Way-too-early 2017-18 Forecasts

[Nathan]

UPDATED 7/17/17

This thread can be a place for general talk about 2017-18 projections, qualitative and quantitative, until the usual predictions competition thread goes up closer to the start of the season.

Right now I have below the projected standings based win total over/under lines from BetOnline. These early lines are a fairly rough measure, but it can give us clues as to who the contenders are likely to be in each conference, and which teams Vegas thinks are likely to add/lose talent in the offseason.

(Seed) -- (Team) -- (Wins)

East
1. Boston --------- 56
2. Cleveland ----- 53.5
3. Toronto ------- 49
4. Washington --- 47
5. Milwaukee ---- 44.5
6. Miami ---------- 42.5
7. Charlotte ------ 41.5
T8. Philadelphia - 40.5
T8. Detroit ------- 40.5
10. Atlanta ------- 35
11. Orlando ------ 34.5
12. Indiana ------- 32
13. New York ---- 31
14. Chicago ------ 22.5
15. Brooklyn ----- 20.5

West
1. Golden State - 68
2. Houston ------- 57.5
3. San Antonio -- 54.5
4. OKC ----------- 50
5. Minnesota ---- 45.5
6. Denver -------- 44
T7. Portland ---- 42.5
T7. LA Clippers - 42.5
T9. New Orleans 40.5
T9. Memphis ---- 40.5
11. Utah --------- 37.5
12. Dallas -------- 34.5
13. LA Lakers ---- 32.5
14. Sacramento - 30.5
15. Phoenix ------ 26.5

[v-zero]

Based on what has gone on so far, OKC looks to me like a 54 win team, Houston a 60 win team, Denver a 50 win team and Minnesota a 50 win team.

[Crow]

6th place in the east took 42 wins last season. 38 wins might get next season.

[Crow]

5th seed for T Wolves seems like max if everything goes right. I don't think everything will go right but haven't studied enough yet.

[Crow]

Mavs a 35 win team give or take a few?

[Crow]

Nuggets look weak at PG to me. Jamal Murray has his fans but I don't see it, yet.

[Nathan]

Nuggets look weak at PG to me. Jamal Murray has his fans but I don't see it, yet.

Could Gary Harris be a point guard? He had a couple of big assist games right at the end of the season, and at age 22 could take another leap forward next year. They need to connect on at least one of Murray, Mudiay, and Beasley to complete their backcourt of the future though, and those guys are all very questionable. More than anything they need one of those four guys to start playing defense.

[Crow]

They don't absolutely need the assists at PG but they are getting blown away at PG counterpart match per 82games overall. Need to cut team TOs and improve defense.

Harris won big there in a ridiculously small trial. Good idea though. Why not try it? Pretty much anybody but Mudiay.

[Crow]

Lakers over / under 35 wins? I'll take under.

Sorry Magic, not enough firepower yet. Not really even close. Brook Lopez is your best player and none of the other big names are good or even average. Some relatively attractive bench players though. Maybe some of them might deserve and / or get promotions. Ennis-Nwaba-Hart-Zubac might be pretty decent, in practice or games.

[Nathan]

A few changes, most noticeably Rockets/Celtics slinking ahead of the Spurs in championship odds.

The West playoff race remains ridiculously competitive with all but three teams at 150/1 or better odds, in spite of the brutal playoff path that faces any lower seed. Could be 50+ wins to make the playoffs in the West while the Bulls or Pistons fall ass-backward into the 8th seed with 35 wins in the East.

[JoshEngleman]

A few changes, most noticeably Rockets/Celtics slinking ahead of the Spurs in championship odds.

The West playoff race remains ridiculously competitive with all but three teams at 150/1 or better odds, in spite of the brutal playoff path that faces any lower seed. Could be 50+ wins to make the playoffs in the West while the Bulls or Pistons fall ass-backward into the 8th seed with 35 wins in the East.

It's not going to be 50+ wins to make the playoffs in the West. Not even close. Portland made it this year at 41-41. The 8th best team in the West didn't improve by 9 games. Plus, these West teams still have to play each other more than they play the East. While the raw talent might be higher next season, the schedule softens the edges.

[Nathan]

A few changes, most noticeably Rockets/Celtics slinking ahead of the Spurs in championship odds.

The West playoff race remains ridiculously competitive with all but three teams at 150/1 or better odds, in spite of the brutal playoff path that faces any lower seed. Could be 50+ wins to make the playoffs in the West while the Bulls or Pistons fall ass-backward into the 8th seed with 35 wins in the East.

It's not going to be 50+ wins to make the playoffs in the West. Not even close. Portland made it this year at 41-41. The 8th best team in the West didn't improve by 9 games. Plus, these West teams still have to play each other more than they play the East. While the raw talent might be higher next season, the schedule softens the edges.

You're probably right.

The Warriors, Rockets, and Spurs are all locks to win 50+ games, and I think the Thunder and Wolves are fairly likely to hit 50 wins as well.

After those five it's admittedly a bit of a muddle. The Clippers and Jazz were 51-win teams last year, and while they lost star players, they did do a pretty solid job patching up the holes (Gallo, Beverley, and Lou Williams for the Clippers, Rubio, Sefolosha, and Udoh for the Jazz). I agree that they're probably both likely to slip a notch nonetheless, but they still seem like winning teams.

The Nuggets, as has been pointed out, seem likely to swing a trade to alleviate the logjam in their frontcourt and bring in a solid point guard (or wing). Assuming they do so, I think they're certainly within reach of 50 wins, though of course it depends a lot on what moves in particular they make.

The Pelicans are an even bigger mystery. Davis and Cousins have both looked like top-10 players in the NBA for substantial stretches over the last few years, but they didn't look great together last year. If they do prove to be a combination that can bring out the best in each other then I think they could win 50 games, even in spite of the mediocre talent around them.

The Blazers and Grizzlies, upon further inspection...what exactly are they doing? Is there any sense in them trying to keep those teams together, or will they blow it up by the deadline?

[jgoldstein34]

I think it's possible the 8th seed has 48-49 wins in the West, but that's at the very high end. While it's likely most West playoff teams would be 50+ win teams versus a normal conference, the West is way too stacked to expect that many 50 win teams. I think a lot of fans are going to be disappointed with their team's win improvement because the conference overall is just so much tougher.

[JoshEngleman]

Here's where I stand right now in raw projections. I made a small tweak to force 1230 wins for right now, since there isn't a schedule to sim. "Min?" is the number of minutes that haven't been allocated to a specific player.

*I just used the data below to sim the season 5000 times, using last year's schedule as a proxy. Each team in the East gains just under 1 win from playing in the East, opposite for the West. Basically, if you are a generic 45 win team in the East, bump that to 46. If you're in the West, drop it to 44. Looks OK to me.

*In one of the sims, the Knicks made the playoffs as an 8-seed with 31 wins, which is hilarious.



Also, here are the median wins across 10,000 sims for each seed.

[Crow]

Assuming Harden back to SG, Rockets are only western team to have a much above average SG to win that counterpart matchup and PG against Warriors but nowhere else. Toronto at SG is only talent indicator here notably better than Warriors in east. In West, beside Rockets, other teams only exceed at center.