RubberMallet wrote:lynchburgwildcats wrote:The Bulls won 75.8% of their games thus year. Last year they won 75.6%. Rose only played in 39 of their 66 regular season games. They got better, without a doubt, by being able to do just as well in the regular season without the defending MVP.
they are paper champs built for the regular season. who cares. the regular season doesn't matter. at. all. stop referring to it. otherwise the spurs would be the champs. how on earth did the bulls get better? rip hamilton? they also played the year before without any consistant big play in the regular season with boozer and noah being out nearly half the season at different times. they probably could of won 80-83% otherwise. nearly everyone in chicago understands that the bulls are nowhere near their level and unless we sign some real talent, we'll never be able to compete for a title against the 2 dynastic teams we just saw run the floor.
Regular season doesn't matter? Interesting, last time I checked, you have to perform in the regular season to get the ever critical higher seed and home-court advantage.
The home team in the playoffs had a playoff winning percentage of 67.5%. How do you get home court advantage? Winning in the REGULAR SEASON.
The higher seeded team (I count OKC as the higher seed against MIA based on better regular season record even though they were both #2s) won 61.9% of their games, and the higher seeded team only lost four of the 15 playoff matchups. Take out the Finals since it was 2 vs. 2, and the higher seeded team won 64.6% of their games and only lost three of 14 playoff matchups.
Getting the #1 seed isn't always important, but being able to get a top-four seed is critical. You don't advance very far in the playoffs without ever getting home court advantage or getting really lucky by playing injury plagued teams.
The Harvard College Sports Analysis Collective also shows that a higher seed is very valuable. How do you get a higher seed? Winning in the REGULAR SEASON.
http://harvardsportsanalysis.wordpress. ... yoff-seed/