You may be surprised as to who is first...
http://espn.go.com/nba/hollinger/powerrankings
The cavs are ranked 17th today, and the 98.205 rating basically means the cavs have played like a slightly below average team up to this point. Obviously the sample size is still small, so these rankings could change drastically tomorrow based on a single blow out win (or loss). However, they are a good indicator of who has played well and who hasn't up to this point.
And please, keep in mind that these rankings are 100% computer automated. Hollinger has no say in how teams are actually ranked; everything is calculated based on a formula he created over 5 years ago.
EDIT: Actually, Hollinger explains it pretty well himself right here:
http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/stor...hia-76ers-lead-inaugural-daily-power-rankings
http://espn.go.com/nba/hollinger/powerrankings
The cavs are ranked 17th today, and the 98.205 rating basically means the cavs have played like a slightly below average team up to this point. Obviously the sample size is still small, so these rankings could change drastically tomorrow based on a single blow out win (or loss). However, they are a good indicator of who has played well and who hasn't up to this point.
And please, keep in mind that these rankings are 100% computer automated. Hollinger has no say in how teams are actually ranked; everything is calculated based on a formula he created over 5 years ago.
EDIT: Actually, Hollinger explains it pretty well himself right here:
Power Rankings: Full of surprises
No. 1 in defensive efficiency.
No. 1 in point differential.
Nearly No. 1 in offensive efficiency.
Yep, there's no question who has been the best team so far: the Philadelphia 76ers.
No, seriously. Philly has been on a rampage in its first eight games, and, as a result, is on top of the inaugural daily daily power rankings, well ahead of the second-ranked Heat.
As a reminder, here's how the daily power rankings work. The most important thing to remember is that it's entirely results-driven.
These rankings are based on a long-established formula, with no human judgment intervening. We don't compensate for injuries, trades or other in-season shifts.
Here's what goes into the sauce: We start with a team's scoring margin, strength of schedule and home/road games (the number of each so far). We weight recent games more heavily and create a rating from it. A perfectly average team will be at 100.0, and any deviation above or below is how much better or worse than average, in points per game, that team has played.
Ideally, you can match two teams up by their rating to see which would be favored and by how much. That's the CliffsNotes version; you can find a fuller explanation here.
Put all that in, and what comes out is that the Sixers have played the best, not that anyone in Philadelphia has noticed. They drew 8,612 fans last night, a shockingly low figure even for a seasoned Atlanta Hawks attendee like me.
Regardless of whether there were any witnesses, the preseason debates about whether the Boston Celtics or New York Knicks would win the Atlantic Division already seem laughable. Last night's Sixers win over a tough Indiana Pacers squad was a good example. Philly flew up and down the court, with Thaddeus Young in particular infecting the game everywhere with his energy. He took four charges, missed only one shot and was all over the place defensively. The book on Young is that he doesn't have the size to be a starting power forward, but games like last night's make you wonder.
Spencer Hawes, meanwhile, has arguably been the league's most improved player in the early going. He leads the team in PER, averaging a double-double with nearly three assists a game while orchestrating from the high post in the Sixers' half-court sets -- something they haven't had to rely on too much because they've created so much havoc in transition.
It's not just Hawes, though. Leading scorer Lou Williams and rookie Nikola Vucevic also have greatly outperformed expectations, and, again, the defense has been rock solid thanks to the superior team quickness.
Can the Sixers keep this up? In a literal sense, of course not; no team is this good over long stretches.
More subjectively, the question is whether the Miami Heat and Chicago Bulls -- teams No. 2 and No. 3 in the daily power rankings -- have anything to fear. At this point, I'd say probably not. Philly still lacks the A-list talent to hang with these guys in a playoff series, let alone match them win for win in the regular season. One also suspects Philly is due for some fairly dramatic regression to the mean, which could come as soon as the next 48 hours as the Sixers complete a back-to-back against the Sacramento Kings and the Knicks.
But it's become clear that continuity, youth and depth are three major advantages this season. The Sixers qualify on all three counts, with the exact same rotation as a year ago, seven of their nine rotation players ages 25 and under, and a second unit that has been a difference-maker on many nights.
So although it's only eight games, Philly has to qualify as the league's biggest surprise thus far. The Sixers might not stay atop the daily power rankings all year, or even all week, but they look legit as a top-four playoff seed in the East.
Other notables in the daily power rankings:
No. 9: Oklahoma City Thunder
Yes, despite an 8-2 start against a fairly strong schedule, the Thunder are only ninth in the daily power rankings thanks to their slim victory margins. OKC has already won four times by four or fewer points, indicating that it probably is fortunate to be 8-2 rather than 6-4. The other reason the Thunder are this low is simple early-season variance; later in the year, when all the outliers have come back to earth, a rating of 103.2 would have them a few spots higher. I wouldn't sweat this one, as they also started slowly a year ago before gaining steam as the year went on.
No. 11: Phoenix Suns
Left for dead after starting the season with a home loss to the New Orleans Hornets, the Suns have recovered thanks to some impressive defense and a revitalized Steve Nash. The Suns are tied for 10th in defensive efficiency, believe it or not, and are the 11th-slowest team in terms of pace factor.
Nash, meanwhile, struggled with a minor injury through the first week of the season but appears to be regaining his form. In the two games since Wednesday's pep talk from our Marc Stein, he went 7-for-7 from the field in one and handed out 17 dimes in the other. Phoenix has a couple of bad losses on its résumé, but all four wins have been by double figures. As with Philly, I'm taking this eight-game sample with an entire pillar of salt, but the Suns have played like a fringe playoff team thus far.
No. 14: Minnesota Timberwolves
They're 3-6 and have already played six home games, but the Timberwolves rank this highly because they have a positive scoring margin -- all three wins were by double figures -- and have played some good teams. In particular, near misses against Miami and Oklahoma City could have been wins that would have changed our perceptions substantially.
On the other hand, they've had some stinkers thrown in, such as Monday's loss to the Toronto Raptors in a game that might have shattered the league record for fouls committed more than 10 feet from the basket. This is heady stuff for a Wolves team that has been 29th or 30th for much of the history of these power rankings, but I'm not sure the Wolves can maintain such a high perch.
No. 21: Boston; No. 24: New York
These two rankings are all about strength of schedule. Boston is 4-4, but three of the wins have been of the near-automatic variety against the Washington Wizards and New Jersey Nets -- the two bottom-ranked teams in these rankings. Meanwhile, they were hammered by New Orleans and haven't beaten a team in the top 25.
The Bockers are 5-4 with a positive scoring margin, but the daily power rankings slam them for an even more laughable strength of schedule than Boston's -- New York opponents have a .294 winning percentage when not playing the Knicks, which is the worst in the table. The Los Angeles Lakers are the only one of New York's first nine opponents that has a winning record.
No. 30: Washington
The shocking thing about the Wizards is not that they're 30th but how far they are out of 29th. Washington's 83.80 rating is more than seven points behind the No. 29 Nets' rate of 90.83, implying that the Nets would be favored by a touchdown on a neutral court. The difference between No. 29 New Jersey and No. 19 New Orleans is smaller than the difference between Washington and 29th.
The really scary part for Washington is that it has played a weak schedule thus far. The average Wizards opponent has a .377 winning percentage when not playing Washington. That will change in a hurry: After tonight's tilt against Toronto, they play Chicago, Philly twice, the Houston Rockets, Oklahoma City and the Denver Nuggets. Thus, if they can't manage to handle the Raptors on a back-to-back in D.C., suddenly a record-tying 0-17 start is very much in the picture.
http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/stor...hia-76ers-lead-inaugural-daily-power-rankings