Updated NBA Playoff Odds – 1/7/08

Categorized as: Author: Patrick, NBA Basketball, NBA Playoffs
Posted on: January 7th, 2008

Twice the number of simulated seasons as John Hollinger’s Playoff Odds, so you know it’s twice as good.

Almost a month ago, I created some NBA Playoff Odds using a program to simulate the remainder of the season. This was in response to John Hollinger’s Playoff Odds on ESPN.com. I didn’t really like what I saw in his simulation (Look at the percentage of the time Boston or Detroit wins the championship), so I set out to see if I could do something better. And not only is it better, it’s now updated. Here are the new odds based on play through 1/6 and 10,000 simulated seasons using the remaining schedule.

In the East, the division races have pretty much been decided. With their latest win, Boston has locked up the Atlantic Division, winning it in 100% of the simulations. They went 75-7 in their best season and won 70+ games in 63 out of the 10,000 seasons (an increase from last time). Detroit has all but locked up the Central with their average of 56 wins. And Orlando wins the Southeast 80% of the time. The Gilbertless Wizards and possibly the Hawks are the only other teams in the East that have even a chance at being Division winners.

The situation is more wild in the West, in which all three divisions are still up for grabs. The Spurs/Mavericks/Hornets, the Nuggets/Trailblazers and the Suns/Lakers all have 25% or more chance to become division champs.

This Just In, Winning Streaks Are Good: The Trailblazers have done the most to help their playoff cause over the past month, obviously because of their crazy long winning streak that recently came to an end. That helped increase their odds of making the playoffs by 63% and winning the division by 29%.

Also Hot: The Nets, who went 8-3 since the last update. And the Mavs and the Lakers are up about 18% on their odds of winning their respective divisions.

Getting Colder: The Jazz went 5-7 over the last three weeks, dropping their odds of making the playoffs from 86% to 51%.

A Cold, Cold Winter: Two teams, the Supersonics and the Timberwolves, did not make the playoffs in any of the seasons (even the Knicks made the playoffs once). In one, the Wolves did not win a single game for the rest of the year and finished with a season for the record books at 4-78.

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