Time for another edition of the NBA mailbag.
Throughout the NBA season, I will be answering your questions about the latest, most interesting topics in basketball. You can tweet me directly at @kpelton, tweet your questions using the hashtag #peltonmailbag or email them to peltonmailbag@gmail.com.
This week we take a look at:
The impact dropping in the standings has on the Los Angeles Lakers' playoff chances in a year where home-court advantage doesn't mean as much as it traditionally does
An update on back-to-back sets between teams
50-40-90 team games
A tweak to the box score
How far have they dropped in terms of playoff odds? Do you see them getting upset in the first round?
— alexander IV (@blvk_w) March 29, 2021
This question about the Lakers' playoff outlook came in the context of their narrow escape Sunday against the Orlando Magic for a second win in now seven games since LeBron James suffered a high ankle sprain on March 20 that's expected to sideline him several more weeks.
With Anthony Davis also still out due to a calf strain and Achilles tendinitis, the Lakers have already dropped from second in the Western Conference standings when LeBron went down to fourth, with the Denver Nuggets a half-game back and the Portland Trail Blazers one game back.
Depending when Davis and James return, the Lakers will probably be able to avoid falling all the way to seventh in the West, which would force them into this year's play-in tournament. They're four games up on the Dallas Mavericks, currently in seventh, and 5.5 up on the San Antonio Spurs for eighth. And remember the Lakers have to fall behind not only one of those teams but also both Denver and Portland.
Still, it's looking much more likely that the Lakers will begin their title defense on the road and won't have home-court advantage in any series barring another team pulling an upset. That will surely make for a more difficult path to the Finals than the Lakers faced in the bubble, when they didn't have to beat another one of the league's top six teams by point differential during the regular season.
The best opponent the Lakers faced by that measure was Houston at plus-3.0 PPG. This year, they could easily face a stronger regular-season foe in the first round. (Denver's point differential is plus-5.1 and the top three teams in the West are all at plus-6.4 or better.)
The wild card here is how much home court will mean in this year's playoffs. As I first observed in breaking down the second-half schedule back in February, we've seen a sizable difference in home-court advantage in games with limited attendance as compared to those with no paying customers at all.
While even games played without fans have conveyed modest home-court advantage, those with limited fans have been much more similar to the typical edge with full arenas. In fact, home teams have done even better in those games than they did before play stopped in 2019-20 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, when they won 55% of the time but with a slightly larger home-court advantage of 2.1 points per game.
Historically, home-court advantage has been greater in the playoffs. This season, it could get a boost if the widespread availability of vaccines by the time the playoffs begin in late May allows increased attendance. The pace of vaccination will be especially important for the Lakers because the state of California has been relatively conservative with attendance at sporting events. The Lakers announced Friday that they are preparing to have fans for their April 15 game against the Boston Celtics, which coincidentally happens to fall on the same day all adults in California will be eligible to receive the vaccine.
Even if the Lakers have neither home-court advantage in a series nor as many fans at their home games, I still might be inclined to take them to win each individual series. But when you multiply all three potential series, the field looks like a much better bet to get to the NBA Finals.
#peltonmailbag What is the influence of much more "baseball style" series in this season. Is it a good news for underdogs because of more chances to get a 1-1 in these two consecutive games between two same teams?
— milan2005 (@milan20056) January 26, 2021
I actually answered this one back in January but wanted to revisit it with more data. As compared to back then, there is more evidence now to suggest playing both games in one city back-to-back is an advantage for the team that lost the first game.
Thus far, we've seen 36 splits of the 66 baseball-style sets, or 55%. That's up from splits 43% of the time in 2019-20 when teams played twice in the same location with time in between the two games. We can also see this effect splitting the results in the second game by the outcome of the first game. When the home team won the first game, it won the second game just 55% of the time (17-14). When the home team lost the first game, it won the second game 63% of the time (22-13).
"The Blazers shot 52% from the field, 42% from the 3 and 100% from the free throw line in their 125-124 victory over the New Orleans Pelicans on March 16. How common in an offensively dominant league are teams putting together 50-40-90 team performances and how relevant are those numbers to winning when done together?"
-- Joseph
There have been 26 such games this season with the Golden State Warriors (3) having the most and the Blazers among eight teams that have done it twice. That represents 1.8% of all team games, which is the second-highest mark ever in a season. The leader, somewhat surprisingly, is 2017-18, when there were 49 team 50-40-90 games -- 2% of all team games.
That 2017-18 is the high point makes sense when you consider the team leader in this category: the eventual champion 2017-18 Warriors, who did it eight times. Nobody else has done it more than six times in a season, with the 2013-14 Mavericks and Miami Heat tied for second. Special shoutout to the 1986-87 Boston Celtics and 1988-89 Indiana Pacers, the two teams in league history to have at least five 50-40-90 games before 2005-06.
Naturally, teams have done quite well in 50-40-90 games. Historically, they've won them 86% of the time (687-115), but with offense increasing that's down to 73% this season (19-7).
"Every basketball box score I look at requires me to subtract 3-point shots from the total field goals. Why not have box scores read as follows: 3-point shots; 2-point shots; 1-point shots (free throws)? It would be so much easier to digest the information!"
-- Patrick
It's interesting to note that this is the convention with international box scores, which have listed 2s and 3s separately in addition to combined field goals as long as I can remember. Why don't American box scores do so? I presume mostly tradition and the historical need to fit as much information as possible into limited space in printed form -- no longer as important now that most of us consume box scores online.
I would probably favor an even more aggressive change to split out field goals by game by zone. My friend David Locke has pointed out that one reason there's so much focus on teams shooting so many 3s -- particularly when they shoot poorly from 3 -- is that missed jump shots from inside the arc aren't as obvious because they're combined with higher-percentage 2-point shots near the basket. I think this is also part of the reason people incorrectly tend to assume there are fewer shots near the hoop as 3-point rates rise, when really there are more than ever before.
So ideally I'd want the following categories: shots in the restricted area, other paint attempts, 2-point attempts outside the paint and 3s.