Denver throwing a game away to Portland on purpose in hope of Houston falling to #4 seed!

You never know.

 

Its better to be "that lucky team that happened to get to the championship through an easy path." than that regular season team who never won it in the post season.

Lebron is a 3x champion while warrior are credited for winning 3 of the last 4. Talks degrading their championships are not any more different from those that try to diminish Hakeem's rings cos MJ was absent - doubt any Rockets fans would take them seriously.

The 'lucky' ones have the privileged to be talked about for years while those that fail to win the chip will barely be remembered. I will take the former over the latter on any day

 

All the mess is because the Rockets are in a place where they are supposed to be (the 2nd spot). It's funny and that teams in a professional league like NBA have to do it so blatantly to avoid a certain team. But it's actully satisfying as a Rocket fan too! While we're discussing in heat, the Rockets just have to win the last game and all the dust will settle accordingly.

Go and wipe all the dust, Rockets!

 

The NBA should investigate Denver for this.

 

lol this is nothing new, its just not usually higher seeds that do it. you would think a 2 seed wouldn't fear anyone but hey...

 

I had to stop trying to think of different scenarios because you also have to take in the factor of teams throwing games.
I also don’t know who I wanna face. Would losing to OKC tomorrow and falling to 4th against Utah be so bad?

Would beating them mean we are likely to face them at 2/7?

I’m just gonna step away and see what happens.

 

wait the best portland can do is tie us and we hold the tie breaker because we won the division right?

 

I thought it was head to head is first tie breaker.

 

oh yeah i guess if two teams are tied then it goes h2h but if its more than two teams than it goes to division winner.

https://www.nbcsports.com/washingto...s-determined-wizards-fans-may-want-brush-them

 

just wait and see jazz also tanking their game vs denver today

 

• If teams have equal overall records, the first tiebreaker is head-to-head record.
• If that is tied and one of the teams involved won their division, they receive the nod.
• If the teams are in the same division and neither won the division, the next tiebreaker is record within the division.
• If the teams are in different divisions and neither or both won their division, the next tiebreaker is conference record.
• The next tiebreaker is record against playoff teams in their own conference.
• We’re getting deep into the weeds now. The next tiebreaker is record against playoff teams in the other conference.
• The next tiebreaker is overall point differential.
• If even that can’t settle matters, there’s a random drawing.

 

I wonder if Denver knew the Jazz would tank tonight - if there was some communication

 

Denver plays .500 ball on the road...while the Jazz are 28-12@home. Utah is -2 1/2 @ the moment. Utah is up 2-1 in the series this year with Denver's lone win coming at home. The Nuggets are playing with fire.

 

Then again, most 2 seeds haven't missed the playoffs the previous 5+ years. I believe Denver historically had low turnout and now they are actually getting people to fill up the arena for the first time in a while - why not put your team in the best place for a longer playoff run? We are talking millions of dollars in profit just from your team having an extra playoff series and thats before all the extra visibility that a deep playoff run gets you with NBA fans. For a team that rarely gets discussed in the media and isn't generally known as a dangerous team to the casual basketball fan - those things all matter. We just don't see this strategy because it's rare that a team will improve that much so quickly.

 

If the Rockets beat the Thunder, the Jazz have a decently realistic shot of getting HCA in the first round. I see absolutely no plausible reason for them to tank. Also, the likelihood of them facing either the Blazers or Nuggets in the first round goes up drastically if they play to win.

 

They can finish 3rd if it is a tie with the Rox due to the H2H advantage.

 

Nuggets are bums.....wack ass fools... hopefully they end up with OKC in the 1st... or spurs.

 

Portland just need to win 1 more game to lock HCA, which is very likely given their next two opponents. If Jazz win, they won't play Nuggets in the first round because they will lock No.5. The reason why they want to tank is to avoid the Rockets in the first round. If Portland win their next two games(high probability), and Spurs beat Mavs(very high probability), then if Jazz tank their next two games, they will definitely play Portland in the first round no matter Rockets beat Thunder or not. On the other hand, if they beat Nuggets tonight and Rockets wins, they'll have to play Rockets in the first round.

By tanking the game tonight, Jazz almost certainly avoid Rockets in the first round(over 90%). If they win, they have like 30% of chance to face the Rockets in the first round. So they're just betting their 10% chance of gaining HCA for avoiding Rockets completely in the first round.

 

But if we lose and fall to 4, they could want the option of tanking their last game to possibly get the hell out of the 5th seed. They can't fall any lower than 6th. Getting HCA would require 2 losses from Portland.

Everybody is maneuvering the best they can to avoid us.