The Looming Blowout

Just how lopsided is this year's Finals going to be? Well, according to Basketball Reference, the 2006-2007 Cavaliers score 105.5 points per hundred possessions while giving up 101.3 points per hundred. That's a 4.2 point efficiency differential. The Spurs, by contrast, score 109.3 points per hundred and only give up 99.8 per hundred for a 9.5 point differential.

That's a pretty ginormous gap. The 2003 Nets had a 5.4 point efficiency differential to the '03 Spurs' 6.3, by way of contrast (a mere 0.9 point gap). Alternatively, the 2002 Lakers had a 7.2 point differential and the '02 Nets clocked in with a paltry 4.4 differential, but even that is only a 2.8 point gap.

Comments

Regular season stats don't matter at all for this series -- all that matters is whether James can keep up his momentum from his last couple games. If he does, it's a series; if not, it's a joke.

Posted by Aaron S. Veenstra | June 5, 2007 4:38 PM

Hey Matt:

Is the efficiency differential differential a very predictive stat?

Posted by blah | June 5, 2007 4:39 PM

Hey Matt:

The 2007 Mavs had an efficiency differential of 8.7 while the 2007 Warriors had an efficiency differential of 0.4.

Posted by blah | June 5, 2007 4:43 PM

Wow. I totally thought the proper spelling was "gianormous". But googlefight says I'm very wrong. weird.

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot | June 5, 2007 4:52 PM

How about the 2004 Finals? I'd be interested to see because it was such a huge upset.

Posted by Freddie | June 5, 2007 4:54 PM

I really want to be able to provide a counterargument here. I love the NBA and I love the Finals, but unfortunately there were two glaring points made in Game 5 of the ECF - yes, Lebron is REALLY good, and yes, the Cavs supporting cast is REALLY bad.

Some worthwhile betting points - will the Spurs shoot over 55% for the series? 57%? 60%? Will Lebron break any significant playoff records? (Jordan's single-game record of 63 springs to mind.)

Will any other Cavs break any significant playoff futility records? (Rodman's record Oh-Fer 14 springs to mind - paging Larry Hughes!)

Is PPH differential a reliable way to predict playoff series; does anyone know?

APS

Posted by Ape Man | June 5, 2007 4:59 PM

2004:

DET: 6.8 Effiency Differential (ED)
LA: 3.7 (ED)

Posted by blah | June 5, 2007 4:59 PM

Thanks Matt. Every time you have stepped up to pick a team or talk about their chances in this season's NBA playoffs, the opposite has happened. Did you bump up against Bush or Cheney sometime back in April? Cavs fans should be feeling pretty good now...

Posted by bubba | June 5, 2007 5:06 PM

Now's as good a time as any to *stop* betting against LeBron.

Posted by sherifffruitfly | June 5, 2007 5:12 PM

It appears that in the Finals the team with the better ED usually wins, but the stat doesn't appear to be a much better indicator than any other single stat that you would expect to correlate with a team's success. Here are the teams I found that have won the finals against an opponent with a better regular season ED (in the last 30 years):

2006 Miami Heat
1995 Houston Rockets
1994 Houston Rockets
1990 Detroit Pistons
1989 Detroit Pistons
1982 Philadelphia 76ers
1979 Seattle Supersonics
1978 Washington Bullets

So that's 8 times in 30 years, making the team with the lower ED a little better than a 3:1 dog.

I would imagine you'd find about the same if you used a simpler measure like regular season road record or something, but I'm not sure.

It is probably worth noting that the Cavs ED definiciency in this series is significantly greater than any of the teams listed above.

APS

Posted by Ape Man | June 5, 2007 5:16 PM

Not only that, but the Spurs' Homecourt Coefficient is at 23.1. If the Cavs had the homecourt advantage, it might be a series, as their HC of 19.1 is also pretty impressive, but 4 games in SA is just too much for them.

Posted by strannix | June 5, 2007 5:18 PM

"but 4 games in SA is just too much for them."

So the Cavs really only need to win one in SA to keep the series from going to SA for 4 games.

If the Cavs take one of the first two games in SA, this should be a pretty exciting series regardless of who wins.

Posted by bubba | June 5, 2007 5:29 PM

Almost all playoff teams have excellent homecourt winning percentages. What differentiates teams is their road winning percentages. The Cavs had a losing record on the road in the regular season (20-21), while the Spurs were 27-14.

This series is very lopsided by any measure.

APS

Posted by Ape Man | June 5, 2007 5:36 PM

Ape Man,

As a Sonics fan what caught my eye was the oddity that the in '78 and '79 the Supes and Bullets played each other and the team with the worst ED won both times.

Not sure what if anything it means, but just kind of interesting that it only happened 8 times and 2 of the 8 involved the same teams with each winning once.

Posted by Eric | June 5, 2007 5:43 PM

"It appears that in the Finals the team with the better ED usually wins, but the stat doesn't appear to be a much better indicator than any other single stat that you would expect to correlate with a team's success."

I believe it correlates less well in the Finals than the overlooked stat of won-loss record.

Posted by Petey | June 5, 2007 5:50 PM

"Just how lopsided is this year's Finals going to be?"

I think the Spurs are more likely to win the series. But the crucial question here is what kind of percentage to assign to their chances.

I think they're more likely win than 50%, but the 81% odds being offered strike me as waaaaaaaaay too dismissive of the Cavs' chances.

The scenarios for the Cavs to win - their defense bending, but not breaking, and the Cavs role players making open shots - don't seem particularly outlandish to me.

Posted by Petey | June 5, 2007 5:58 PM

Yeah, but the match-up of "energy guys"--Oberto vs. Varejao--will be one for the ages.

Posted by Kit Stolz | June 5, 2007 6:29 PM

So the Cavs really only need to win one in SA to keep the series from going to SA for 4 games.

I'm not sure you understand the importance of HC. It's really pretty simple math - with San Antonio's 23.1-19.1 advantage, they're not only 42% more likely than average to win a home game against a similarly talented team, but they're also 23% more likely to win a game in Cleveland for the same reason.

But it another way, no team has overcome an HC deficit that big since the 1970 Knicks knocked off the Lakers. And no one's even forced a game 6 since the '85 Celtics.

Posted by strannix | June 5, 2007 6:30 PM

Yg's on the Pistons/Bulls:

"My heart says Bulls..."

My heart says Bulls are watching these proceedings on television.

Bruce Bowen will be "greeted as a liberator."

Posted by DJ Tennessee | June 5, 2007 6:32 PM

7 games is too small a sample size for any of these stats, and for that matter just about any statistic, to be predictive. Besides, stats blow up in the postseason, when substitution patterns, strategy, and outlier performance are more significant. The NBA is about 1 year away from seamheads ruining it for the internet with these bullshit stats like they did with baseball.

That said, why not hang your hat on the slightly counter-intuitive argument that the Spurs will win because they have the best individual player on either team? I don't happen to agree, but it's a good bet-the-house argument, and it has at least as much history behind it as any quantitative argument.

Posted by diddy | June 5, 2007 6:40 PM

Every time you have stepped up to pick a team or talk about their chances in this season's NBA playoffs, the opposite has happened.

Except for, um, the Spurs who I predicted to come out of the West before the season started and then again on the first day of the playoffs.

Posted by Matthew Yglesias | June 5, 2007 6:44 PM

So the Spurs' entry into the Finals is your fault? Thanks for ruining the playoffs, Yglesias.

Posted by SomeCallMeTim | June 5, 2007 6:52 PM

"Except for, um, the Spurs who I predicted to come out of the West before the season started and then again on the first day of the playoffs."

Indeed.

I think you're right for the wrong reasons, but that doesn't change the fact that you've been right so far.

Posted by Petey | June 5, 2007 6:52 PM

Yeah, but the match-up of "energy guys"--Oberto vs. Varejao--will be one for the ages.

Bah. You blaspheme the memories of Kurt Rambis vs. Marc Iavaroni.

Posted by Swopa | June 5, 2007 7:34 PM

"The 2007 Mavs had an efficiency differential of 8.7 while the 2007 Warriors had an efficiency differential of 0.4."

FYI, this Dallas Maverick fan has given up on basketball entirely until next year's second round.

Posted by bob mcmanus | June 5, 2007 7:35 PM

5 games at the most, with the one that the Cavs win being entirely on the back of LeBron.

For behold, The David Stern 8-ball sez:

LeBron must lose in order to create buzz for next year.

Posted by Ugh | June 5, 2007 7:57 PM

How did Cleveland compare with Detroit in all these stats?

Posted by John | June 5, 2007 8:55 PM

Why does Matthew bring up the two Nets Finals? Is he trying to bait me? I mean, the Nets-SA series went to 6 games, so that wouldn't be indicative of a blowout no matter what.

Posted by Al | June 5, 2007 9:54 PM

don't ignore that the spurs almost never finish anyone off quickly. they're just not sufficiently motivated, even if they're clearly a better team. so i think the series goes 6.

Posted by dj superflat | June 6, 2007 12:47 PM