Dwight Howard and Competitive Balance


Not everyone's impressed (Not pictured: Danny Ainge).
With the news of Dwight Howard going to the Lakers, an obvious question emerges: "What happened to competitive balance?" We ask because we suffered through the 2011-2012 lockout, that cost 16 games and innumerable knee and ankle injuries, obstensibly to ensure this balance. Now, the league is very top heavy, specifically the top two teams (and maybe a third, although OKC took a more organic approach).

To illustrate this point, Nate Silver asked on Twitter if you would you rather have an 8-man rotation drawn from the Lakers and Heat or the rest of the league. To follow this line of thinking, I constructed two 9-man rotations (Bill Simmons 2012 Trade Value links in parentheses demonstrate how elite the Hot Lakes would be):


Lakers/Heat
PG: Nash (36) / Chalmers
SG: Wade (7) / Bryant (9)
SF: James (1) /Artest
PF: P. Gasol (17) / Bosh (18)
C: Howard (6)


The Field
PG: Paul (8) / Rondo (15)
SG: Williams (20) / Westbrook (12)
SF: Durant (2) / Carmelo (19)
PF: Love (4) / Garnett (28 in ’11)
C: M. Gasol (13)

There's plenty to argue with when it comes to these picks for the field (it's woefully Celtic biased and has four point guards, although I would argue Deron Williams and Westbrook are combo guards), but the fact remains clear. The Hot Lakes wouldn't just have a fighting chance, they might be favored. 

So what does the rest of the league hope for? Well, those teams can get old quick, especially LA. But short of twisted ankles or turned knees in May and June, the Larry O'Brien trophy can probably be postmarked for Miami or Los Angeles. 


Popular posts from this blog

2024 Projection: Not Going Back

Image
  This is the most difficult little projection that I can remember doing because the polling industry seems broken. I'll get to why in the polls section below. But first, I think Kamala Harris is winning, and as I've told a few reporters this week, on track for perhaps a "comfortable" win. Let's talk about why. Kamala June 28-July 21 of this year was just about the most fascinating period of party politics I've ever lived through, rivaled only by the 2008 Obama-Clinton primary, or 2015-16 Trump vs. Everyone in the Republican party primaries. But Joe Biden's terrible debate was almost more interesting because there was no schedule, no rhythm to it. In those party nomination contests there's a cycle of polls-fundraising numbers-nomination contest-polls-etc. that was absent here. This was just Democrats working behind the scenes to determine who was their best chance to win the election. I was shocked by what I saw from Biden in the debate, and even thou...
Read more

The 2016 Projection: Hillary's day finally comes

Image
Clinton 323, Trump 217 Since it became clear that Donald Trump would win the Republican nomination in June, I have been about 80% certain that Hillary Clinton would beat him in the General Election. So I put my money where my mouth is, buying stock in Clinton the day before the Democratic Convention when the price was $0.64 to win $1.00, in essence a 64% chance of winning. Like any good scientist, I was prepared to factor new information into my view. But the real threats to Hillary's candidacy (an indictment from the FBI investigation, a Lehman Brothers like collapse, etc.) never materialized. On Twitter, I doubled down on this confidence a number of times in response to particulary silly moments in the news cycle, such as when Hillary was struck was pneumonia... If you're a bettor, feel free to cash in on this ridiculous news cycle that has Hillary's chances at $0.64 to pay $1 https://t.co/nWJbkxXoNK — Alex Garlick (@garlicksauce) September 13, 2016 or wh...
Read more

10 Tips for Going on the Political Science Job Market

Image
It’s August, and academics are procrastinating so I’ve seen lots of advice on the job market. A lot of this advice seems good, but it usually comes from tenured professors who last went on the market before the advent of Twitter. So here are ten quick thoughts on my two recent trips to the academic job market: My qualifications for dispensing advice include spending many hours in the belly of the beast. Long term planning. One of the most sobering pieces of advice I got on the market came from Mike Horowitz at Penn, who emphasized to a group of us: “The market is a multi-year process.” This turned out to be the case for me, and the majority of people I have seen go through the market. At Penn we had 5 years of guaranteed funding, so planning for the market should begin in earnest in the second half of the fourth year. Once you lose that guaranteed funding, you’ll need to spend time on finding contingent employment, and anytime that is spent not on research you will not get...
Read more