i just realized that there may have been a shift in the balance of power between the conferences. i know i'm probably late to this party. for the longest time, the East has been considered weak tea, and the West has been full of teams wishing they had been in the Eastern conference so they could make the playoffs. i just noticed that the West has the worst team in the league, in Sacramento, as well as 6 of the 8 teams with winning percentages below .400. now, until tonight, all 8 western conf. playoff teams were over .600 (dallas losing dropped them). but now it seems, they may have been feasting on those 6 crappy western conf. lottery teams. looking at the numbers, all the west playoff teams have a pretty healthy conference record. i haven't done an indepth analysis on each team's wins and loses. i'm just curious as to what has caused this shift in the balance of power. is it just cyclical? is just that eastern teams have had cap room and lured quality players out of the west? and for all those who want to flame me because this has been discussed numerous times in other threads.....suck it. i made andequate due diligence (meaning i looked beyond the first page of threads)
I brought this up earlier and agree with you. The West teams competing for playoff spots have feasted on the 5 rubbish teams at the bottom. The East only has one team that is complete garbage (the Wizards). Even the 3rd to last team (the Pacers) has beaten some very good, top-level teams (Celts, Cavs, Lakers). The East leads the West 219-196 in inter-conference games. That says it all. Over the course of a season, everything averages out.
I think it's tough to objectively say one conference is better than the other. What does that mean? overall win pct.? best teams? better playoff teams? parity? There was a while where it was hard to make any legitimate argument that the east was as good as the west. Now, the consensus is that the east has caught up to the west but I just can't bring myself to say that the east is better when the 9th place west team could be a 5 seed in the eastern conference.
The west is still better; Kings losing every game against the east doesn't help the West vs East record. You don't need need to have a 0.500 record to make the playoffs in the east. Hell, the Mavs would be the 4th seed in the east.
With it this close, I don't think you can definitively say one is better than the other. If push comes to shove, the East has a better record against the West and it's lower echelon teams are harder to beat. The East's top-level 3 teams are also better than the West. Comparing lower-seeded playoff teams, the West is better.
1-9, I think the West still has the significant edge. The bottom portion of the East is better than the bottom portion of the West.
I agree with this, but I would also like to add that the reason the West is considered to be better these last several seasons is because the top half of teams are more important and relevant than the bottom teams.
Historically the East has been better for longer so there is no balance. No one really talked balance when the Bulls and Pistons won 8 in like 12 years... The team with the best record in the East is Cleveland. I would take 4 teams in the West over Cleveland in a series. Even if they have homecourt.
The way I see it is a like bell curve of all the teams, the west being on both extremes and the majority of the east in the middle but you have to bump CLE and BOS into the beginning of the curve and WAS towards the end. Go Rockets!!!
My sentiments also. I just happen to think a fully healthy Celtics team will beat a fully healthy Cavs team in a series also.
I dunno. They've added Mo Williams, Celtics lost Posey. I'd probably put my money on the Celtics but those Cavs at home would be tough to beat. Just a good matchup for the Cavs.
Huh, I'm beginning to wonder if the Celtics have enough wing players to beat up on LBJ. Cause that's a key to beating the Cavs, just make LBJ pay for going into the lane, make every hard foul count. Interesting to keep an eye on.
The Celts did that last year and it was barely enough to win. After the first two games, the Cavs caught on and nearly won the series. This year, the Celts are worse and the Cavs are better. If you assume the Celtics will be 100% healthy, it will be a dogfight. Otherwise, I think the Cavs will decisively beat them. I'm also assuming the Cavs will snap out of their slumber by then and raise their intensity up to a championship level. Otherwise, they may not even make the ECFs.
Isn't this logic a bit off? The west top 9 seeds are much, much better than the East, especially outside of Cleveland and Boston. Therefore, the bottom feeders in the West have to play these 9 teams much more often, and are bound to have a worse record because they face 9 superior teams. In the east, outside of the top 2-3, the game is really up for grabs. Atlanta in the 4th seed? They would not make the playoffs in the West. So before you judge teams like GS for having 24~ wins, I really think if they were in the east, they would have 35~ wins.
I think Rondo has improved enough that the PG battle will be a wash between him and Mo. Perkins and Wallace wash each other out (presuming Ben recovers from the injury). KG > Big Z or Wallace if they switch. Pierce < LBJ, it's key that Pierce keeps LBJ occupied on offense. Delonte can bother Ray and I'm assuming Ray won't disappear again in the playoffs. Bench I'll give a slight edge to Cavs; I think Joe Smith will be key in keeping KG occupied, I think Joe still has some gas in the tank. I'm just not impressed with the walk it up offense and LBJ dribbling the top of the key and then barreling into the lane 1 on 5, I keep thinking just smack him around maybe he twists an ankle or something then the Cavs are in deep doodoo. The Hawks will be a sleeper and tough out. They are athletic enough and big enough to give a tough series to the top 3 East teams. I think the Magic are overrated. The rest of the East teams are just playoff fodder...
I'm going to avoid the "best" argument because it is subjective and people have different criteria and it's not like it's 2003 where the East was crap from top to bottom. I'll once again revert to my transparency and "fake records" point. I just want records to reflect the reality of a team. A winning team to me is a winning team against both conferences. A fake winning team is one that feasts on one conference and sucks (like sub .500 sucks) against the other. Over the last decade, many many "winning" teams from the East fell into the "fake winning team" category and it was NEVER the other way around. This season, I think we're finally seeing true records. So at least I'm happy about that. I do honestly believe that the Lakers, Cavs, Celtics, and Magic are in a league of their own by most standards (home record, road wins, East record, and West record). And the rest of the playoff West teams are the next echelon (with the Mavs and Hawks rounding out the bottom of that group). Then the other half of the league is just mediocre...talented here and there, but not consistent quality. My opinion of the sucky West bottom: Kings: bad contracts, roster turnover transition, relatively young...reminds me of the Francis Mobley era after Dream and pre-Yao. Clippers: terrible, undisciplined, low IQ, selfish, some young talent, lazy Grizzlies: young, no super star yet, but there's potential Thunder: lost a good coach and went into rebuilding mode when they traded Ray Allen...totally young Minnesota: young, I still think McHale is a bad coach, but superstar in the making Jefferson and other pieces might make this a winning team in 2 years Golden State: young and injured and inconsistent year...I really don't know what to make of them
I think you're absolutely right here. The last time this subject came up, I looked up the record of Eastern playoff teams (top 8) against Western playoff teams (top 9) and the advantage was definitely in favor of the west. I think this is a good point as well. For some reason everyone is looking at it like the Eastern scrub teams are just more competitive, but it may be that they only have to play four quality teams in their own conference, while western scrub teams play nine quality teams.
