James and the Lakers must accept it

Last year, LeBron James said of the play-in tournament, “Whoever made that shit up should be fired.” That came as the Lakers needed to play an extra game, beating the Golden State Warriors to advance to the playoffs as the seventh seed in 2021.

The situation has changed this year. The Lakers, now 4½ games behind the LA Clippers for eighth place in the West, have a much better chance of making the playoffs via the walk-in tournament than if it didn’t exist. With that in mind, this week’s mailer takes a look at what the play-in meant for the Lakers.

For me, this is a two-pronged question: how much did the play-in tournament compromise the Lakers’ playoff chances last year and how much will it help now?

Let’s start with 2021. In practice, the play-in cost the Lakers only a couple of days off, as they beat Golden State in Game 7-8 to advance to the playoffs as the seventh seed, exactly the same as it would. have happened in a non-play-in world.

That said, LeBron was right to point out that the play-in tournament posed a risk for his team. Based on the lines for the Lakers-Warriors game, as well as Golden State’s subsequent home showdown against the Memphis Grizzlies for the eighth seed (and generously assuming about 2.5 points per home-court advantage despite capacity limits at the time) produces an estimate that the Lakers are expected to finish seventh about 68% of the time, eighth about 27% of the time and miss the playoffs 5% of the time.

In contrast, this year’s Lakers unequivocally benefit from the play-in. Projections using ESPN’s Basketball Power Index (BPI) show that the Lakers jump in the standings to finish seventh or eighth less than 1% of the time. In a non-play-in world, the Lakers would likely be close to shutting James down, an idea he firmly rejected after Tuesday’s loss to the Dallas Mavericks.

The play-in gives the Lakers a path to the playoffs, particularly if they can get Anthony Davis back from a sprained midfoot in time for those must-win games. BPI suggests a 9% chance the Lakers earn the eighth seed via the play-in.

Given the difference between finishing seventh and eighth last season would have been marginal (the #2 seed Phoenix Suns ended up looking like a tougher playoff opponent than the top seed Utah Jazz) I think the Lakers would trade the smaller chance of missing the playoffs in 2021 due to the play-in for the chance to get there in 2022.

More generally, this shows why teams shouldn’t worry too much about how a rule change, such as the addition of the play-in tournament, affects them at that time. Eventually, it will most likely end in a variety of different ways.