2010 NBA Team Performance Rankings For the Stretch Drive

With about 20 games left in the season for most teams, the final push for playoff and lottery seeding has begun.

And Brothersteve's simplified, objective performance ranking shows where the teams stand based on their season and current trends.

In the West, Memphis, New Orleans, and Houston have fallen five games off the pace and barring another significant Portland injury situation, they have little chance of making the postseason. 

Except for the first place Lakers, the seven other teams in the playoff picture look to be fighting for playoff seeding down to the wire.

In the East, Toronto, Milwaukee, Chicago, Miami, and Charlotte are all within three games in the fight for the final four playoff spots. 

Toronto without Chris Bosh went 2-4 but managed to hold the fifth spot as only Milwaukee has shown any real push to move up in the standings.  Cleveland has a strangle hold on first, but Orlando, Boston, and Atlanta are in a fight for the next best seed.

Cleveland and the Lakers have remained one-two almost since the season started. But since the big moves at the All-Star break, everyone else in the playoff picture has been jostling for position.

NBA Teams Performance Ranking For the Stretch Drive
								Points	Performance
Rank	Team	W	L	GP	HOME Wins	ROAD Wins	L 10	Differential	Score
1	Cleveland1	48	14	62	26	22	7-3	7.46	88.1
2	L.A. Lakers1	46	15	61	29	17	8-2	6.7	85.7
3	Orlando2	42	20	62	24	18	7-3	6.11	76.6
4	Dallas2	41	21	62	21	20	9-1	2.25	76.2
5	Boston4	38	21	59	17	21	6-4	4.59	71.8
6	Phoenix5	39	24	63	23	16	8-2	3.5	70.0
7	Denver3	40	21	61	26	14	6-4	4.83	69.9
8	Atlanta3	39	21	60	24	15	6-4	4.78	69.9
9	Utah4	38	22	60	24	14	6-4	4.83	68.1
10	Oklahoma City6	36	24	60	19	17	7-3	3	66.6
11	Portland8	37	27	64	20	17	7-3	2.98	64.2
12	San Antonio7	34	24	58	21	13	6-4	4.17	63.1
13	Milwaukee6	31	29	60	19	12	8-2	1.11	57.3
14	Miami8	30	31	61	15	15	6-4	0.72	51.9
15	Chicago7	31	29	60	19	12	6-4	-1.14	51.1
16	Toronto5	31	28	59	21	10	5-5	-1.13	49.1
17	Memphis	31	30	61	18	13	5-5	-0.93	48.9
18	Houston	30	30	60	17	13	3-7	-0.23	44.9
19	New Orleans	31	31	62	20	11	4-6	-1.67	44.5
20	Charlotte	28	31	59	20	8	4-6	0.2	43.1
21	L.A. Clippers	25	36	61	18	7	4-6	-4.65	32.1
22	Washington	21	37	58	12	9	5-5	-3.58	32.0
23	Philadelphia	22	38	60	10	12	3-7	-3.31	29.8
24	Sacramento	21	40	61	15	6	4-6	-4.32	26.3
25	New York	21	39	60	13	8	2-8	-3.23	24.7
26	Detroit	21	40	61	14	7	3-7	-4.7	24.3
27	Golden State	17	43	60	13	4	4-6	-3.85	20.6
28	Indiana	20	41	61	13	7	2-8	-5.13	20.4
29	Minnesota	14	48	62	9	5	1-9	-8.59	5.2
30	New Jersey	6	54	60	3	3	2-8	-10.85	-6.9

(Note: a number after a team indicates current playoff position)

The performance rankings at the All-Star break can be found here .

The Cavaliers remain in the No.1 spot because they have earned it!  With the best points differential in the league by three-quarters of a point per game combined with the most road wins of any team, prove Cleveland's dominance.

The LA Lakers are a close second but have yet to prove themselves to be better on the road than the front-running Cavs.  One could blame the Lakers heavily home-weighted schedule, except that shouldn't this mean they would have more wins?

Orlando has held on to third since the all-Star break, but just barely. 

The third best points differential indicates just how good the Magic are and they continue to win games.  But the Magic didn't get better at the deadline and other teams did.

The big trade deadline deal by Dallas has pushed the Mavericks from a suspect ninth ranking to a solid fourth.  Since the break, the Mavs have added half a point to their scoring differential and are on a 9-1 streak. 

Dallas looks like the second best team in the West now.

Boston moved up a spot to fifth based more on Denver and Utah sliding back than anything the Celtics have accomplished recently. 

Utah was red hot at the All-Star break but have looked average over the past 10 games and Denver's toughness is showing cracks as their points differential has dipped recently.

The surprising Phoenix Suns surged up from 10th to sixth based on an 8-2 run that saw them add three big road wins since the break. 

No one expected this, but the Suns have refused to go away and now have more road wins than Denver or Utah.

Atlanta continues to tread water as the eighth ranked team but when you are solidly in a top four playoff seed in your conference, treading water isn't so bad.

The Thunder round out the top 10 teams at this time.  OKC still has a solid points differential at plus three and are 7-3 over their last ten games. 

The big surprise of the season? OKC is a good team.

Portland was crushed by injuries at the break but have made a nice recovery since and now rank 11th.  With Roy playing again, the Trailblazers are winning and should be good enough to hold onto the last playoff spot.

San Antonio slips a spot to rank just behind Portland.  And they should rank here. 

The Spurs are four road wins back of Portland.

Milwaukee was on a 7-3 run at the break and are now 8-2.  The Bucks are on the move and jump from 16 to 13 in the rankings, trading places with Toronto. 

Milwaukee is the only team fighting for one of the final four playoff spots in the East who is hot.

The final three spots in the top 16 are held Eastern Conference teams trying to hold onto their playoff positions, thus placing all of the top 16 ranked teams in the NBA playoff picture at this time.

None of Toronto, Miami, or Chicago have looked particularly imposing post All-Star break. 

The Bulls have injury concerns and their trade deadline deals didn't help their cause.

Miami has recovered from the pre-All-Star swoon but isn't over-whelming anyone. 

And without Chris Bosh for the past six games, the Raptors have only managed to beat the very worst the league has to offer.

Of this group, the Raptors are most likely improve as Chris Bosh is expected to return from his ankle injury shortly.

Only the 20th-ranked Bobcats have a shot at sneaking past one of the current playoff seeds in the East.  But the Bobcats remain inept on the road with only eight road wins on the season. 

If this doesn't improve, it is hard to see Charlotte stealing one of the East's last playoff spots.

Houston and New Orleans have slipped out of the top 16 ranked teams to join Memphis on the outside looking in.  But more importantly for these teams, they have fallen out of the playoff race in the West since the break and it looks unlikely that they can get back in.

The rest of the league is now only fighting it out for ping-pong balls in the lottery.  But no one is going to catch the Nets.  New Jersey tanked the season early and often. 

Even a really weak Minnesota team can only aim for second worst.

Brothersteve's Performance Ranking is based on key objective measures that reflect how a team is actually performing.

1. If a team wins its games by more points than a team with a similar record, then they must be the stronger team.

2. If one team is Hot (as in winning games now), then at this point in time they are better than a team that is Cold.  Even if their records are similar.

3. Road wins are harder to earn than home wins and should be afforded a higher value when accessing a team’s overall strength.

The ranking system weighs road wins approximately 25 percent higher than home wins, adds in the teams points differential, then adjusts for the team’s trend over the past 10 games.

Strength of schedule is not adjusted for.  There is no objective measure for determining the strength of opposition that takes into account: injuries; back-to-back contests; and, the "hot" or "cold" streaks teams have.  Road wins are considered to be the better indicator of team strength.