2010 Round One Series: Oklahoma Thunder vs Los Angeles Lakers: How the Thunder are Challenging the Lakers

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SCALE FOR REGULAR SEASON REAL PLAYER RATINGS
Perfect for all Practical Purposes / Major Historic Super Star 1.100 and more
Historic Super Star 1.000 1.099
Super Star 0.910 0.999
A Star Player / A Well Above Normal Starter 0.830 0.909
Very Good Player / A Solid Starter 0.760 0.829
Major Role Player / Good Enough to Start 0.700 0.759
Good Role Player / Often a Good 6th Man 0.650 0.699
Satisfactory Role Player 0.590 0.649
Marginal Role Player 0.530 0.589
Poor Player 0.470 0.529
Very Poor Player 0.400 0.469
Extremely Poor Player and less 0.399

The User Guide for Team Grids is here.

THE LAKERS-THUNDER SERIES
One interesting thing about this series, which is at the moment two games to one in favor of the Lakers, with all games having been won by the home team so far, is that the Lakers' players other than the starters and the best non-starter are not as good as those for Oklahoma. Not counting historical superstar Lamar Odom, the Lakers' non-starters are practically scrubs compared with the Oklahoma non-starters.

In terms of actual number of players, due to injuries and due to having too many disappointing players, the Lakers don't have as many playoff quality players (those whose ratings are greater than .600) as do the Thunder! But Phil Jackson likes to have a nine or even a ten player rotation in the playoffs because he knows those extra "wild card" players are sometimes secret (and sometimes not so secret) keys to tough wins in the playoffs. Alas, Phil is not a happy camper this year because there is no way in hell he can run a nine or ten man rotation.

Shannon Brown and Jordan Farmer are decent but definitely not outstanding guards. The injured 2-guard Sasha Vujacic was just a role player this year, but every one of the mighty Lakers who play in the playoffs are supposed to be better than mere role players, Derek Fisher included.

Coach Scott Brooks (who is the NBA official Coach of the Year) is, chances are by accident, conducting an unusual experiment where the non-starters are about as good as the starters (in fact, they are even better in this case).

Incidentally, Quest for the Ring does not have a "Coach of the Year," but we do annually give Real Ratings for coaches that are based on the coaches' entire NBA coaching careers. See here for the 2009 Report.

"Coach of the Year" is not a very meaningful thing because coaching is complicated and subject to a lot of luck (for example, do you have good players or not?). The only truly meaningful way to rate coaches is over their entire careers. But of course, coaches who have been coaching for less than about five years don't have enough performance data to have a Rating that is high quality statistically, but we have a few tricks we use to improve the quality of their ratings so that we can include those newer coaches in the annual Coach Rating Report.

All of that said, it sure would appear that Scott Brooks is a fine new coach; he certainly seems to be one of the more intelligent coaches, which by itself is an important factor. If you don't have a smart coach you can generally forget about winning the Quest for the Ring. Brooks was a point guard for ten seasons in the NBA and point guards are supposed to be smarter than the average player.

THE MUCH IMPROVED THUNDER
Firstly, note that another interesting thing about this series is that the Oklahoma non-starters are better than the Oklahoma starters!

Secondly, check out last years' Thunder Ratings:

Kevin Durant OKC 0.876
Thabo Sefolosha OKC 0.820
Joe Smith OKC 0.780
Russell Westbrook OKC 0.753
Chris Wilcox OKC 0.731
Nick Collison OKC 0.716
Nenad Krstic OKC 0.716
Malik Rose OKC 0.697
Johan Petro OKC 0.662
Jeff Green OKC 0.661
Robert Swift OKC 0.596
Earl Watson OKC 0.590
Kyle Weaver OKC 0.578
Damien Wilkins OKC 0.491
Desmond Mason OKC 0.482

First notice that last year's Thunder had too many players for there to be much of any chemistry to develop.

Second, compare last year to this year. For the following, the first rating is last year and the second rating is this year.

Kevin Durant: .876 to 1.050
Russell Westbrook: .753 to .919
Thabo Sefolosha: .820 to .596
Jeff Green: .661 to .675
Nenad Krstic: .716 to .644
Nick Collison .716 to .806

Durant at small forward and Westbrook at point are up huge from last year to this year and have become an historical superstar and a superstar, respectively. Collison is up big and is a solid starter (who doesn't start because Jeff Green is starting at power forward). Collison should be starting and if he did start the Thunder would pose a slightly greater threat to the Lakers than they already do.

Or if not Collison than Serge Ibaka should start at center over Nenad Krstic. Due to chemistry and due to the inherent risks of playing rookies in the playoffs, I wouldn't go so far as to say that both Collison and Ibaka should start over Green and Krstic respectively, but at least one of those switches would have to be made if the Thunder really wanted to defeat the Lakers in this series.

But Brooks is doing the next best thing to starting Ibaka or Collison; he is making sure they get playing time equal to or greater than the starters. For example, in the game three win over the Lakers, Ibaka played 27 minutes and Krstic just 16. At the four, both Collison and Green played 28 minutes a piece. So there is some nice work by the Coach of the Year, for you.

The Thunder did have one big disappointment this year, Thabo Sefolosha at 2-guard, but that position is where relatively low ratings are often a fact of life that you can offset to a good extent. If you were to judge just from this year, the rookie James Harden should be starting over Thebo Sefolosha in this series. Rookies at the 2 spot in the playoffs are relatively common and a relatively low risk thing.

But Scott Brooks is apparently following the "Reverse 2-Guard" strategy whereby the inferior 2-guard starts but plays fewer minutes than the best 2-guard on the team who checks into the game sometime in the 1st quarter and ends up playing more minutes than the starter. In last nights' 101-96 win over the Lakers, Harden played 32 minutes and Sefolosha just 19. Quest does not recommend this strategy (despite the fact that Greg Popovich, the second best Coach in the League swears by it). But we are not ready quite yet to completely condemn this strategy for all eternity. We are going to continue to recommend against this but to technically have the jury out on this for awhile longer.

Eric Maynor, .829 this year, James Harden, .788 this year, and Serge Ibaka, .843 this year, are all NBA rookies. I would bet good money that this is by far the best group of three rookies on one team in the League this year. To have three rookies playing that well is nothing short of amazing, and also nothing short of an actual threat to the Lakers winning this series, especially considering the Lakers play relatively poor non-starters versus these three, non-starting rookies.

Phil Jackson really has his work cut out for himself this time. If Jackson can not staunch the bleeding caused by his sorry ass scrubs in his non-starting squad (excepting Lamar Odom, of course) the Thunder might conceivably humiliate the ten-time winner of the Quest for the Ring. Oh well, its high time he earned his ridiculously high pay, laugh out loud.

SCOTT BROOKS COULD HAVE BEEN AND PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE BEEN COACH OF THE NUGGETS
Interestingly, Brooks used to be an assistant coach for the Denver Nuggets for whom coaching seems to be one of the big franchise shortcomings. I don't know about you, but quite frankly it seems to me that the Denver Nuggets are never in my lifetime going to be coached by one of the best coaches in the NBA.

Denver seems to be motivated in other directions than high quality coaching. It appears that Denver thinks that coaches are more important from a player management perspective than they are from a winning playoff games perspective. In other words, the number one duty of the Nuggets coach is to manage players (to "keep them in line" and so forth). Both at the high money end in trades and at the low money end on pickups of players other teams are staying clear of, Denver likes to grab players with personalities which are more volatile and/or more immature than average. I sometimes call the Nuggets a hyena type organization: they look for players who have been cast out of most other teams and can often be obtained cheaply (but not always, for example, Kenyon Martin). All teams do this once in a while but Denver in recent years has been going out of their way to do this kind of thing.

Having a team loaded with personalities less mature and more volatile than average is dangerous, so realizing that, Denver has apparently elected to offset that with a coach who will crack the whip (with benchings for example) if necessary to make sure those players with their somewhat wild and/or somewhat immature personalities don't go completely off the reservation and cause the team to lose cohesiveness and morale. This is my main theory for why George Karl, who has very seldom had any success coaching in the playoffs, has been doggedly supported by the ownership and management of the Nuggets. It is in fact true that Karl is one of the better coaches you could have if your primary objective is to make sure that an unusually large number of players who might fly off the reservation don't do so. But unfortunately for Denver, Karl follows inconsistent and often inferior strategies and tactics for winning in the playoffs.

Introducing Team and Playoff Preview Grids: The Denver Nuggets vs The Utah Jazz, Round One, 2010 Playoffs

The Quest for the Ring presents the first ever published Team Grids as a preview of and guide for the competitive 2010 first round series between the Utah Jazz and the Denver Nuggets.

The other three first round series in the West are most likely already decided. A relatively brief (for us, laugh out loud) look at them:

LOS ANGELES LAKERS OVER THE OKLAHOMA THUNDER
Even with no Andrew Bynum the Lakers are most likely too chock loaded for the Thunder to beat them. But the Lakers’ 2010 secret weakness is out: their bench is a combination of banged up players and players who are just not getting it done.

In the front court there is a huge drop-off from the Gasol-Odom-Bynum “Great Wall of Los Angeles”. If Bynum is out with an injury as he is threatening to be, the Lakers are in trouble unless Ron Artest can magically and instantly become more power forward minded. Josh Powell can successfully fill in for next to no one let alone for Gasol, Odom, or Bynum. Either all three of them play injury free, or the Lakers suddenly transform their guard crew behind Kobe Bryant to better than average, or it seems that the Lakers are doomed to lose to either the Orlando Magic or to the Cleveland Cavaliers in the 2010 Championship. Assuming they even get there: without Bynum the Lakers can relatively easily lose to the Dallas Mavericks in the West Final, who are injury free.

In the back court, Kobe Bryant can make up for only so much lame and uninspired play. Just how bad is the Lakers’ back court this year? It’s so bad that 2-guard Vujacic being out with an injury is most likely a good thing, since he was the biggest disappointment of all for the Lakers in the backcourt this year. Instead of getting better as the Lakers thought he would, Vujacic got worse from last year.

Ironically, considering the relatively sorry state of the Lakers’ reserves, the Thunder have one of the very best benches in pro basketball while Kevin Durant holds down the fort among the mediocre at best other Thunder starters. The Thunder non-starting crew has been nothing short of a miracle this year.

But if Bynum starts or if Lamar Odom starts in place of Bynum for the Lakers, Los Angeles has the best starting five in the West, which if they work their tails off will be enough to prevent the upstart Thunder from taking the series to six or seven games.

For Oklahoma, since backup center Serge Idaka is actually better than the starter Nenad Kristic, Thunder fans should probably hope that he gets more minutes due to a Kristic bruised right knee.

The Thunder can and will run the Lakers right out of the gym in a game whenever the Lakers think that talent alone will give them the game and the series, because the Thunder are younger and can run faster, because the Thunder and not the Lakers are more talented outside of the starting five, and because the Thunder and not the Lakers have the 2009-10 regular season top scorer (Kevin Durant). So unlike last year when the Lakers took forever until they closed out Houston and took their time to close out Denver, they had better close out Oklahoma early rather than late if they know what is good for them.

Last year I think everyone knew that Houston was eventually definitely going to be defeated by LA even if it took all seven games to do it. The Lakers taking until the cows came home to beat the Rockets was as if the cat was toying with the half dead mouse before it kills the mouse once and for all. A warning to the Lakers: the Thunder are NOT mice you can play with before you kill them.

But we have to say the Lakers win this series in God only knows how many games (I’ll guess five or six).

DALLAS MAVERICKS OVER THE SAN ANTONIO SPURS
Marc Cuban spent too much money, Marc Cuban obtained too many of the right players, Marc Cuban cares too much about winning the Quest, and Jason Kidd is just too good this year for San Antonio to be able to pull this out even though, for the record, Greg Popovich is the second best coach in the NBA and is a substantially better coach than Rick Carlisle. But Dallas wins this in five or six games for and due to Cuban and in celebration of a Jason Kidd return to superstar status.

PHOENIX SUNS OVER THE PORTLAND TRAILBLAZERS
The Pacific Northwest basketball monster known as the Trailblazers lost superstar center (if he ever gets to play) Greg Oden for the season. But the monster came back to terrorize the West without Oden. Then they lost established star at the center position Joel Przybilla for the season. But again the monster defied know it alls including Quest for the Ring and came back for more wins and for a playoff berth. But now that monster has lost two guard superstar Brandon Roy for the playoffs.

True, they did scramble to get Marcus Camby to partially make up for the loss of Oden and Przybilla. But the loss of superstar 2-guard Brandon Roy just before the playoffs began would have to be the last nail in the coffin for Portland. You can lose only so many of your best players before its over no matter what you do. So this series will be one of those first round injury washouts: Phoenix in four or five games.

DENVER NUGGETS VERSUS THE UTAH JAZZ
We now have Team Grids that show you the matchups at a glance. The first one ever published, which is for the Denver-Utah series, follows:

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PLAYOFF SERIES GUIDE / TEAM GRIDS USER GUIDE
In general the playoff series guide / team grid system allows for quick and easy comparisons between teams. It also allows managers, coaches, or anyone else to consider changes in playing times that would improve the chances of winning the playoff series. At the same time, and just as importantly, it allows for quick flagging of coaching errors, some of which can be big enough to cost a team a playoff series.

A depth chart shows you team policy regarding who starts and who are the backups and in what order for the five positions. The grid is based on the depth chart style. However, players (other than players acquired during the season; see below) are placed into first squad, second squad, and third squad according to minutes played, not according to the latest ESPN or any other estimation of what the team policy is. Whoever has played the most minutes at a position is shown in the “1st Squad” whether or not that player starts at the position.

There is a notable exception to the rule for who goes in which squad. If a player has been acquired during the season and he is listed as the starter on the ESPN depth chart, he will be shown as first squad. Similarly, if a player acquired during the season is shown as the first backup to the starter in the depth chart he will be shown as second squad regardless of minutes. In other words, the depth chart prevails over minutes in the case of players acquired by trade during the season.

Just to the right of the “3rd Squad" you see two grey areas. From left to right the first one is for players who are probably or definitely out for much or for all of the series for some reason, usually due to injury.

The second grey shaded area is for players who could play but almost certainly will not play because they played fewer than 300 minutes during the regular season. The 300 minutes threshold is the minimum needed for a hidden defending adjustment and therefore is the minimum needed for a player to get a Real Player Rating. It also is being used here as the threshold for determining whether a player was essentially benched for the season. 300 minutes is less than four minutes a game, which is a very good dividing line for saying whether a player was benched for the season or not. You can get close to 300 minutes with just garbage time, so if you don't play at least 300 minutes, you are basically benched.

PLAYERS ACQUIRED BY TRADE
Players acquired by trade during the season who have played at least 300 minutes for their new team at the time when ratings for that team are done are treated on the grid as if they were on the team the entire season. The rating you see for them is for their new, current team minutes. The previous team rating is considered to be irrelevant for the grid.

Players acquired by trade during the season who have NOT played at least 300 minutes for their new team are either:

--Completely ignored and not shown on the grid if they did not play at least 300 minutes for the team they played for earlier in the season (regardless of whether they ever played at least 300 minutes in any year).

--They are shown as "more or less benched" if they did play at least 300 minutes for the previous team this season but not at least 300 minutes for the new, current team. The rating you see for them in the "more or less benched" column would have to be and is their rating on their previous team this season.

PLAYERS WHO HAVE NEVER PLAYED AT LEAST 300 MINUTES IN ANY SEASON
These players will not be listed even in the "benched for the season" column since no rating can be computed for them for any year and since, quite frankly, they are completely irrelevant for the playoff series at hand.

So players who are listed in the “more or less benched for the season” column are players who played at least 300 minutes during at least one NBA season. The Real Player Rating is shown for those players for the most recent year they played at least 300 minutes. What year that was is shown right next to their rating.

TEAM COMPARISONS USING THE GRID
First, you can compare specific players for any position. For example, you can see that Deron Williams was a substantially better point guard than Chauncey Billups was this year.

COMPARING TEAMS BY POSITION
By looking at the “Position Averages” column you can compare the two teams position by position. For each position, only the ratings of the 1st squad and of the 2nd squad player are considered for the position average. In other words, for each position the position average is the average rating of the two players who played that position for the most minutes. If there is only one player who played 300 minutes or more at a position, that player’s rating is the position average.

Real Player Ratings vary by position because ultimately some positions are on average more important for winning the Quest than others. We don’t have exact numbers yet but here is a rough estimate of how League average ratings will vary by position:

Point Guard .825
Center .775
Power Forward .725
Small Forward .600
Shooting Guard .575

We don't have a hard number yet, but we already know that, approximately, playoff team ratings, at least for the teams that win the first round, which would be eight teams, average out to .800. The very best teams will have ratings averaging even higher than that. So ideally, and once again with the reminder that teams can and will vary radically from the position pattern, here is a prototypical, "average" round 2 level NBA playoff team by position and by RPR:

Point Guard .925
Center .875
Power Forward .825
Small Forward .700
Shooting Guard .675

Again for emphasis: in reality many playoff teams will have at least one position where the average RPR of the two players who play it the most is greater than .925. And many will have at least one position where the average of the top two players at the position is substantially less than .675.

But Championship teams will seldom have any position where the best two players average below .675 and they sometimes will feature two positions where the average of the top two players is greater than .900.

THE SUPERSTAR COMBO GUARD STRATEGY
Sometimes the shooting guard is so good that he is effectively also the point guard to some extent and he has a much higher rating than other shooting guards and perhaps a higher rating than other point guards. Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers are a very good example. The overall 2-guard League average Real Player Rating is about .575 in the regular and .675 for the final eight teams. Kobe Bryant, of course, is well over 1.000.

One reason why having a superstar 2-guard who can take responsibility for keeping the ball moving and for being a playmaker is a very good strategy for winning the Quest is that you eliminate the common problem of leaving the 2-guard position as a weak spot in your overall lineup. In other words it is a very good way of optimizing your overall lineup, provided that the "real" point guard understands and can work with the strategy correctly.

If the "real" point guard does not understand the strategy and / or he disagrees with it, the drawback will be that to the extent you play that real point guard at the same time as your combo guard at the shooting guard position, you may have a player even less useful than a straight up mediocre 2-guard, in which case the strategy has backfired. There are several wrong ways and only a very few right ways to deploy the superstar combo guard strategy. There have been and will in the future be more Quest Reports on this very important subject.

By looking at the squad averages row you can see what the average rating of the players in that squad is for each team. By comparing the first squad with the second squad, you can see how much of a drop off there is between them. Since most of the players in the first squad are starters, this is approximately equivalent to comparing the starters and the bench. The bigger the drop off, the more minutes the starters should be playing.

SQUAD AND TEAM AVERAGES
You can also of course compare the squad averages of the two teams. If you do, you will be essentially comparing the starters as a whole and the non-starters as a whole of the two teams, although keep in mind a team may have graduated one or two second squad players to starter for the playoffs.

Finally, notice that there is a “Team Average” at the lower left for each team. This is two times the first squad average plus the second squad average divided by three. In other words, this is a weighted average of the top two squads, with the first squad counted twice and the second squad counted once, which roughly corresponds to typical playing time patterns. Players in the third squad, the injured players, and the benched players are not counted in the team average.

You can put substantial stock but not a very large amount of stock in the team average number because there are still often going to be in the second squad a player with a very low rating from time to time. How much such players play in the playoffs is dependent on how strapped the team is at the position and on how dumb the coaching is.

Often, especially on the best coached teams and on the primary contenders, a second squad player with a relatively low rating will be strategically benched during the playoffs. In general, players with ratings below .600 should play sparingly in the playoffs or not at all. Players with ratings below .500 should generally not play in the playoffs at all for any reason.

So there is a fairly large statistical error going on with the overall team average. But if you see that there is a big difference of about ..050 or more in the team averages, that would tell you that the higher team is clearly more talented than the lower.

Coming next we’ll use the Utah-Denver grid to begin to Report on this series.