4 games left, 3 game lead

[DERRENMATTS]

There's just 4 games left in this season and we are currently hold a 3 game lead on Milwaukee for the 2nd worst record in the league.

This is a race for the ping pong balls!!! We go up against them tonight and with a win, we'd be a mere 2 games ahead.

Tonight's game may be a contest of "who wants to lose the game more".

[DERRENMATTS]

Here's some interesting lottery stats that I extracted from this morning's Simmons article on the ping pong winners since 1994 (13 years all together till now).

In the 13 drafts since 1994,

-the team who finished 3rd won the 1st pick the most times (4)
-by looking at the stats, if you finish 2nd, there's a good chance you'll land the 4th pick (happened 5 times--50 X greater than landing the top pick or the 3rd pick)

-by looking at the stats, if you finish 3rd, there's a good chance you'll land the 1st overall pick (happened 4 times in 13 years).

[eja117]

I am trying to look at it the exact oppositte way. I figure since the third pick won so many times and since we lost in 96 that means we're due. Eventually it should even out. If I were with the 3rd spot I'd be thinking "what are the odds the 3rd spots wins AGAIN?"

[freshnthehouse]

derrenmatts said:

-by looking at the stats, if you finish 3rd, there's a good chance you'll land the 1st overall pick (happened 4 times in 13 years).

there's a good chance, but not as good of a chance as the team that finishes in 2nd.

Lets say you flidded a coin a dozen times and it came up heads 9 of those times. By looking at the stats, you would think that on the next flip, their is a better chance of heads coming up. But we all know that would be wrong. There is still a 550/50 chance. Whatever happened on earlier flips does not change that.

So no matter what has happened in earlier drafts, it is still prudent to get higher lottory position. THe more balls you have in the hopper, the better your chance to win.

This lesson on the rules of probability were brought to you by freshinthehouse.


freshinthehouse: Making learning fun since 1979

[Roadrunner]

For some reason, I thinke everyone will look back at this season, and the Celtics selecting Oden or Durant, and the rest will be history.

[eja117]

If the Celts suddenly start winning now people will get really mad, so I hope they lose now even more than before.

[DERRENMATTS]

Well, we lost, so there's a good chance we end the season with the 2nd worst record. I hope this is the last time I'm happy to have a rotten record.

[DERRENMATTS]

BTW, with last night's loss to the Bucks, we have officially clinched the 2nd worst record in the league. With 3 games left, we have a 4 game cushion.

The rest is up to the ping pong balls.

[Roadrunner]

The M. Bucks should be p-nalized for their play down the stretch. OK, let's sit Redd, Bogut, and C Villannueva.

[FLCeltsFan]

roadrunner said:

The M. Bucks should be p-nalized for their play down the stretch. OK, let's sit Redd, Bogut, and C Villannueva.

Was that so much different from what the Celtics did? Our players played hard and wanted to win but weren't allowed to. We sat players who could have played and Doc consistently kept our best players on the bench in crunch time. This quote from Gomes kind of says it all:

"I probably (would have played), but since we were in the hunt for a high draft pick, of course things are different," Gomes said. "I understand that. Hopefully things get better. Now that we clinched at least having the second-most balls in the lottery, the last three games we'll see what happens. We'll see if we can go out and finish some games."

Doesn't sound like the players were very happy with what Doc was doing either.

[DERRENMATTS]

Wow, I wonder if Gomes is going to have a closed door conversation with Ainge and Doc for those comments ;D

[eja117]

I can't BELIEVE he said that. I guess the players don't want to be replaced unfairly and Gomes knows if we bring in a high level big man that he will be pushed further down the bench.

[FLCeltsFan]

And Gomes is quoted in today's Herald with this

“The players weren’t thinking about the lottery and all that,” said Ryan Gomes, “but reality is reality. Now that our position in the lottery is set, hopefully we can go out and win some games.

“Things could change now, but another thing you’ve got to think of is that he (Rivers) was doing that for a reason. It could be for that reason (lottery position) or it could be for getting the younger guys some playing time or seeing who’s going to be here next year. There’s a lot of things that go into that.”

He clearly isn't happy with what has gone on with the coaching these last few games. And honestly, I can't blame him.