And our record is 6-1. 10/30 vs Dallas- Harden makes a free throw with 0.1 seconds left to win the game. 11/9 at San Antonio- Two late defensive stands cause misses by Kawhi and Aldrdige. 11/16 at OKC (the one loss)- Harden and Ariza failed to connect on a pass for a corner 3 11/21 at Det- Harden made free throws and Drummond missed two to ice the game. 12/1 at GSW- Double overtime game with key defensive stops. 12/5 vs Boston- Horford missed a last second shot 12/9 vs OKC- Beverley shuts down Westbrook. Impressive job by everyone to be on the same page. Harden running the offense like it was intended (yes sometimes they stagnate like every team), role players hitting shots, and the defense making impressive last stands.
That's true, but on the other hand we have blown out a lot of teams. Our margin of victory is pretty good. And we have a new system with new players, so haven't reached our peak.
Coaching. In the past we had Kevin " I don't know what to do" McFail sitting on the bench scratching his head in these situations and looking clueless. He would send a sense of panic down to the players and lack of confidence Now we have Mike ANthony who can actually think on his feet and stay CALM while showing FIRE and PASSION
Almost half of the team's wins have been by double digits. It's never a bad thing to win close games, unless you're reliant on it (and even then, it's better than losing those games).
First time i heard that winning majority of your close games is a bad thing. if anything , that means resiliency and tough under pressure.
So this probably isn't substainable but to me in basketball,as well in life, sometimes you have to get the job done.
We're not there yet, but it's vitally important to this team's mental toughness and confidence to win close games like this. There will be nail biters in the future, and it's good to see they are learning to maintain more composure than they did last year. They're gonna need it for the playoffs.
Morey has said this. When it comes down to the last second a lot of it is just random luck. Like OKC missing a fast break layup after the harden turnover yesterday. Still I think it's encouraging because in some of these games we were blowing our teams in the 4th and are still getting used to new pieces and a new system.
For one shot, yes. A series of games, not sure if we can still call it luck. All card games have the same probabilties for everybody but some are better than others because they are more skilled
Well you can also flip tails 6 times in a row and it's just luck. I think we need to analyze what is sustainable and what isn't. Sustainable: solid defense, harden creating for himself and others, role players hitting open shots Not sustainable: hoping the other team misses layups, hoping to draw a foul It's not really just the last play but the last few minutes. Generally the execution and coaching adjustments have been good I think.
Wow...is this like the first GARM thread for Mr. Clutch ever. Going out on a limb there with your opinion, 'eh? Good job! That's impressive. In Pythogorean Theorem terms, Sabermetrics statisticians might call this "Lucky", meaning we will out-perform our current +3 pt differential. Meaning we are actually better than our ranking, not actually "lucky".
Check this out. 1994 Rockets did the same thing. Here's how the Sabermetrics guys refered to the 1994 team as a Outlier to the Pythagorean Theorem predictions -- the formula by Bill James, which was tweaked by Daryl Morey for the NBA. Notice how they refer to the Rockets and appearing "lucky" at first, but the theorem vindicated later in playoffs. btw: This article was written to explain Morey's role in perfecting the formula....must have been a kid at the time.
well not to mention we have had one of the hardest schedules in the nba so just winning is definitely a good thing even if we had some good luck. last year we were horrible in close games and the year we went to the Western Finals, we were incredible in close games
Coin flips require no skill set but bball and card games do. Aditionally, each individual flip has the same probabilty while each bbal game is different depending on the opposition so I dont think it is a fair comparison. We all want our team to get better but to say that winning a huge majority of your close games as a concern is nit picking
We are pretty bad in the 4th quarter, too much iso ball and maybe tired as well..still that's something we can improve and we are very good already!
I'm pretty sure I've created garm threads before! But it's been awhile. And I agree with what you're saying, it's not really "lucky" necessarily
