FAKE RONJAN!!Let's check in on the Golden State Warriors
So this may come as a surprise to anyone who's read this site recently, but we actually used to write exclusively about sports! And as recently as two years ago, we posted every few months about the Golden State Warriors as they were trying to make history. (link link link link link)
Then Tim Duncan retired - slightly reducing my interest in the NBA - and Donald Trump started winning primaries - basically eliminating my interest in all frivolities. Sigh.
Well, Tim Duncan is still gone and Donald Trump unfortunately isn't, but it's time to take this site back to its roots. Now that we're past the All Star break, let's check in on the Golden State Warriors!
There's no better place to start than with the latest LOGAN Power Rankings (methodology). The Warriors currently have the 2nd-best record in the league, and my model - which heavily weights recent results - has them ranked 3rd overall at the moment:
LOGAN Power Rankings for 2018 Season at All Star Break
For most teams, that'd be an impressive place to be. But these Warriors aren't used to being in 3rd, having won 67, 73, and 67 games the past 3 seasons en route to two championships and one near-miss. And each of their past three seasons found a way to top the one that came before. Here's a look at the Warriors' cumulative point margin at each point of the season:
Warriors Cumulative Point Margin by Season (2015-2018)
The 2015 Warriors put up the 5th-best point margin in the 3-point era (at the time) en route to winning their first title in decades. The 2016 Warriors improved to post the 3rd-best point margin in the 3-point era (at the time) while they won an NBA-record 73 games. And last year's squad, in adding Kevin Durant, put up the 2nd-best margin in the 3-point era (trailing only the 1996 Chicago Bulls) as they demolished the league and very nearly swept through the playoffs.
This year's Warriors are well off that torrid pace. While they sit at an impressive 44-14, they've gone 1-4 so far against rivals Houston and Oklahoma City and are basically guaranteed to have their worst record in 4 years.
So what's their deal? Well, rather than approach this by watching every game so I can be truly informed, I'm just going to check their stats vs. last year. Here's a breakdown of how they perform on average in each quarter vs. last year:
Quarter-by-Quarter Average Margin in First 58 Games (2017 vs. 2018)
Whoa! That's crazy!
The Warriors this season and last year play nearly identically, with one huge exception - the first quarter. Last year's team got out to fairly large leads in the first quarter, extended them slightly in the second quarter, blew the game open in the third, and then played out a bunch of garbage time in the fourth.
Meanwhile, this year's team has actually been cumulatively outscored in the first quarter! That's basically unheard of for a team with this level of talent, and it may speak to a natural issue: are the Warriors just bored?
I took a look at one last stat - how many games the Warriors trailed by double-digits this season vs. prior seasons. (Technically, I'm looking at games in which they ended any quarter down by 10+.)
Number of Games Trailing by 10+ Points at End of Any Quarter in First 58 Games (2015-2018)
Again, crazy! Last year's Warriors only trailed by double-digits in 7 of their 58 games. This year, it's 18.
They're getting worse here, too. They've gone down by double-digits in 8 of their past 12 games! And in 7 of those, they were down by 10+ after the first quarter. For context, that only happened to them 6 times in all of 2015, 4 times in 2016, and 7 times in 2017.
Maybe the most impressive thing about the Warriors this year is that even when they're down by double-digits, they still come back and win. They're 9-9 in games this season in which they've been down by 10+.
But who knows, maybe they're not bored, they're just woke. I know from personal experience, the current political climate can take a toll, and that can make even a day job feel like a frivolity.
-rj