NBA Team Rankings - February 18, 2012

February 18, 2012
Triple dead-heat
Triple Heat
Here are the NBA Team Rankings as of February 18, 2012.  These are a couple days late as I was busy with the day job.  In a nutshell, I am using the point spreads from recent games to derive an implied power ranking.  For more detail on the general methodology behind these rankings, refer to the Methodology page.

 These rankings now incorporate the rest adjustments I described in this post.

The media hasn't been playing it up much, but the Knicks have experienced quite a turnaround recently, thanks to the strong play of an undrafted point guard (I think his name is Jeremy).  In a separate post, I'll take a brief look at how the betting market has reacted to this turnaround.


 Once again, the top 3 teams in the rankings remain unchanged (the Heat, the Bulls, and the Thunder).  However, the Heat are looking particularly strong this week, with a 2 point cushion over the number 2 Thunder.

 The under-the-radar Knicks, despite going 4-1 last week, were only able to move up 1 spot in the rankings (from 21 to 20).  That may have to do with the fact that the teams they faced, with the exception of the Lakers (who were playing back to back and on the road) were all below average teams (#19, #23, #27, and #29).

 The Magic have reversed their free-fall from two weeks ago and are now back in the top 10.  In general, the rankings seem to be aligning more and more closely with the win-loss records of each team, although the market hasn't completely given up on the Trailblazers just yet.

 The Rankings (glossary below)
Rank Team LstWk GPF oGPF dGPF GOU W-L GWP
1  MIA 2 9.0 7.5 1 1.5 13 196 4 24-7 2 0.80
2  OKC 3 7.0 7.5 2 -0.5 15 198 3 23-7 3 0.74
3  CHI 1 6.0 1.0 9 5.0 4 187 20 25-7 1 0.71
4  DAL 4 5.0 0.5 15 4.5 5 186 23 20-11 7 0.68
5  SAS 6 5.0 3.0 6 2.0 9 191 16 21-9 4 0.68
6  LAC 7 4.5 3.0 5 1.5 12 192 15 19-9 5 0.67
7  PHI 11 3.5 -2.0 24 5.5 1 183 28 20-11 6 0.64
8  LAL 9 3.0 -2.0 23 5.0 3 184 27 18-12 11 0.61
9  ORL 17 2.5 -0.5 18 3.0 7 186 22 20-11 8 0.60
10  POR 5 2.0 0.5 14 1.5 11 189 18 16-15 17 0.58
11  DEN 8 2.0 7.0 3 -5.0 29 202 1 17-14 12 0.57
12  IND 10 1.5 1.0 10 0.5 14 191 17 18-12 10 0.56
13  MEM 12 1.5 -2.0 21 3.5 8 185 25 17-14 14 0.56
14  ATL 14 1.0 -2.5 25 3.5 6 185 26 19-11 9 0.54
15  BOS 13 0.5 -4.5 27 5.0 2 181 29 15-14 15 0.53
16  HOU 15 0.0 2.0 8 -2.0 20 194 8 17-14 13 0.51
17  GSW 16 -0.5 4.0 4 -4.5 28 199 2 11-16 20 0.48
18  UTA 19 -0.5 0.5 11 -1.0 18 192 12 15-14 16 0.48
19  MIN 18 -0.5 2.0 7 -2.5 22 195 6 15-16 19 0.48
20  NYK 21 -1.0 0.5 16 -1.5 19 192 14 15-16 18 0.46
21  MIL 20 -1.5 0.5 12 -2.0 21 193 10 12-18 21 0.44
22  PHX 22 -2.5 0.5 13 -3.0 24 194 9 12-19 23 0.40
23  SAC 23 -4.0 0.0 17 -4.0 27 194 7 10-20 24 0.36
24  CLE 24 -4.0 -1.0 20 -3.0 23 193 11 11-17 22 0.35
25  DET 29 -5.0 -4.0 26 -1.0 17 187 19 10-22 25 0.31
26  NJN 26 -5.5 -2.0 22 -3.5 26 192 13 8-23 27 0.30
27  NOH 25 -6.0 -8.0 30 2.0 10 180 30 7-23 28 0.28
28  WAS 28 -6.5 -0.5 19 -6.0 30 195 5 7-24 29 0.28
29  TOR 27 -6.5 -5.5 28 -1.0 16 186 24 9-23 26 0.27
30  CHA 30 -10.0 -7.0 29 -3.0 25 187 21 4-26 30 0.18


GLOSSARY


  • LstWk - The BTM ranking from last week.
  • GPF - Stands for "Generic Points Favored".  It's what you would expect the team to be favored by against a league average opponent at a neutral site.
  • oGPF - Stands for "Offensive Generic Points Favored".  The component of a team's total GPF attributable to its ability to score points (per game).
  • dGPF - Stands for "Defensive Generic Points Favored".  The component of a team's total GPF attributable to its ability to prevent the other team from scoring points (per game).
  • GOU - Stands for "Generic Over/Under".  It's what you would expect the betting over/under to be for the given team when playing a league average opponent.
  • W-L - The team's win/loss record (and win percentage rank)
  • GWP - Stands for "Generic Win Probability".  I converted the GPF into a win probability using the following formula: 1/(1 + exp(-GPF/6.5)).

    • Additional Key Factors:
    • League Average Points Scored (APS): 95.0 points
    • Home Court Advantage (HCA): 3.25 points
    • Back to Back Penalty (B2B): -0.75 points (see here)
    How to Use This Table to Build Point Spreads and Over/Unders
    • Point Spread (in favor of home team) = HCA  + (B2Bhome - B2Baway) + (GPFhome - GPFaway)
    • Over/Under = 2*APS + (oGPFhome + oGPFaway - dGPFhome - dGPFaway)

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