In a recent entry, right here, it was noted that, since the 2000-2001 season, each of the two finalists for the NBA Championship have also been top performing teams during the regular season, not just according to their overall Won-Loss (W-L) records but two other simple objective measures … i.e. (i) Quality Rating (QR), and (ii) Quality Index Rank (QIR) … which reflect a team’s approach (i.e. balanced or not) to Offense, Defense and Rebounding.
Looking at the current league standings, these are the QR & QIR values for the 16 teams that would qualify for the Playoffs, if they were to start today:
|
Team |
W-L |
Score Differential Rank |
Opponent Score Rank |
Rebound Differential Rank |
QR |
QIR |
|
Boston |
20-2 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
3 |
1 |
|
Detroit |
17-7 |
2 |
2 |
9 |
13 |
2 |
|
San Antonio |
18-6 |
3 |
3 |
8 |
14 |
3 |
|
Utah |
14-12 |
5 |
19 |
3 |
27 |
4 |
|
Washington |
13-10 |
11 |
16 |
2 |
29 |
5 |
|
LA Lakers |
14-9 |
4 |
23 |
6 |
33 |
6 |
|
New Orleans |
15-10 |
13 |
6 |
15 |
34 ↑ |
7 |
|
Dallas |
17-9 |
9 |
14 |
12 |
35 |
8 |
|
Toronto |
14-11 |
10 |
8 |
20 |
38 |
9 |
|
Orlando |
17-9 |
7 |
17 |
18 |
42 |
10 |
|
Atlanta |
12-12 |
17 |
7 |
21 |
45 |
11 ↑ |
|
Cleveland |
11-14 |
22 |
21 |
11 |
54 |
12 |
|
Indiana |
13-12 |
15 |
27 |
15 |
57 |
13 |
|
Denver |
14-10 |
8 |
25 |
27 |
60 |
14 |
|
Phoenix |
18-7 |
5 |
26 |
30 |
61 |
15 |
|
Golden State |
14-11 |
12 |
30 |
29 |
71 |
16 |
While they may win a lot of games this season, based on their performance thus far, neither the Phoenix Suns not the Golden State Warriors – with their present QR & QIR values – should be considered “legitimate contenders” for the 2007-2008 NBA Championship.
Tags: champions, Golden State Warriors, NBA, Phoenix Sun
February 1, 2008 at 9:02 am
[...] Legitimate Contenders in the NBA, Part I Legitimate Contenders in the NBA: Part II What it takes to win the NBA Championship [...]