Meine Damen und Herren,

The end of the regular season has been a long time coming, but it's finally pancake time at The Q! Okay, so this first series is more like the amuse-bouche before the pancakes. But still—let us preview!

As we usually do for our Super Preview Extravaganzae, I'll run down each of the four factors twice (once for offense and once for defense), to try and paint a picture of how these teams' strengths and weaknesses align.

When the Cavs are on offense

The Cavs have the NBA's 4th-best offense, having scored 112.4 points per 100 possessions, whereas the Pistons have the NBA's 16th-best defense, having allowed 108.0 points per 100 possessions. Let's check the four factors:

1. Shooting

             eFG%    NBA rank
   Cavs      .519        4
   Pistons   .485        6

   This—the most important of the factors—is the bread and butter of both the Cavs offense and the Pistons defense. The Cavs' most efficient shooters are Mo Williams (.548 eFG%), Anderson Varejão (.536—surprise!), Wally Szczerbiak (.536), and LeBron (.530). Their highest-volume shooters have been LeBron (25.0% of team FGA), Mo (17.4%), and Z (11.2%). The Cavs' least efficient shooters (among the guys who get regular minutes, anyway) are Ben Wallace (.445 eFG%), Z (.483), and Boobie Gibson (.493). Meanwhile, Detroit has been among the best at forcing inefficient shots, so while the Cavs still hold an edge here, they'll probably have to leverage some other skills to realize their full advantage on the offensive end. Which brings us to...
   
   
2. Turnovers

              TO%    NBA rank
   Cavs      .125        6
   Pistons   .117       29

   Here we go. The once-vaunted Pistons defense now can't buy a turnover. The Cavs will get their money's worth (i.e. attempting at least one shot) on just about every possession, especially since they're among the best at not coughing it up. The least turnover-prone Cavaliers are Joe Smith (7.3 TO%), Gibson (9.7%), and Z (10.1%).
   
   
3. Rebounding

            OReb%    NBA rank
   Cavs      .277       13
   Pistons   .260       12

   Though the Cavs are no slouches on the offensive glass, the Pistons hold an edge here. Detroit's best defensive rebounders are Antonio McDyess (27.2 DReb%), Rasheed Wallace (24.6%), and Kwame Brown (24.0%). The Cavs' best offensive rebounders are Ben Wallace (12.8 OReb%), Z (11.0%), and Joe Smith (10.8%). Contrary to popular belief, this is not Anderson Varejão's strong suit (8.9%, to rank 6th on the team)—Andy does collect some offensive boards that other players might not even try for, but not often enough to completely forgive his relative lack of more "conventional" offensive rebounds.
   
   
4. Getting to the foul line & foul shooting

           FTA/FGA   NBA rank     FT%    NBA rank
   Cavs      .312       12       .757       21
   Pistons   .320       19         --       --

   Traditionally, the stat for measuring this final factor is FTM/FGA, but that has always bugged me. Sure, it combines two different skills—getting to the foul line in the first place, and making one's free throws—into one handy metric, but it has the potential to mislead (as was the case last season, when the Cavs got to the line a lot but couldn't convert on their FT opportunities). Besides, what do I care how well Pistons opponents shot from the line in 2009? I only care how often the Pistons committed fouls resulting in FT opportunities. So I'm going with FTA/FGA—which tells us that the Cavs are above average at earning their way to the stripe, while the Pistons defense is below average at avoiding fouls—in addition to plain old FT%, in which the Cavs are (still) below average (though better than last year). LeBron James, of course, is the Cavalier most likely to earn a trip to line (9.0 FTA per 36 minutes); His FT%, however, is a merely human .780. The most efficient free thrower on the team, of course, is Mo Williams (.912).

The Cavs hold slight advantages in factors #1 and #4, while the Pistons hold a slight edge in factor #3. But it's the Cavs' commanding superiority behind door #2 (turnovers) that keeps... whoever is coaching the Pistons these days... up at night. Bear in mind that both of these teams play at a very slow pace. Detroit (86.7 possessions per game) had the 2nd-slowest pace in the NBA this season, while the Cavs (88.7) had the 6th-slowest. So these games may turn out to be rather low-scoring—just don't confuse that for "good defense." The Cavs have an elite offense, and the Pistons defense is nothing special.

When the Cavs are on defense

The Cavs have the NBA's 3rd-best defense, having allowed 102.4 points per 100 possessions, whereas the Pistons have the NBA's 21st-best offense, having scored 107.4 points per 100 possessions. Take it away, factors:

1. Shooting

             eFG%    NBA rank
   Pistons   .483       26
   Cavs      .468        2

   Silly Pistons, you're supposed to shoot the ball into the basket. Oh well; they'll get plenty of shot attempts (thanks to their success at factors #2 and #3), they just won't make many of them. The Pistons' most efficient shooters are bench players Amir Johnson (.595 eFG%), Jason Maxiell (.575), and Kwame Brown (.533). Their worst shooter is actually the high-volume Allen Iverson (.432 eFG%); alas, tragically, Iverson will not play in the series due to a "back injury." It's okay: other than Antonio McDyess, the other Pistons starters all have eFG%s below .500 (the NBA average this season).
   
   
2. Turnovers

              TO%    NBA rank
   Pistons   .117        1
   Cavs      .135       10

   The Cavs do a good job at generating turnovers, but the Pistons are the best in the NBA at holding onto the ball. If the Pistons offense has one thing to try to exploit against the Cavaliers defense, it's getting as many shot attempts as possible. (I should say, "as many shot attempts per possession as possible." As noted above, the Pistons and Cavs play very slow-paced games, so there won't be that many possessions... but you know what I mean.)
   
   
3. Rebounding

            OReb%    NBA rank
   Pistons   .279        7
   Cavs      .254        9

   Speaking of maximizing their shot attempts, the Pistons may be able to leverage a slight offensive rebounding advantage to compliment their aforementioned no-turnovers offense. In many ways, this Pistons offense is set up like the Cavs offenses of 2007 and 2008 (only crappier): they're not the best shooters, but they try to make up for it with volume. Detroit's best offensive glassmen are Maxiell (14.0 OReb%), Johnson (13.1%), and McDyess (11.6%). The Cavs, however, are excellent defensive rebounders themselves. They'll counter with Big Z (21.6 DReb%), Varejão (20.6%), and Ben Wallace (19.7%)—or, if Ben doesn't recover from his injury in time, then LeBron (19.0%).
   
   
4. Getting to the foul line & foul shooting

           FTA/FGA   NBA rank     FT%    NBA rank
   Pistons   .282       23       .751       24
   Cavs      .294       12         --       --

   The Pistons don't get to the line that often, and the Cavs don't foul especially often, either. Without Chauncey Billups, Detroit is also a rather weak free-throwing team.

Like I said, the Pistons will generate volume, in the form of second-chance opportunities and a healthy lack of turnovers, but the bottom line is, they don't convert their opportunities into points. The Cavs, meanwhile, have a truly great defense, designed to shut down just such an offense, by cutting off scoring lanes and frustrating shot attempts. I expect the Pistons to be forced into some undesirable jumpers, not to mention their fair share of dwindling shot clocks.

Gratuitous graphs

In my most recent post (which, I'm ashamed to say, was posted a month ago), I experimented with some bubble graphs, juxtaposing each Cavalier's offensive performance against his defensive performance. Each player is represented by a bubble, which gets bigger the more minutes he plays. Anyway, I thought it might be interesting to see how such a graph would look with both the Cavaliers and their opponents jumbled together. So, as in the previous post, I made two different versions—one using Dean Oliver's O-Rating and D-Rating to measure offense and defense, the other using net offensive and defensive plus/minus ratings. The two sets of statistics offer widely differing outlooks on certain individual players, but the bigger picture remains roughly the same.

First, here is a comparison of all Cavs' and Pistons' O-ratings and D-Ratings (click to enlarge):



Here's the same study, only with offensive and defensive plus/minus (click to enlarge):



What jumps out at me from these graphs? First, mad praises to The Chosen One, our Savior and King. Second, the Pistons appear to have things all backwards. Whereas the Cavs' largest bubbles (i.e. the players getting the most minutes) are also the bubbles closest to the top right corner (i.e. the team's most efficient players), a few of the Pistons' largest bubbles (such as Tayshaun Prince's, Rip Hamilton's, and Rodney Stuckey's) are clustered in the bottom left. Meanwhile, some of Detroit's more top-righterly bubbles (Johnson's, Maxiell's, Brown's) belong to bench players. For that reason, the Pistons might—I said might—be able to pick up some ground during those portions of the game when the second teams come in. To a man, the Cavs' second-teamers rate much better according to O- and D-rating than plus/minus, so who knows, they may still have the Pistons bench overmatched, or they may not.

All in all, this appetizer—I mean series—should be fun to watch. While I am very, very, very disappointed in the Washington Wizards for not holding up their end of the bargain this year (there is nothing like seeing the year-end resignation on DeShawn Stevenson's ass face), I am content to let the once-frightening Pistons be the Cavaliers' new practice squad. Enjoy it, Cavs fans!