Run for Play-In

[BacktoBasics]

Not top 5 but still plenty of maneuvering among 6 - 10 can occur.

This is my point.

Let’s say they lose out. They’re still not going to land in the top 6 and probably not 7 either. They can just as easy trade for a 6-10 pick as they can losing out. While still attempting to make the play in.

Now a month ago when cracking the top 6 had a much higher chance I was definitely all for tanking out.

At this point no amount of tanking will produce a pick that wouldn’t otherwise be obtainable via a moderate trade.

[MultiTroll]

I believe exstatic posted the stats.
#6 is not impossible far fetched to reach #1 overall pick or is it?
Thought it was like 15%.

[slick'81]

This is my point.

Let’s say they lose out. They’re still not going to land in the top 6 and probably not 7 either. They can just as easy trade for a 6-10 pick as they can losing out. While still attempting to make the play in.

Now a month ago when cracking the top 6 had a much higher chance I was definitely all for tanking out.

At this point no amount of tanking will produce a pick that wouldn’t otherwise be obtainable via a moderate trade.

yup spurs are going to be in the playin again and we just have to hope for a different outcome this time around

[exstatic]

Because at this point it doesn't change much. The Spurs aren't breaking the top 5 even if they lose out. Their ability to package up a 10th, 11th or 12th pick to acquire a 7th or 8th pick(which is where they'd be if they lose out) wouldn't be impossible.

So basically they can get a 7th or 8th pick if they really want it regardless of whether they land there by loses or package a player/late pick that was already not in the plans.

No ideal but not catastrophic like some make it out to be.

Nobody here really is hot and bothered at picking 7th. What they want is to FINISH in 7th, and have that 32% chance of jumping into the top 4. Pick #7 has done it for 4 years in a row. Now, it's nearly impossible currently to finish 7th with Portland in the tank hard, but we could easily finish 8th, and have a 26% chance. You can't replace that chance, because nobody is trading out of the top 4. Slot #10 has a 13.9% chance. Dropping 2 slots from 8 to 10 and making the play in cuts our chances almost in half.

In the new draft era, 3 years total, 7 out of the 12 teams in the collective top 4s jumped in via the lottery. Only once with the new flat odds has a team 10 or later jumped in, and people were convinced that the league fixed it for the Lakers (#11) to do so as payment in the AD trade.

[BacktoBasics]

I believe exstatic posted the stats.
#6 is not impossible far fetched to reach #1 overall pick or is it?
Thought it was like 15%.

I believe 6 is impossible. If it isn’t it’ll take an absurd scenario to get there.

Let’s say the Spurs covet the 6th pick. It’s not unobtainable like a top 4 and probably easier to package up picks and players than it would be to work a miracle of losing out and needing other teams to win out.

We’re out of the window where we control our own destiny by simply losing out to get a good pick. At this point might as well put up the good fight

[BacktoBasics]

Nobody here really is hot and bothered at picking 7th. What they want is to FINISH in 7th, and have that 32% chance of jumping into the top 4. Pick #7 has done it for 4 years in a row. Now, it's nearly impossible currently to finish 7th with Portland in the tank hard, but we could easily finish 8th, and have a 26% chance. You can't replace that chance, because nobody is trading out of the top 4. Slot #10 has a 13.9% chance. Dropping 2 slots from 8 to 10 and making the play in cuts our chances almost in half.

In the new draft era, 3 years, 7 out of the 12 teams in the top 4s jumped in via the lottery. Only once with the new flat odds has a team 10 or later jumped in, and people were convinced that the league fixed it for the Lakers (#11) to do so as payment in the AD trade.

This is a fair argument but still requires divine intervention.

[exstatic]

This is a fair argument but still requires divine intervention.

It does, but the odds aren't awful at 7 or 8, and that's where the real talent is in most drafts, the top 3-4 picks.

[rjv]

if i had to prognosticate, i'd say that the spurs will make the play in as the 10th seed, lose to the pelicans (although it wouldn't shock me if they didn't) and then wind up with the 9th position in the lottery.

[jjspur]

He is playing his damn ass off. Can’t fault him for that. His GM skills make Brian Wright and whoever else has been pulling strings in PATFO look like rockstars though.

I don't fault him for that. I do fault him for getting his high priced, oft injured, over the hill pals to play with him. It doesn't leave any money to attract average priced 2nd teamers or reliable backups. Lebron " Come play with me in L.A. while I score a bunch a points and get paid 40 plus million dollars and you can get paid the veterans minimum. As a bonus we'll be the favorites to win the NBA championship" Of course you will Bronny. There's always next year when you get paid even more and this situation can happen again.
You're right, Brian Wright and company look like geniuses in comparison.

[gambit1990]

And the team isn’t trying to win at expense of giving young players minutes. Vassell will get close to 2,000 minutes, Jones over 1,000 minutes and Primo almost 1,000 minutes as a kid who just turned 19.

They dealt away three of the four oldest guys on the team (Forbes, White and Young) and got back assets. The only other older guy getting minutes provides important floor spacing that helps development of the rest of the roster.

Not sure what your definition of tanking is. Should they have kept Eubanks and Forbes and played them with street free agents?

i'd rest murray and poeltl some games tbh.

[Mr. Body]

Some interesting things going on with the team lately. I don't think the team is tanking, borne out by appearance, but Pop is definitely tinkering.

1. Getting Primo play. He's looking solid as a starter. I like what I see and am not concerned about his shot and mistakes. He's creating a great foundation for next year.

2. Richardson. Adds a real punch to the bench, finished the game against the Rockets. Closer to the true wing this team hasn't had and doesn't have the sadsack yips that still plagues Walker and Vassell.

3. Two-big sets. Earlier in the year, I wondered if we'd see Landale with Poeltl or Eubanks. Now we're starting to see it (and Collins in the mix). It causes problems for some teams.

The latter two are allowing Keldon to play more 3, which suits him in stretches. Primo is flashing some playmaking skills, even if he's not always executing, and Richardson looks untapped in a Popovich system.

Some casualties include KBD, who can't provide what Richardson does. I wonder if Richardson just makes any attempt to continue with Lonnie obsolete, although of course there are possibilities of trading J-Rich. I think the Spurs are nearly a playoff team outright next year if they make a couple of adds/changes.

[KingKev]

Some interesting things going on with the team lately. I don't think the team is tanking, borne out by appearance, but Pop is definitely tinkering.

1. Getting Primo play. He's looking solid as a starter. I like what I see and am not concerned about his shot and mistakes. He's creating a great foundation for next year.

2. Richardson. Adds a real punch to the bench, finished the game against the Rockets. Closer to the true wing this team hasn't had and doesn't have the sadsack yips that still plagues Walker and Vassell.

3. Two-big sets. Earlier in the year, I wondered if we'd see Landale with Poeltl or Eubanks. Now we're starting to see it (and Collins in the mix). It causes problems for some teams.

The latter two are allowing Keldon to play more 3, which suits him in stretches. Primo is flashing some playmaking skills, even if he's not always executing, and Richardson looks untapped in a Popovich system.

Some casualties include KBD, who can't provide what Richardson does. I wonder if Richardson just makes any attempt to continue with Lonnie obsolete, although of course there are possibilities of trading J-Rich. I think the Spurs are nearly a playoff team outright next year if they make a couple of adds/changes.

I wouldn’t take much if anything away from these points as they probably have little relevance come next season. We aren’t tanking but we aren’t all in for the play-in either. Points 1-3 above seem more cir stantial to end this season and less what we can expect next year.

[lefty20]

LBJ out against Mavs tonight. We in boys, for tonight at least.

[007nites]

LBJ out against Mavs tonight. We in boys, for tonight at least.

AD playing?

[TD 21]

The Rockets just drafted four first-rounders last year to go with Wood. Sacramento has two All-Star threats and a number of decent role-players. If you don't think getting a high pick is a talent infusion, I don't know why you want the Spurs to get worse in hopes of getting it.

Drafting in the 1st round doesn't automatically equate to high end talent. The Rockets have one player projected to fit that description. The Kings are horribly constructed, including their two "All-Star threats".

I want the Spurs to get a high pick because it's greater odds of getting a high end talent. There are obviously no guarantees though.

But I don't have to worry about the cognitive dissonance trying to feel happy about a team losing. I get to want them to win and still find the silver lining of them not doing that. Being a Spurs fans has never been easier.

But a young team with tons of assets? Yep. It's fine.

Neither do I. It's not like I'm in a rage over these results. I thought they'd do this down the stretch and am predisposed to presume bad luck against them, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

But they don't have tons of assets.

I'm assuming you mean "keep it simple, stupid". But that is like saying, "Your plan to go to school, get a degree and work experience and saving money to buy a home is needlessly complex. I'll just keep playing the lotto" is a good idea because it's simpler. Playing the odds isn't a way to build a roster. At best it's a way to acquire the initial building block.

No, it's not like that at all and pro sports should never be analogized to most any profession. In this world, you're incentivized to a much higher degree for being bad.

A single building block is all I'm advocating for. This is not a ground floor re-build.

One of the main reasons why bad teams stay bad even after picking up talent is that they don't have structure in place to develop talent. Removing that structure has a cost, even if it's just for the last quarter of the season.

There's downsides to virtually anything. I'd have taken this miniscule one for a decent chance at getting a high end talent.

Eh, count me as someone who'd be fine with the team playing too big for a while rather than too small. Plus, if it all works out, then Murray, Collins and Poeltl would pretty comfortably fill most of the front-court minutes. That's especially true given that Murray is likely to at least start the season off on the bench.

I agree, but the lineup you're proposing is too lacking in ball handling mainly.

[lefty20]

AD playing?

Nope, he's confirmed to be out as well.

[RC_Drunkford]

I'm on neither team tbh. Weather it's play in or tanking, I don't really care. The team is a lot better than at the beginning or even middle of the season and that's with Lonnie and McDermott out. As long as they find a way to fix the hole at the starting 4 position in the offseason I'm fine. They should be a playoff team next season.

[boutons_deux]

LBJ out against Mavs tonight. We in boys, for tonight at least.

For tied records, the NBA tiebreaker rules apply

[Mr. Body]

I wouldn’t take much if anything away from these points as they probably have little relevance come next season. We aren’t tanking but we aren’t all in for the play-in either. Points 1-3 above seem more cir stantial to end this season and less what we can expect next year.

I mean, they literally are relevant to next season. This is literally the reason Popovich is trying them.

[Mr. Body]

Lakers look completely done.

[ZeusWillJudge]

Do you guys understand how the whole lottery thing works? The real method takes a lof of math, but an easy way to picture it is this:

Say there are 1,000 ping pong balls. With the current standings, HOU/ORL/DET each get 140 balls, and the Spurs get 60. So the Spurs chance at the #1 pick will be 60/1000 or 6%. Now... suppose Hou gets picked. It's time for the second pick, but Houston can't get a second pick so you have to remove all 140 of their ping pong balls. The Spurs still have 60 ping pong balls, only now there are just 860 balls in the container. So the Spurs chance at getting the #2 pick would be 60/860 or 6.9%.

Most of you can see that it would be different if Charlotte got drawn for the #1 pick. Charlotte only had 5 ping pong balls out of 1,000. So after they got drawn, only those 5 ping pong balls would be removed, and the Spurs would have a 60/995 chance at the #2 pick.

That's not the real methodology, but the important thing to remember is that when someone gets drawn for the #1 pick, they can't get picked again. So all the lottery odds you're looking at are estimates and averages. Because you can't know what the real odds for the #2 pick are until the #1 pick has been made, and you can know how many ping pong balls don't count anymore.

So if you can live with a little more math... imagine that Houston gets the #1 pick, Orlando gets the #2, and Detroit gets the #3 pick. None of them can get picked again, so there would be 420 ping pong balls removed from the bin. So the Spurs chance at getting the #4 pick at that point would be 60/580 or about 10.3%.

So in that exact situation, the 8th-worst Spurs would have had an overall 31.5% chance of getting one of the top 4 picks. The 14th-worst Hornets would have had a 1.7% chance of getting one of the top 4 picks. (That's not perfect, but it's darned close.) You see how much difference there CAN be between the 8 and the 14 record? It's not just the difference between the 8 and 14 pick, which is big. It's a HUGE difference in the chance of getting a Top 4.

And no matter what anyone says, Top 4 is everything. Because everyone available at 15 was available at 4 - not the other way around.

[Dex]

For tied records, the NBA tiebreaker rules apply

We're well ahead with the tie-breaker which will come down to record vs Western Conference. And we still play the Blazers twice

[Dex]

Lakers down 30 with 7 minutes left in the 2nd

[slick'81]

Lakers down 30 with 7 minutes left in the 2nd

no ad or bron so they suuuck

[Mr. Body]

The whole Lakers team is checked out. It must be a nightmare for the rank and file. Total dysfunction. I think they're done, the question is what they do for next year. Spurs are against NOP for the play-in. Who would have thought.