The Bratwurst – Milwaukee Bucks Blog

Normally, I think John Hollinger puts out some of the most interesting reading about the NBA that there is. He does a great job of using his statistical analysis to make his real-world observations objective, and he’s a pretty humorous writer, as well. Learning about PER is what inspired me to take the fantasy basketball scoring system I had come up with and fine-tune it into IPM.

That said, Hollinger’s new ESPN Playoff Odds Calculator has to be one of the stupidest things I have ever seen.

Essentially, the calculator inputs Hollinger’s formulas and power rankings into a simulator, which then simulates the remainder of the season 5,000 times and comes up with a ranking of “Team A has an (X) percent chance of making the playoffs, a (Y) percent chance of winning the title and a (Z) percent chance of winning the lottery.”

So what you are telling me is that if a team has played poorly this season, it is unlikely that they will make the playoffs? Thanks, John. In related news, I hear that water is wet.

But let’s let Hollinger himself explain how useless this tool is:

In all seriousness, fans of, say, the Nets or Bulls may feel slighted since this tool isn’t very fond of their chances at the moment. But all it’s saying is that neither team is likely to make the postseason if they continue playing the way they’ve played thus far. I doubt fans of either team would argue much with that assessment.

That’s the key assumption here: that teams will continue to play the way they’ve been playing. Based on that idea, every day, the computer plays out the season based on each club’s Hollinger Power Ranking on that day.

So if the Bulls continue to win 5 games out of every 16 for the rest of the year they are unlikely to make the playoffs? Thanks.

What would be far more useful would be some way to mathematically figure out the likelihood of a team’s performance dramatically changing vs. what they have already done. How much better is Miami with Wade healthy? Are Orlando or Indiana a fluke? That would be something useful. Coming up with a fancy way to say that an 8-9 record would leave you out of the playoffs if the season ended today really doesn’t mean much.

(By the way, not to blow my own horn or anything, IPM suggests that Orlando is overachieving and due for a losing streak, Indiana has played about equal to their record, and if Miami had Wade from the beginning of the year they should have about 3 more wins — making them better but still a sub-.500 team).