In today's stats-only run, the T-Wolves have a better shot at the title than the Thunder, despite having a lower playoff net rating and being less likely to make the final given their tougher current-round opponent. Is that just random fluctuation, or is there a factor I'm missing?
That's an excellent question. Here are the conditional probabilities if each team wins the 2nd round:
Minnesota: 63.5% to make the Finals, 26.8% to win the Finals
OKC: 52.3% to make the Finals, 18.1% to win the Finals
I think that's because Denver would be a much tougher opponent for OKC than Dallas would be for Minnesota, and now Dallas is favored to be that opponent if Minnesota wins. And 24.1% * 26.8% = 6.5% for the Wolves; 35.4% * 18.1% = 6.4% for OKC.
Then conditional on making the Finals, the T-Wolves have a 42% chance to win and the Thunder have a 35% chance... and that might be simulation noise tbh. There's no other reason why Minnesota would be higher, since the simulations are just purely based on playoff ratings and home-court, and Boston would have home court over either OKC or Minnesota. (Or either of them would have HCA over NYK/IND).
Yeah, it's that second part that I thought didn't make sense, though I hadn't considered home court, so thanks for pointing that out. (Though in this case it doesn't matter.)
Right, the expected quality of opponent and home court should be the same for any team coming out of the West at this point (except maybe Mavs-Knicks? Would the Knicks host?), so I would expect any of the other three to have their probability of winning the Finals vary only based on the number in the "PO" column. Sounds like we're in agreement and this is just small sample in a 5,000-run Monte Carlo.
I'll definitely change the stats-only version to % reaching different rounds once the real playoffs are set. What I do with the composite depends on the odds FanDuel posts for making it to different rounds.
In today's stats-only run, the T-Wolves have a better shot at the title than the Thunder, despite having a lower playoff net rating and being less likely to make the final given their tougher current-round opponent. Is that just random fluctuation, or is there a factor I'm missing?
That's an excellent question. Here are the conditional probabilities if each team wins the 2nd round:
Minnesota: 63.5% to make the Finals, 26.8% to win the Finals
OKC: 52.3% to make the Finals, 18.1% to win the Finals
I think that's because Denver would be a much tougher opponent for OKC than Dallas would be for Minnesota, and now Dallas is favored to be that opponent if Minnesota wins. And 24.1% * 26.8% = 6.5% for the Wolves; 35.4% * 18.1% = 6.4% for OKC.
Then conditional on making the Finals, the T-Wolves have a 42% chance to win and the Thunder have a 35% chance... and that might be simulation noise tbh. There's no other reason why Minnesota would be higher, since the simulations are just purely based on playoff ratings and home-court, and Boston would have home court over either OKC or Minnesota. (Or either of them would have HCA over NYK/IND).
Yeah, it's that second part that I thought didn't make sense, though I hadn't considered home court, so thanks for pointing that out. (Though in this case it doesn't matter.)
Right, the expected quality of opponent and home court should be the same for any team coming out of the West at this point (except maybe Mavs-Knicks? Would the Knicks host?), so I would expect any of the other three to have their probability of winning the Finals vary only based on the number in the "PO" column. Sounds like we're in agreement and this is just small sample in a 5,000-run Monte Carlo.
Will you have a bracket specific forecast available?
I'll definitely change the stats-only version to % reaching different rounds once the real playoffs are set. What I do with the composite depends on the odds FanDuel posts for making it to different rounds.
(In the MLB playoffs, they did have prices for different rounds, though who can say for sure)