Daily Thunder.com

goody...

Mike Prada has his weekly rankings up

always a good read!

Hooray, my comment has made it to its own post :)

For the second time by the way, I also uploaded the Intro video back when the season started and it was posted as saturday morning cartoon.

I'm just really glad you had fun and I was able to contribute to this awesome blog.

I found that website on a formula one forum by the way, as they do tons of other sports.

news flash:

Kevin Durant suspended for DUI!
.
.
.
just kiddin'

;)

@crick
lol yeah maybe, i have him on my fantasy team, been killing me lately.

@f5alcon
i continued my analysis and added road vs home games, which all but eliminates the hornets, as they have only a 11-20 road record, and would have to beat the spurs,suns, thunder, utah, memphis and houston on the road.

memphis doesnt fair much better with having to beat hornets, boston, houston, Milwaukee, spurs and thunder on the road.

So houston is the only team really competing for a spot at this point, the others are just waiting to be eliminated.

it also looks from that site that 44 wins will be the current magic number, so we just need to win 9 more games.

@justin
I wonder if the fact that he's starting will change anything. He'll be on the floor against different people.

I hate having to see Carl Landry more than three times. That guys kills us.

f5alcon :@crick

he was out of their rotation already

oh... maybe that's why he got drunk :(

last time we played Sac, Nocioni put 16 points on us -- but that was WAY BACK in November

@crick
he was out of their rotation already

news flash:

Andres Nocioni -- DUI charge

Andres Nocioni will be suspended two games

I think this means he won't play tonight

thunder tim :
I hope the guys don’t find that site and start day dreaming instead of playing ball.I hope they stay locked in and demolish the kings tonight.

One of the good things about our squad is how competitive they are. KD talked about how hard it was to lose so much his first two years. Now that he's winning, I don't see him slowing down at all. He seems to have the kind of fire that will propel him to multiple championships without any let down or satisfaction.

cool site.
makes me think of an ancient proverb:
don't worry about tomorrow; tomorrow has enough worry of its own.

I hope the guys don't find that site and start day dreaming instead of playing ball.
I hope they stay locked in and demolish the kings tonight.

Chad Ford continued his love affair with the idea of Bosh going to the Thunder this summmer.. I don't know how down I am with the idea of Bosh/Durant/Westbrook taking up basically the entire salary cap in a couple years(close to 50 million) And then having us have to fill out the rest of the roster while preferably keeping our young talent (Harden, Green, Ibaka) all while staying under the luxury tax which will likely be less than 70 million.. I just dont think it is in the cards for us.. I am therefore officially appointing myself head of the "trade for Biedrins" campaign this summer.. :)

@falcon - yea, and earlier in the year, everyone (myself included) expected us to be in that huddle - fighting, scratching, clawing for our lives to make it into that 8th spot. Nice to be in a more comfy position.

For the rockets to make the playoffs at a 2/3 chance they cant lose more then 7 games. they still play denver, lakers, boston twice. Assuming they lose those games, they cant lose more then 3 of the following, thunder,spurs,suns, utah, new orleans, memphis twice, and win all games against kings (twice),wolves, pistons, wizards(twice), nets, knicks, bulls, clippers, bobcats. Thats a tall order to happen.

For the hornets to make the playoffs at 60% chance they cant lose more then 6 games. they have 2 games against denver, lakers, dallas, cleveland, thats 5 losses right there, that means they can only drop 1 game against houston, utah(2x), memphis(2x), portland,phoenix, thunder, spurs. Win all games against warriors(2x) clippers, wizards, nets, bobcats, wolves.
That is almost an impossible task.

Memphis also needs to only have 6 losses to make the playoffs.
Denver(2x) dallas(2x) orlando, boston gives them 6 losses, so they need to sweep everybody else including thunder, houston (2x), hornets (2x), spurs (2x)

So based on remaining schedules the rockets are the only team with any real chance of getting in the playoffs. With tiebreakers for the playoff spots only houston beats us, so if we win 11 games we are almost certainly in, barring huge upsets by memphis or new orleans.

memphis could be all but eliminated by the end of the week if they lose to the hornets and spurs, same with the hornets if they lose to memphis and spurs. If the hornets win we could push them far back enough to miss next wed, and memphis could survive til the 17th if they win against the hornets.

poor Clark, he's been replaced by a computer!

@f5alcon
Solid breakdown. And I definitely don't disagree. I think there's potential to go 15-9, but I think 13-9 is most realistic, yet optimistic.

Hat tip to Alex from Germany on the link. Good find sir.

of course, you have to trust the methodology being used for the numbers to mean anything, but the algorithms sound reasonable...

Ken Roberts (the guy who created this) explains his methods in detail:

What is this
place?

The Suns and Spurs games really killed our chances for the 5th/6th IMO. We'll have to beat them both coming up to keep our hold on 6th seed.

I'll say we get 46 wins and the seventh seed.

really there are 8 we had better wins left(2 kings, nets, 76ers, clippers, pacers, warriors and wolves), so that should be the minimum we get. Anything less then that is a disappointing end to the season.

there are 2 should wins, raptors, bobcats.

3 increase distance against teams trying to get in (hornets, memphis, rockets)

4 division games(excluding denver, and wolves which im counting in different groups,)

5 games against division leaders (2 denver, boston,lakers, dallas)

2 games against other playoff teams (suns, spurs)

So if we get the 8 we had betters and win 1 game out of each other group we will have 48 wins and go 13-11. That in my mind is somewhat realistic. however we can probably heavily increase our odds if we beat houston, hornets and memphis in our head to head games against them.

That is a detailed site. These days a lot of advanced stuff is getting done.

One of Houston, New Orleans or Memphis will need to go at least .667 to cause trouble and right now it would most likely be trouble for Portland. And that .667 needed will fairly quickly become .750 unless one of the playoff seeds slip off a decent pace.

It's also interesting that the site gives the Thunder the best chance of going 14-10... which keeps them in the 4-5-6 seed range.

Interesting stuff... but for the sake of the team, I hope the players aren't paying any attention at all!

that site is bomb.com (sorry Uncle Jeff)