the top to get a 4 digit sequence. There's no 'ball removal'. That of course, raises the question what if you get the same sequence (although the odds are slim) in a row? Well, you do it again. This is all behind closed doors anyway (until the display... which I confused w/ the drawing earlier where they do count down from 13-1) so who's telling if it's not your soppiest story to David rather than chance by lotto balls. So watch the halftime game whenever this year, and hope like hell you don't hear the Rockets until past or at our expected slot.
Great idea - I think this could be marketed to not only the other NBA city candidates, but cities with teams in other sports that have no chance of making the playoffs from Day One. Such as New York (for the Jets and Giants), Anahiem (Angels), etc...
