[scroll down or click here for this week's carnival of the NBA]
Way back before the start of February, I had a prediction of the Bulls going 5-6 in the coming month. With only 3 home games all month and tough teams all over the schedule, the Bulls looked to be in trouble relative to their easy January which saw them make the leap into the East playoff picture.
As mentioned in the previous post's comments, other predictions included:
Bulls Report: 4-7 or 5-6
UnknownColumn: 6-5
PDaddy: 4-7
CRG: 4-7 or 5-6
Mike_g: 4-7
After sweeping the weekend with a win at home against the Wizards followed the next night by an ugly victory over the Bobcats in Charlotte, the Bulls finished the month 7-4. This included wins over Miami, Dallas, Minnesota, Sacramento, and the aforementioned Washington. A welcome surprise to say the least.
It doesn't get any easier, notes KC Johnson:The worst part about these back-to-backs is that they are against teams the Bulls can beat: @MIL, @NJ, @PHI, IND, CLE. It hurts their chances since one would already factor very tough games against HOU, @SAS, @SEA, SEA, @BOS (since the Bulls are 0-2 there) and MEM. The games that I would reasonably expect victories from are: MIL, @POR, @LAC, NO, ATL, @TOR, @CHA, and even a few of those are on the road, which doesn't make some of these a slam dunk.The Bulls will have to do so again in March, which features season highs of 18 games and five sets of back-to-back games. The Bulls are 8-5 in the first game of back-to-backs and 7-6 in the back end.
All that considered, and throwing a
bit if whim (if not whimsy) and guesswork, I'll give my 30-second calculation
for expected wins for March. Expected Wins is something I borrowed from my Dad
(the apple doesn't fall far....ok, well, with this kind of thing at least it
doesn't), who before every season figures expected wins for the entire season,
assigning each game a value between (but not including) 0 and 1, with 0 being an
automatic loss and 1being an automatic win (since nothing in the NBA is
automatic, I do not include 0 and 1 as possible values). I find it is much
easier to come up with a win total this way than to guess for every game an
absolute value of a win or a loss:
|
Date |
Opp. |
E(w) |
|
|
3/1 |
HOU |
0.4 |
|
|
3/4 |
@SAS |
0.1 |
|
|
3/5 |
@MIL |
0.6 |
|
|
3/7 |
MIL |
0.9 |
|
|
3/9 |
@POR |
0.5 |
|
|
3/11 |
@SEA |
0.4 |
|
|
3/13 |
@LAC |
0.6 |
|
|
3/15 |
SEA |
0.4 |
|
|
3/16 |
@NJN |
0.5 |
|
|
3/18 |
NO |
0.9 |
|
|
3/19 |
@PHI |
0.4 |
|
|
3/21 |
ATL |
0.9 |
|
|
3/23 |
@TOR |
0.7 |
|
|
3/25 |
@BOS |
0.6 |
|
|
3/26 |
IND |
0.5 |
|
|
3/28 |
MEM |
0.5 |
|
|
3/30 |
@CHA |
0.8 |
|
|
3/31 |
CLE |
0.5 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
10.2 |
Total |
So by that un-scientific method, I'll say 10-8. You'll probably notice that I go to extremes when the Bulls are facing very good teams (like San Antonio), or very bad ones (New Orleans or Atlanta). I figure this because during this stretch of the season I can imagine a good team as more likely to be gearing up for the playoffs (while not yet at the point yet where they would be resting guys), and a poor team is more likely to mail it in.
A record like 10-8 for this month will more than hold serve in the East. As we all know, due to the 3-divisions per conference, at least one team from the Atlantic Division will get a playoff spot, currently Boston (2 games behind the Bulls). So really it doesn't matter if one Atlantic team passes the Bulls or not. Despite recent moves, Philadelphia (4) and New Jersey (6) have a lot of ground to make up to catch the Bulls, and while Indiana (2) is the most likely to make a strong push, Orlando (2...yup its a logjam down there) looks just as likely to keep fading.And at the risk of sounding overzealous, should I mention that with the Cavs losing today, they are now, with the Wiz, only 1 game ahead of the Bulls?
With a much more manageable 11 games in April, by the time this month is over the Bulls could have a nice cushion to work with to get to their first playoff appearance in 7 years, and then we can officially start haggling over which seed is most desirable. Before February started, most fans were hoping the Bulls would keep their heads above water. They've done that and more, now time to swim to the finish.(and the award for lamest metaphor to end a blog post goes to.....)