NBA PLAYOFF TIME .....................2025......

CLAW 

Thanks Claw.

I had pretty much decided to take the Pacers this morning. Then i saw your post and thought long and hard and ultimately changed my pick. 

Pacers made few runs, but they didn't cut it below 10 the entire second half.

The Knicks really need KAT to stay out of foul trouble though. Pacers went on runs every time KAT was taken out of the game. His +/- was plus 26. 

I think the Pacers close it out next game though. If not, good value on Pacers +150ish in game 7. Don't think it gets there though. 

Right now without looking into anything yet, I agree with Pacers game 6.

season --- 22-17, won 5.01 units

All Knicks last night. Was a very good spot to back the Knicks. 

I did see line go to -4.5 so no play on my line. Pacers are really not playing much if any better then their full season rating.

I will run the numbers from Jan 2cd when they seemed to turn things around.

My line in game 1 if Pacers get there, 0KC -12.51

I saw game 1 line posted DraftKings, somewhere around 8 or 9 best I remember. 

All OKC in game 1.

Since 1980 there will be 92 teams in the finals 8ncludung this season.

Of those 92 teams 22 or 23.9% have a shooting efficiency margin of 4% or better.

This is strong efficiency  of out-playing your opponent. With OKC becoming just the 2cd team to be over 6% at 6.11%.

10 teams played each other, of the previous 11 teams 4% or better they are 9-2 at winning the series.

85 Lakers with Magic and Kareem were the 1st team to do it. Since then over 3 decades no team lost the series untill along came a man named LBJ in 2011 who faded in the clutch and could not get it done.

BUT, the 2cd team to lose over 4% 2016 Warriors who held a 3-1 lead, then that same man LBJ was part of a historic come-back erasing the 3-1 deficit and won the title.

I just found it interesting LBJ was a part of both those losses.

2008 Celtics were the first team to go over 5% shooting efficiency margin.

Since 2008 we have had 7 teams over 5% 8 if we include 2018 Warriors where Curry only played 51 games after playing 80, 79, 79 in the other 3 years Warriors were over 5%.

3point shooting is the big difference. 

85 Lakers shot 4.1% off all shoots were 3's.

92 Bulls --- 6.2%

96 Bulls--- 19.6% .......Bulls actually ahead of their time.

99 Spurs 13.7%

2008 Celtics 24.9%

2011 Heat 23.5%

2013 Heat 28.5% .....2cd team over 5%

2015 Warriors 31.1%.....1st Warriors title

2017 Warriors 35.9% .......1st team over 6%

2024 Celtics 47.8% .....wow

2025 OKC 41.7% I think 

2025 Celtics was over 50% . Crazy.

From the little I looked into it the 96 Bulls seemed to be ahead of the curve. Went to 20.3% in 97 with Jazz at 14.5% about the same as 99 Spurs.

MJ took the 2cd most 3's on the the team in 96 but only 3.2 a game but shot a very strong 42.7%.

Interesting in 98 MJ was not a good 3 pt shooter as he was getting older. But he shot a pretty impressive 46.2% from 16 feet to 3 pt line.

To put that in perspective Kobe never shot that once on his career and only shot over 43.5% 1 time yet MJ did it as an older player.

LBJ never did it either. He never shot over 45%.

Shot over 44% maybe 3 or 4 times in how many years he has been playing yet MJ did it as a older player.

As we can see it is much easier to get over 4% today then back in the 80's and early/middle 90's with 7 even 8 teams over 5% with 0 back then.

Today the minimum should be more like 4.5% because of the era. And possibly we could lower the 4% to 3.6 or 3.7% back in 80's then we'd  have 2 more teams, 86 Celtics and 91 Bulls.

To shoot a strong efficiency  over opponent takes alot of focus but then to achieve that high efficiency  and rebound at a high rate is very difficult for any team to Do.

In fact only 1 team has done it and stands heads & shoulders above all other teams.

The best rebound % by any team over 4% was 97 Jazz at 50.7%.

2024 Celtics at 50.6%

85 Lakers at 50.5 %

Of the 22 teams half or 11 were under 50% rebounds. With only 3 teams 50.5% or better .

1 team stands alone at the top ............ so far ahead of any other team

Enter the Mightly Bulls ...............

92 Bulls 52.2

97 Bulls 52.6%

96 Bulls 54..................... and remains the best rebounding team by a country mile  to win the NBA finals since they starting tracking off and def rebounding need to get reb %.

MJ was top 5 all-time for shooting guards rebounding. 

LBJ is not 10 for his position. 

2014 Heat ...4.12% but a pathetic 46.8% reb

2014 Spurs 4.16% .......49.55% reb....Spurs win 4-1

2013 Heat ..... over 5 %, 5.64% but again a pathetic 47.6%

2011 Heat ....4.07% ... 50.35% reb, respectable rebounding but lost the series.

I wasn't trying to turn this into MJ VS LBJ but based on the info it just happened.

87 Lakers with Magic and Kareem 4.6% was the best by any champion and likely any team untill 2008 Celtics.

Wow, that is so incredible since 3 pt shots were like 4,5,6 % back then and it took Celtics 24.9% .

2cd best was 99 Spurs 4.5%

3rd best 96 Bulls 4.4%

But rebounding ........

87 LA 50.2%

99 Spurs 49.9%

96 Bulls 54%

Now very likely we do have 2 more teams would be over 4% with no 3's.

71 Bucks

72 Lakers 

Both very strong shooting efficiency  likely could the 2 best ever but since they did not track turnovers which I include I don't know how they would rate.

Interesting I will run OKC's rating with out turnovers and post it later.

But adding it all up you don't want to go against  a team over 4% shooting efficiency margin winning the series in the  NBA finals.

You are really bucking very strong history if you decide to take Pacers or Knicks to win the series.

Great info 

Thanks Fuse ............

Good read.   Merci.  

I saw someone stating OKC net rating was almost half was because of winning the TO battle.

Hard to believe but winning TO's by 5.8 I can't recall any team being better.

96 Bulls did very well winning by 2.8. Damn, not even close to OKC.

2017 Warriors by like .7

87 Lakers by only .1. Crazy as this team had the largest difference 4.6 % all the way to 2008 Celtics.

So I ran OKC's rating with no TO's.

4.11%. Drops about 33% not 50% as suggested by someone.

OKC 6.11% with TO'S included. Drops 2 %.

If we only looking at shooting efficiency margin 87 Lakers would drop almost nothing maybe .1 % if anything. And be the better team.

But Magic an all-time great Passer had a high TO rate so it is not a fair comparison that we count all the very easy high % basket he got for teammates without counting the negative parts of those great passes which is TO's.

When OKC is creating and winning TO's they are very difficult to beat.

If we look at the 2 3 pt Shooters shooting 80% on 3's in games 1 & 2 ..........

1of 6 game 3

3 of 8 game 4 ......not bad

1 of 6 game 5 .......there's  your regression at work

Over the next 3 games those 2... 80% Shooters shot 25%

The law of averages...............

MY LINES ............Saturday game 6

Pacers -3.21 over Knicks

My line has no play at Pacers -4.

2cd closeout game for Pacers, we don't use my lines for closeout games IF  the team is clearly the better team and should win the series.

Here we don't have that. So we could use my lines that says no play unless goes to -4.5 then play is on Knicks.

The spot does favor Knicks on one hand as the better team in both PR's and forcing a game 7 would be typical.

But spot favors Pacers as they lead 2-0 on the road and they lead 3-1 these teams rarely lose the series and the most likely outcome is win series at home in Game 6.

The spot I think carries more weight favors Pacers.

Pacers did get very lucky winning game 1 making 8 straight 3's then on top of that having the final shot bounce off the back of the rim and go in. This most likely would be a different  series had that luck shot not gone in.

My line has been spot on this series, 3-0 ATS with a 1 pt difference. 

I will pass on this game, but think Pacers should win SU.

Thanks Claw. I'm actually looking for a reason to take the Knicks tonight. Doubt it gets to the +4.5. 

Was thinking Indiana ML all day, but having second thoughts again. Need to look into some stuff. 

I agree and I took IND ML -177 for 2 units.  I have a bunch of queries that favor IND SU with -177 as a bargain, but tighter ATS margins.  This is the main one with a HUGE sample size:

PO = 1 and HF and p:LAD

SU:   252-107 (6.8,70.2%)  The 6.8 is the average SU margin.

ATS:  200-156-3 (2.3,56.2%)

The Sports Data Query Language on this one is pretty simple, and one needn't be an SDQL pro to understand it:

In the PlayOffs a Home Favorite who Lost as an Away Dog in the previous game is 70.2% SU and 56.2% ATS.

I usually stick to ATS wagers hitting at 59%+ with a minimum average ATS margin of 3+ points.  At -177, any SU queries hitting above 63.8989% create a positive Expected Value.

I am not having a good NBA playoffs run, so feel free to fade me.  Good luck everybody.

Re Comment #340 and turnovers:

I love the Sports Database, but one thing that really bugs me about Sport Data Query Language is that an offensive turnover is a Plus value and a defensive takeaway is a Minus value.  WTF???

Here is a playoff query about turnover margin (TOM) just for this season:

season = 2024 and PO = 1 and TOM < -5.5

SU:   24-2 (16.6,92.3%)

ATS:  21-5 (10.8,80.8%)

In the 2024 playoffs season, teams with at least 6 more takeaways than turnovers win SU 92.3% of the games and cover 80.8% of the games.  Good luck trying to predict that.  If that is what happened in the previous game (p:), it is not predictive:

season = 2024 and PO = 1 and p:TOM < -5.5

SU:   15-15 (3.1,50.0%)

ATS:  12-18 (-0.1,40.0%)

Surprisingly, OKC's big TOM in their clinching game vs. MIN bodes ill for Game 1 vs. IND:

PO = 1 and p:TOM < -5.5 and line < -7.2 and series game = 1

SU:   11-9 (2.7,55.0%)

ATS:  6-14 (-6.5,30.0%)

Teams that clinch a playoff series with at least 6 more takeaways than turnovers only cover 30% of the following series' openers when laying at least 7.5 points.

Good stuff .........

Thanks for posting that, very good info to know..........

I don't think one needs to predict TO's, OKC is very strong at winning To's they will win that battle when they really need a game is when you can expect them to bring their best games.

This is consistently what I have seen over the years with other strong teams.

POWER RATING I...............

OKC 10.64.........by 8.51

Pacers 2.13

Teams better by 1.25 are 26-6 winning the series since 1980.

POWER RATING II.................

OKC 55.51..........by 5.48

Pacers 50.03

Teams better by .75 are 16-5 at winning the series since 1980

Power Rating I & II combined .........

OKC by 13.99 over Pacers 

Teams better by 4.5 are 16-2 (88.9%) since 1980

PLAYOFF ONLY POWER RATING ..............

NBA FINALS VERSION ...

OKC 70.01.........by 8.12

Pacers 62.95

Teams over 5 since 2001 are 6-0 at winning the series.

Teams over 3.25 are 8-0 at winning the series

Of those 8 teams 5 had home court and of those 5 with home court advantage won 4-0 or 4-1.

OKC ranks 4th most dominate through the playoffs of any series since 2001. 

Of the other 3 , 4-1, 4-0, 4-1 including Celtics of last season who rolled the Mavs when many liked the Mavs so much 

Other matchups over 3.25 .........

2006 D Wade, Shaq Heat over Mavs by 6.32 Mavs home court 60 win team. Heat win 4-2.

2011 Mavs over D Wade, over LBJ Heat  by 3.37, win 4-2 as road team in series

2016 LBJ Cavs over Warriors by 5.44, win 4-3 as road team

2018 Warriors over Cavs by 16.16, 4-0 sweep

2001 Shaq & Kobe Lakers over 76ers by a whopping 26.85, win 4-1

2024 Celtics over Mavs by 12.37, win 4-1

2020 Lakers over Heat by 5.22. Win 4-2

2017 Warriors over Cavs by 3.26 win 4-1