Friday, May 30

Former Sonics Factor

One month ago, we introduced a new statistical analysis for predicting outcomes of playoff series. It was dubbed the Former Sonic Factor (FSF for short), and did extremely well in the first round of this year's series.

How well? How about nailing 6 of the 8 series well? How you like that, smartypants? Now, some might argue that a brain-dead monkey could have picked the first round of this year's NBA playoffs, and I suppose there would be some legitimacy to that argument, if one gave credence to the notion that monkeys fully grasp the fundamentals of basketball statistical analysis. As we all know, monkeys are still woefully unstudied in the finer aspects of PER, TS%, and the like.

Ah, you ask, but how about the following rounds, did your super-duper predictor fare so well?

Yes and no. I used Henry Abbott's point-scoring system to keep track and, well, it's doing better than Henry's mom and the equal to Jeff Ma, who apparently is really smart. So we've got that going for us.

Thus far, through 2 1/2 rounds of the playoffs, the FSF has accumulated 45 points (I've thrown out the points Abbott rewards for guessing game totals correctly), and with a Boston win over the Pistons in their series and a Laker win over the Celtics in the Finals, that would vault us to 55.

Granted, three guys already are checking in with 60, so bragging rights are already off the table, but shouldn't we get some credit for doing as well as some MIT brainiac?

Yes, I thought so, too.

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