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It seems almost certain at this point. It's rough. And so much of the Pacers roster is there because their skillsets work well with how Haliburton plays.

That was rough. Great defense by OKC. Some Pacers players going cold. And really poor officiating last night. I certainly hope this is the last Scott Foster game. And yup, in 4 minutes the Pacers went from IMO 80-85 percent to win the title to 75 percent to lose. I think one of the three games remaining will be an OKC blowout, so the Pacers need to win the other two, and that's a hard recipe. This team doesn't ever lay down and die though, so I think they will make it interesting.

Sometimes I wish I was a sports better. The Pacers are 14-5 in the playoffs so far. They've been favored in 6 of those 19 games. This is going to be the second series they aren't going to be favored in a single game in. And while I get some of it, some of it doesn't make sense. OKC was favored by 5.5 last night. They won one road game in the playoffs by 6 points, that was the game in Memphis where Ja Morant got hurt. Other than that they have won by 5 or less or lost every other road game. The Pacers meanwhile have been a very good home team both in the regular season and the playoffs. I completely, 100% get why OKC is seen as the better team. The analytics are clear. But with their home/road splits, last night's game should have been seen as a complete tossup.

And Minnesota is still the smallest second round favorite, despite being the only favorite who isn't down in their series. Crazy start to the second round.

I mostly like the gambling aspects (Note: I never have gambled on sports myself). I like it because it has caused the analysis to be more precise. Before, it was a lot the favorite is going to win and the star player is going to play well. I especially like it before a season because it gives a reason for people to talk about every team in the league and exactly how good they think they are going to be. But 1) I'm a probability thinker, which a good chunk of people aren't and 2) that's not factoring in the lure of actual gambling.

This is a good point. Basketball is more complicated than ever and so harder for a casual fan to drop in and see what's going on. Defensive schemes in particular have become more and more complex and more oriented on each member of the team doing their part. So there are way less 1 on 1 battles than 20-30 years ago, which of course is way easier to focus on and sink your teeth into.

I get everything you are saying. And in what I'm going to say next, I'm not trying to get you to like the current version. But when I read what you wrote, it reminds me of when people say, baseball is just strikeouts and home runs, it's so boring. Where are hit and runs, double switches, bunts, productive outs, etc? Or when people say that it's an abomination that people line up in shotgun on 3rd and 2. Or go for 4th down constantly instead of taking the points. Or that people can't get hit over the middle anymore. Most major sports have changed drastically over the last 30 years as teams figure out what's best to win. Centers shooting 3's for example is a huge advantage in basketball. Not for the points themselves, but because drawing the opponent's big out of the lane is such a huge advantage to get layups. So it just kind of depends on what drew you to the sport in the first place, and whether you have kept up with it through the changes to whether you like what each sport has changed into. But it isn't just an NBA issue, and it isn't because they just chuck low percentage shots because they always have done that. Now, did I support baseball's rule changes to try to bring some of the older stuff back into the game? Yes. Would I support some of that in basketball? If it isn't too drastic, probably yes. It's fun to have the greatest variety of styles possible.

And they used to hoist a bunch of shots from 17-21 feet, and they didn't shoot very well from those either. The main difference is because they moved back 5 feet, we track those shots in the box score now. Here's the FG% of an average team over the last 7 decades: 24-25: .467 14-15: .449 04-05: .447 94-95: .466 84-85: .491 74-75: .457 64-65: .426

I don't advocate for my team very often, but if the Pacers can get past the Bucks (which will still be a hard series), I think they are going to give Cleveland a fight. They probably only win 20-25 percent of the time, but I don't think that will be a walkover series. The Pacers tend to play better against better opponents, and their starting lineup when they all play together has been really good both last year and this year. Part of this is I definitely see it as OKC, small step down Boston, a little bigger step down Cleveland, then an even bigger step to anybody else.

This is a great example of the NBA struggling to market its product if you're a Bulls fan enough to know that Caruso is on OKC but have never heard of a guy who finished 2nd in MVP voting last year and is likely going to win the MVP this year.

It does weaken the importance of some games, but I would argue it increases the importance of four times as many regular season games as it diminishes the importance of. There were so many fun twists and turns because more games mattered.

Are you referring to the break since the championship games? My guess is that is partially to make it closer to traditional bowl season, and partly because of the Army/Navy game last weekend blocking that out from being a playoff weekend.

It's reductive, but it comes mostly down to two things 1) People feel like Allen has done it with less talent and 2) wins and losses. There hasn't been an MVP winner from a 5 loss team since 2016. If the Ravens lose again, there hasn't ever been a QB who has won MVP from a team with 6 losses or more. And then I'm sure the fact that Lamar has 2 MVP's and Allen has 0 factors in as well. If it's close, people are going to give it to Allen. But I would agree, the fact that Allen is -900 and Lamar is +750 with 3 games to go is kind of crazy. If there were 1 game to go, I would agree with those odds. With 3 left, there's enough randomness left to potentially flip it.

Interesting to see that the initial lines for the first round are between -7.5 and -10.5. No utter mismatches, but Vegas doesn't see any game as anywhere close to even either.

Indiana and Notre Dame have only played once since the 1950's. Indiana's only victory at Notre Dame was in 1898.

I'm interested to see how the committee handles the conference championship game losers. Is it a regular penalty for a loss, a reduced penalty, or no penalty at all? Oregon/Texas losses would be pretty easy to figure out where they would slot in, but Penn State/Georgia losses are more uncertain, other than they would both be in the field no matter what. For personal reasons I would love for a couple matchups to be shaken up! And that's doubly so for the SMU debate if they were to lose. I wish I could have more outrage over Alabama still being in, but their metrics suggest it's probably the right move. It's at least close between them and the teams right behind them.

Oops, I forgot Miami didn't even make the ACC title game. That actually makes it more interesting because now we will have to see how far they fall compared to the trio of Alabama/Ole Miss/South Carolina. It's possible the committee keeps them ahead of those three. But we will know that this week and none of them play next week. And Clemson can still win the ACC, which would make Boise likely the 3 seed and Clemson likely in a fight with the Big 12 winner for the 4 spot if they end up accomplishing that.

I agree with this generally, but I think a few things depend on how championship games go. For instance, I think if Oregon wins tonight and loses the Big 10 Title game, they go to 5th and ND to 6th. I think a Texas win tonight and loss to Georgia would create a very interesting debate with Ohio State for 6th, and definitely ahead of Tennessee. Yeah, that 11 spot is down to Alabama/South Carolina/SMU if they lose in the title game (Miami has to win the title game no matter what now). Or Texas A&M winning the SEC title could essentially make that spot disappear.

Come on GT, you have an unbelievable power running QB. Use him on one of these 2 point plays!

From an outsider's perspective: Kyle is right that the ideal clock move is to not call the timeout and run the play.....if you trust your QB and your team's execution in an incredibly stressful situation. Kyle is wrong in this specific case because you shouldn't trust a rookie QB to be able to handle that situation correctly. I would rather trust my kick team to run on quickly than my offense to recover from the sack and not do something dumb in that situation. And as far as Caleb goes, you simply can't audible out of the play in that situation. It doesn't matter what you think of the call or how dumb it was, you have to run the play because audibling increases your risk of what happened today by a ton.

And that's where I think timing makes it interesting. If Clemson jumps Indiana (which I think is less than 50% even with a Clemson win, but is still very possible), it would be this week. If Miami/SMU also win, that would make it Miami/SMU/Clemson/Indiana. If Miami or SMU then lost a close game in the championship game, how does the committee handle that? Do they drop them below both Clemson and Indiana, or do they reward them for playing in that game in the first place? So my question is I guess if there's a way that the ACC gets 3 teams in. I still think Indiana gets in, but it's not nearly as much of a slam dunk as it was. And the oddsmakers agree. It was 18 to 1 yesterday afternoon for them to miss the playoffs, and now it's down to 11 to 1. Which is still incredibly likely, but I think they still need one more result to feel secure. My guess is that the Miami/SMU loser doesn't drop any further than behind Indiana. So I think the teams behind that are going to need further carnage to be able to make it. Of course, A&M could still steal a bid and make it even tighter.

We went from wondering what the committee was going to do with the SEC to wondering what they do with the ACC. How far does a Miami/SMU title game loser (if they both win this weekend) drop? Does Clemson leapfrog Indiana with a win over South Carolina? Those seem to be the key questions other than does South Carolina jump Alabama/Ole Miss with a win over Clemson which would only matter based on the results of the first question.

5, 7, 9, 14, 15, 16, and 19 lose today. And projecting the last at-large team is kind of crazy right now. If SMU beats Miami in the ACC title game and the ACC becomes a 2 bid league, that's a solution. If that doesn't happen, it feels like there are 8 schools who all have a claim to the last spot.

I've never seen a 9-0 team only be a 2.5 point favorite at home to a 3-6 team in their own conference. But BYU was last night, and they got beat outright. That finishes any chance of the BIg XII getting 2 bids. So it's down to the SEC, Big 10, and Notre Dame basically for those at large bids. It still comes down to what the committee is going to do with all these 2 loss SEC teams. An interesting wrinkle is that whichever 2 loss team makes the SEC championship game, it's going to be a risk/reward situation. It's probably safer to not make it to make the playoff because a loss could knock that team out, but the team could also win a bye with a win.

The SEC feels like the key to all the playoff permutations right now. The Big 10 feels fairly set, with Indiana being a fringe team in some scenarios but likely getting in. The ACC got closer to being a 1 bid league with Miami's loss today. The Big 12 feels like they need to beat an undefeated BYU in the championship game in order to get a second team in. Notre Dame is in if they run the table, and not if they don't. But I have no idea who or how many will make it from the SEC right now. 6 teams with reasonable cases and one more fringe team. Their head to head games will either muddy the waters even further or clinch it for a couple teams and knock a couple others out.