Hollinger Power Ranking....Utah Jazz ranked 12th WTF???
- Thread starter Lakers_Slapper
- Start date
We did win. Against 3 of the best teams in the East. On the road. With hardly any rest. Even though half of the team is made up of new players. And despite the fact we played some of the worst professional basketball ever in the first halves.
The Jazz are going to be special.
Yeah, the Jazz have beaten OKC, Miami, Orlando and Atlanta already this season, all on the road. The Jazz have had as tough a schedule as anyone.
This shows you can rely on statistical analysis alone. Oklahoma City has beaten Portland twice already this year, Portland is having injury issues with Roy, and yet Portland is above OKC in these rankings. At some point, you have to add common sense. In all fairness though, Portland's schedule has been as tough as ours.
...can't rely on statistical analysis alone.
Sean
Well-Known Member
It's stupid to say he doesn't have an opinion, since he created the damn formula in the first place. His formula has been awful for years now because it's flawed and laced with what he believes are strong attributes toward figuring out what team is the best.
Remember, for a good portion of the 2nd half of last season, the Jazz ranked #1 in his rankings. Even better than the Lakers. His rankings are useless and I don't understand why ESPN feels the need to continue peddling that crap.
Darkwing Duck
Well-Known Member
So all power ranking should be made ONLY looking at the win loss record? So the only true "power rankings" are these?
https://espn.go.com/nba/standings/_/group/1
https://espn.go.com/nba/standings/_/group/1
Sean
Well-Known Member
Definitely not. But there has to be some sanity to the process. Does anyone really believe Miami is, at the current time, playing the 2nd best ball in the league?
Are we to believe Houston, with their two wins, is better than the Jazz? Of course not.
LunaticWolf
Well-Known Member
Uhh. Because it isn't the end of the season yet?
If they have a ridiculously hard schedule now, then they will have an easy stretch later. If the Jazz had played LA Boston Miami Orlando, OKC and LA again, and they were 0-7. Would you consider them as bad as the Nets last season?
LunaticWolf
Well-Known Member
Actually, you can. If a teams win/loss record is 0-8, but the numbers say they should be 4-4, there is a pretty damn good chance they are going to bounce back.
larryselbows
Banned
what does WTF mean?
What the "fetch"
Yes, it's likely that the 0-8 team will improve and rise in the standings due to natural correction, but you can't really justify ranking that 0-8 ahead of another team that has a better record, has beaten the 0-8 team in both of their meetings thus far, and isn't having critical injury problems. That's why you can use statistical analysis but not use it exclusively. Besides, at this stage of the season, 8 - 10 games in, the data isn't statistically significant yet. Technically, you should really wait another 10 - 15 games so that you have a reliable data sample. There is too much margin of error to determine who is better among teams that are close to one another. Only teams like the Lakers, Hornets and Celtics clearly stand out at this stage.
LunaticWolf
Well-Known Member
If the sample size is too small to get accurate readings, you can't complain about the results.
I state again, if the Jazz played all of the leagues best teams and were 0-8, you would be completely fine with them being ranked below Minnesota, who has eeked out 3 wins against ****** teams, and been blown out of the building in every other game?
Sean
Well-Known Member
You can complain about the results based on historical trends. Hollinger's rankings are consistently off at the end of every season and yet he continues to use them and others continue to use it as gospel.
In March of 2010, Hollinger had Utah ranked 2nd behind Orlando and L.A. all the way down at 4th.
Now the problem with your point, Lunatic, is that you're assuming an 0-8 start comes under the scenario of a team playing the best eight teams in the NBA. That's unlikely. If a team is 0-8, they'll have lost to a sub-par teams along the way.
Look at Houston, who's ahead of the Jazz by a spot. They're 2-6. Why? They lost to Denver like the Jazz. They lost to Golden State like the Jazz. The difference? Their two wins are over Minnesota and Indiana. Two teams that currently sit at or below .500.
To compare, the Jazz have defeated four teams that are currently above .500.
Yet Houston is ranked ahead of Utah because they've been more respectable in their six losses than Utah has been in their three.
Okay - but Houston is not just losing to good teams. They're not beating good teams, either. That's something the Jazz have done.
In March of 2010, Hollinger had Utah ranked 2nd behind Orlando and L.A. all the way down at 4th.
Now the problem with your point, Lunatic, is that you're assuming an 0-8 start comes under the scenario of a team playing the best eight teams in the NBA. That's unlikely. If a team is 0-8, they'll have lost to a sub-par teams along the way.
Look at Houston, who's ahead of the Jazz by a spot. They're 2-6. Why? They lost to Denver like the Jazz. They lost to Golden State like the Jazz. The difference? Their two wins are over Minnesota and Indiana. Two teams that currently sit at or below .500.
To compare, the Jazz have defeated four teams that are currently above .500.
Yet Houston is ranked ahead of Utah because they've been more respectable in their six losses than Utah has been in their three.
Okay - but Houston is not just losing to good teams. They're not beating good teams, either. That's something the Jazz have done.
LunaticWolf
Well-Known Member
Yes, they were ranked that high, as they had just come off a great winning streak. Have you even looked at the formula he uses? It heavily weighs how teams have played in the last 10 games, or later in the season, their last 25% of games.
Houston has also played the Lakers, the Hornets, and San Antonio, 3 near perfect teams.
Jazz have played a 6-4 Miami team, a 5-3 OKC, and a 6-3 Orlando.
Based on how teams have performed so far, Houston has had a much more difficult schedule than us.
LunaticWolf
Well-Known Member
It is using an extreme to make a point. Who you have played matters a lot more than W/L early in the season
Sean
Well-Known Member
Which is why I find his formula faulty. Hollinger's rankings are consistently wrong throughout the season and they're consistently wrong at the end of the season.
His same rankings had Utah beating L.A. in six games when the playoffs started last season. He had the Suns going to the Finals and eventually the Cavs winning it.
So I don't care how much he defends his formula. Year in and year out, it's no more accurate than the human rankings. Hell, in some instances, it's less accurate.
Sean
Well-Known Member
Which is ridiculous because trends are, whether we want to believe it or not, generally established early in the season. It's certainly not the established fact, but the reality is that any team that can go 4-0 on an eastern swing against playoff teams is probably going to win a lot of games. You don't see bad teams do that.
You do see, however, bad teams starting the year 2-6 with their only wins coming against bad teams.
If he doesn't have a large enough sample size to produce non-laughable rankings, then he should wait until January to release his crap.
LunaticWolf
Well-Known Member
You are seriously mixing past years.
Hollinger chose the Jazz to beat the Lakers in 07-08, which we arguably came very close to doing. After that, it was the Lakers winning both series.