Cavs in talks with Larry Drew to join coaching staff
July 16, 2014WFNY’s State of the Browns: Linebackers
July 17, 2014Holding out hope: The Cleveland Indians are 47-47 at the All-Star Break. There are only 68 games left to play in the regular season. In order to make the playoffs again, the Indians will likely have to go on a torrid second-half run yet again Last year, you might recall how I often updated the team’s playoff odds from three different outlets. Today, as we begin the second half, I’ll take a look at where those odds stand:
FanGraphs: 23.6% playoff odds (19.0% wild card), 82.6 expected wins
Season-to-date stats: 18.9% playoff odds (9.7% wild card), 81.5 expected wins
Baseball Prospectus: 16.0% playoff odds (11.7% wild card), 81.0 expected wins
The Indians, as they’ve played so far this season, do project to finish right around .500. They most likely route at any type of playoff berth is through the wild card, unsurprisingly. Detroit currently maintains a 6.5-game lead over Kansas City and 7.5-game lead over Cleveland in the AL Central. But the three sites differ somewhat on Cleveland’s overall odds.
The most optimistic is FanGraphs and the most pessimistic is Baseball Prospectus. It’s interesting to know that that was flipped for the Indians with PECOTA (BP) actually viewing the team slightly more favorably than ZiPS (FG). Either way, if the Indians are going to be serious contenders, they’d have to get to at least the 87-win mark. That will require a smoking 40-28 (.588) finish.
Los Angeles (57-37) has all but snatched up the first wild card spot. From there, Seattle (51-44) is the clear favorite followed by Toronto (49-47). The right-around-.500 squads – Kansas City, New York and Cleveland – bring up the rear of the wild car showdown.
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The Blatt Show: Buried within the Q&A with Grantland’s Zach Lowe, we learned that David Blatt’s thesis was on the author Bernard Malumud. I’m in love.
Blatt once asked a struggling Russian player what he ate for breakfast with a minute left in the Euroleague title game. It loosened up the player so much, he stole the ball and sank a game-winning jumper, all per The New York Times’ Billy Witz. Blatt also said: “I’m the last guy who’s going to back down from anybody.”
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On the NEOMG Cavs job: I owe an apology. When I first saw that Northeast Ohio Media Group had posted the Cavaliers beat writer position on Craiglist, I was aghast. It was a visceral reaction. I just felt wrong to me at first. Within a few minutes, I had become convinced quickly it clearly wasn’t the worst thing ever in sports. I’m actually becoming more and more pleased with it now.
I get it, it’s a tough time in the sports media world. NEOMG is doing the right thing in exhausting all possible channels to get anybody back in that grueling job. I initially had a bias that they should be recruiting for the position; now I get how somebody could come out of nowhere and knock it out of the park.
This is a very cool opportunity to cover the Cavs, cover LeBron James and cover all the various storylines for basketball in Cleveland right now. I hope that NEOMG gets the best candidate in the world for the job. Heck, you should probably go apply too.
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More LeBron reads: I know you’ve been exhausted by links all week. But these are some of my favorites, in case you haven’t seen them yet.
“It’s practical to hope.” – David Giffels at Grantland
“In the end, LeBron’s impact on Cleveland might be more psychological than anything —and what is professional sports really about if not that?” – Angie Schmitt at Good Magazine
“I would guess that the true number will be roughly 95-98% less than Mr. FitzGerald’s claim Bloomberg’s absurd reporting, so I am going to go ahead and call this the worst economic impact estimate ever.” – Victor Matheson at The Sports Economist
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Stats on Stats on Stats: This week, Nylon Calculus launched. It’s the new analytics site within the Hardwood Paroxysm basketball blog universe. I’m fortunate enough to be a part of the fantastic crew of writers assembled by lead editor Ian Levy. You can check out my first few posts on the site, about Carmelo Anthony’s re-signing and Paul George’s shooting.
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Byron Scott tweets: If you haven’t heard, Byron Scott had his third (!) interview yesterday with the Los Angeles Lakers for their head coach opening (!). Yes, the Lakers still haven’t hired a coach. Yes, they want to chat with Scott yet again for some reason. In celebration of this rare accomplishment, here are some of my favorite Scott tweets that I saw.
Lakers interviewing Byron Scott for a third time is like opening the fridge over and over again hoping to see something different.
— Jason Walker (@JasonWalkerNBA) July 16, 2014
https://twitter.com/AdamReisinger/status/489514062401658881
Byron Scott is the only person who responded to the Lakers' eHarmony profile and they aren't hot for him but they don't want to die alone…
— Contrarian Contrarian (@basquiatball) July 16, 2014
https://twitter.com/AminNBA/status/489517772955590657
"Oh Byron, you havent seen Game of Thrones???! Man, alright go watch the series then we'll meet up in a few weeks for a follow-up interview"
— conrad kaz (@conradkaz) July 16, 2014
"Hey Byron, we're not sure if you heard but we re-signed Nick, Jordan and traded for Lin.." "Great, I thin-…" "We'll talk to you later"
— Drew Garrison (@DrewGarrisonSBN) July 16, 2014
Maybe the Lakers are waiting for Byron to pay them to coach.
— Andrew Ungvari (@DrewUnga) July 17, 2014
7 Comments
While the tweets are hilarious, going through a few rounds of interviews isn’t particularly crazy for any job, let alone one that pays so much and is so integral to NBA success.
It’s the new analytics site within the Hardwood Paroxysm basketball blog universe. I’m fortunate enough to be a part of the fantastic crew of writers assembled by lead editor Ian Levy.
Congrats on the continued success, Mr. Rosen.
How about interviews spread out over this timeline? And I’d argue this is just plain rare in the NBA, where searches generally take only a couple weeks max.
1st interview – Tuesday, May 20
2nd interview – Tuesday, June 10
3rd interview – Wednesday, July 16
Thanks much sir. You’ll still see me around these parts.
As with the Brown’s HC search, I don’t think taking the time and searching out candidates is the issue. I do think that interviewing the same guy once a month for 3 months is a bit crazy. And, letting the HC search go into the FA period is destructive as well.
The first to second one doesn’t seem off at all – he was part of a first round of candidates, then they brought him back for a second 3 weeks later. The 5 weeks after that seems odd, but they may simply have been focused on the draft then free agency before focusing on the coach (and who they picked up may have impacted who they thought was the proper fit).
The Indians playoff odds just point out the obvious. Something has to change if they are going to make a run. For a team like the Yankees, the change is obvious. They need their rotation to get healthy. For our team, it is less obvious as we could either become a dynamic offensive team (if Kipnis/Santana hit their stride while everyone else keeps on chugging) or we could have a repeat of last year’s 2nd half pitching dominance (though it seems difficult to imagine presently, especially because it partially relies on our defense coming through as well).
Regardless, the M`s have to play a bunch of games against the A`s and Angels. The Blue Jays have been faltering. The Yankees are hurt and as flawed as us and the Royals. Should be a fun ride.