Friday, March 31, 2023
Well, Rust “upset” 🕊️ 124-107. (Vegas, seriously?)
As did 🍎 130-116 at ⚔️.
☘️ drained Jizz 122-114 in 🫘 town.
NJ moves 2 full games ahead of Miami with five left to play for both teams. NY +4.5, "Heat" with one game in hand. If the season ended today and the play-in went per present seeding it would be Mil vs Atl, Boston vs Miami, Phila vs BKLN, Cleve-NY.
The Times in particular repeatedly has made the following their palimpsest:
I take that very seriously.
CONGRATULATIONS TO LSUW
FT LSU (3) 79 Va. Tech (1) 72.
9 p.m. Iowa (2)-South Carolina, the Lady...STOP IT! (1)
“The Heat is expected to make roster changes this summer, but [they] want to see the entirety of the season before making any decisions”-Barry Jackson, Miami Herald
Oh, 93.9% of the regular season isn't enough, they want the full 💯 ? You're thinking I'm going to make fun of them and you're 93.9% right.
Look, it's been the Kyle Lowry Defect not the Kyle Lowry Effect. All of last season + 93.9% of this has been a disaster.Donut. There was the Duncan Robinson Moment, 2019/20. Before and after he has been the Michigan Sixth Man.
Lovey Dovey Turtle Dovey. He was Cleve's like ninth man. He starts for us.
Caleb Martin.
Gabe Vincent.
Max Strus.
Vic Oladipo.
That's the best seven-man rotation in the history of the G-League. Gotta be worth something, no? No. "Heat" fannies breezily throw out "trade" solutions. You have to match salaries, you know. Go ahead brother, find a team willing to take Kyle at 37 earning $26.9M next season...Line forms on the right.
Donut. Production declines four straight seasons. Three seasons left on a contract paying $19M per...Going once, going twice.
Love is a free agent at season's end. Not re-signing him will save you $3M, chump change in today's Association.
Caleb you could get something for. He's heady, plays sticky D, has averaged 9.5 ppg for us and is earning $6.8M next season and a player option $7.1M in 2024/25.
Vic. He's averaging 10 ppg. He's only 31 but Vic's shot! He makes $9.4M next season. You could get someone to take that contract but you'd have to take flotsam back.
The Artist. Gabe's production has increased each of his three full seasons with us and he only makes $1.8M per. You could definitely get something for Gabe.
The Composer. The Composer is another future, production increased each year in Miamuh, numbers very similar to The Artists and he only makes $1.7M.
Duncan is worth, hmm maybe what Gabe or Max make; fine, make him worth their salaries combined, $3.5M...And your point is? The "Heat" are going to have to eat Donut and his $57M for the next three seasons. Maybe it'll go down better with plenty of coffee.
Moreso with Kyle. Bees and Gees, $26.9M here, $26.9M there, pretty soon you're talking real money! Seriously, $26.9M eats a TON of cap space. Kyle is 21.7% of "Heat" cap space this year! Four more Kyles and you're capped out. Off reputation alone you could probably get a team to bite $10M for him.You could definitely get a team to take Kyle and Vincent and Strus. That would be $33.3M you would off-load and could theoretically bring you a damn good player in return. $33.3M will get you a damn good baller. But the rule in sports trades is the team wins who gets the best single player. $33.3M would get you exactly CJ McCollum, Nikola Jokic with $2M to spare, Joel Embiid if you threw in a paltry 300 thou. So you're telling me Denver is going to trade MVP candidate Jokic for Kyle Lowry, Gabe Vincent and Max Strus? Who wins that trade according to the rule? Philly's gonna trade MVP candidate Joel for the same package. Bull and shit. You can work variations anyway you want, the "Heat" is not getting a "Whale" with what they have to offer.
93.9% laughing at us. That still leaves 6.1% dreaming and here I go. I really believe that some of the "Heat's" 10-13 game decline from last season to this is up to fatigue. They came within a bucket of making it to the Finals last season. That’s a long-ass season and it takes a lot out of players mentally and emotionally. Pat Riley doesn't accept that and that's on him. He ran this entire exhausted roster back for another this season. You can't do that. Guys are getting on Spo's nerves and he on theirs. You have to refresh a little. The players have not had it in them this season to give the 110% that the "Culture" demands. Lowry pushed back, big time, on Riley's demands. Jimmy, you can't get blood out of a stone, folks. Bam is at his ceiling. Tyler is the third gem in this collection and he will get even better. Jimmy, Bam and Tyler is a damn good nucleus--it's not the Big Three! but it's definitely better than 40-45 wins. This same roster won 53 games last season, tops in the East! With...you can't say "taking this season off" because they certainly did not, but organically this season and the summer should bring back a refreshed Really Good Three. That core with the improving Vincent and Strus and the solid Martin could win 53 games again next season. Really. But Gabe and Max and Caleb are not starters. You have three starters and no point guard. You need two more Real Goods, one of them a PG.
IndicTrump Reaction Overseas
In China, the indictment was a top trending topic on the social media platform Sina Weibo. Some Weibo users poked fun at Mr. Trump, saying that if he were convicted, they would hope for a lenient sentence because he had brought them so much comedic joy over the years.
😂
Bromwich changed his post 👍:
In an interview on NBC, a lawyer for Donald J. Trump, Joseph Tacopina, said that as expected, Trump will not take a plea deal and is instead prepared to go to trial. He reiterated that Trump will surrender to authorities so that he can be formally charged in a New York courtroom.
Earlier:
In an interview on NBC, a lawyer for Donald J. Trump, Joseph Tacopina, said that as expected, Trump will not plead to the charges and is instead prepared to go to trial. He reiterated that Trump will surrender to authorities so that he can be formally charged in a New York courtroom.
I Also Agree With the Chief WaPo Editorial Board
The Trump indictment is a poor test case for prosecuting a former president
Donald Trump deserves the legal scrutiny he’s getting — which has come from many corners on many counts. Yet of the long list of alleged violations, the likely charges on which a grand jury in New York state voted to indict him are perhaps the least compelling. There’s cause for concern, and caution, ahead.
Thursday’s events are the result of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s decision early in his tenure to abandon a probe centered on the former president’s business practices in favor of what had come to be known as the “zombie” case: the matter of a $130,000 payment made to adult-film star Stormy Daniels in exchange for her silence about an affair she claims she had with Mr. Trump about a decade earlier. (Mr. Trump denies the affair.) Check-writer Michael Cohen, Mr. Trump’s longtime lawyer and fixer, pleaded guilty to crimes related to the payment in 2018. Though the precise charges are not yet known, it’s expected that prosecutors are now going after his boss for supposedly covering up his reimbursements for the favor. Falsifying records in this way is usually a misdemeanor in New York, but if it was done to cover up another crime, it can turn into a felony. The idea here is that the hush-money payment constituted an improper political donation because it benefited Mr. Trump so close to the election.
Pyramiding two transgressions of state rules to go after a federal candidate is legally plausible. But the strategy is also novel, and courts may regard it with skepticism. What’s more, the potential campaign finance charge itself is shaky. When federal prosecutors charged former senator John Edwards (D-N.C.) with a similar crime following his 2008 presidential run, he rebutted the accusation by arguing he was trying to disguise his faithlessness from his wife rather than from the voting public. The trial ended in acquittal on one count and a hung jury on others — at which point the Justice Department dropped the charges.
Breaches of campaign finance law undermine democracy and deserve to be taken seriously. Yet the potential downsides of indicting Mr. Trump ought to be taken seriously, too. This prosecution is now bound to be the test case for any future former president, as well as, of course, proceedings against this former president in particular — of which there are plenty. Other investigations underway include Justice Department examinations of the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and classified documents discovered at Mar-a-Lago, where the possibility of obstruction of justice is particularly grave. These are straightforward cases compared with the one proceeding in Manhattan. A failed prosecution over the hush-money payment could put them all in jeopardy, as well as provide Mr. Trump ammunition for his accusations of “witch hunt” — in light of which House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was right to urge supporters to refrain from protesting.
Public perception and political strategy shouldn’t dissuade a district attorney from bringing a solid case, but neither should they persuade him to bring a shaky one. This prosecution needs to be airtight. Otherwise, it’s not worth continuing.
Thoughtful Article
The key Big Stuff, to me, in the Manhattan indictment are these:
1) Indeed, while voting to acquit Mr. Trump at his second impeachment trial — the one charging him with inciting the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol — Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader from Kentucky, said he did so because Mr. Trump was no longer in office but added that he was still subject to criminal prosecution.
Jan. 6 was Big Stuff; the election interference in Georgia was Big Stuff--both worthy of precedent setting--hush money to Stormy Daniels is not, to me, Big Stuff, not worth setting precedent. I agree with Peggy Noonan on this point.
2)“My view is that so long as the case that is brought is
a) for a crime that is not unusual to charge, and
b) the proof is also as strong as one would normally have — i.e. that one wards against the problem of selective prosecution — then it is imperative that we hold politicians to account regardless of what position they hold or held,” said Andrew Weissmann, a deputy to Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel who investigated the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.
Those are in the conjunctive, that is, both conditions precedent must be met in this charging standard. Now, we do not know exactly what charges the indictment makes but we have a damn good idea and the informed reading of tea leaves by legal eagles is that these charges are unusual, they go back years, to before Trump was illegitimately president; if they are felonies the only way to make them felonies is to tie them to the federal crime of illegal campaign contributions, which federal crime the federal authorities in the Southern District of New York did not charge. Under Weissmann's standard that ends the analysis: no charges.
The proof is informedly speculated to be less than "one would normally have"; without knowing the charging history of the Manhattan D.A.'s office in sex hush money cases it sounds plausible to me that this would be rarely done, that is, that it does raise "the problem of selective prosecution". Once again, since Weissmann's standard is conjunctive that ends the analysis with no charges.
There does seem to be additionally a statute of limitations issue that Elie Mystal in The Nation raised. That's not a proof problem but a legal hurdle, perhaps fatal.
…others worry about the long-term consequences for the presidency, not least because this indictment is being brought by a local prosecutor rather than the Justice Department, opening the door to prosecutors around the country taking it upon themselves to go after a president.
In 2008, voters in two small towns in liberal Vermont approved resolutions accusing Mr. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney of “crimes against the Constitution” and instructing their town attorneys to draft indictments. Nothing ever came of it, but it is not hard to imagine a conservative local prosecutor trying to charge President Biden with, say, failing to adequately guard the border.
Finally, this to me is ominous politically, our Republic is, after all, a political structure. Prosecutors always say political considerations have no bearing on their decisions, that it's the law and evidence uber alles. And in this Manhattan case Alvin Bragg can say that with complete credibility: He is not indicting a sitting president or a former president for crimes committed in his official capacity or while he held office; he is indicting a man, then only a candidate, for crimes committed when he was a private citizen in Bragg's local jurisdiction. For analytical purposes if we make this not a small potatoes case but a big enchilada of a case how would our analysis change? Let's say Donald Trump did, as he said in Iowa he could do, "shoot a man on Fifth Avenue" with political impunity would any of us say that Trump could not be prosecuted for that shooting? Similarly, Bragg's statute of limitations argument would be: "I did not charge him for the shooting while he was president in deference to principles of federalism but I am now that he is out of office." I don't know if that is a winning legal argument or one merely consistent with Department of Justice guidelines in federal prosecutions of presidents but it is a very compelling equitable argument.
In our division-of-power political system there are a zillion prosecuting authorities: local "district" prosecutors offices, statewide prosecution authority, and federal United States Attorney's office who are under control of the Justice Department. One entity does not control all of them. In the overwhelming majority of local prosecutions the Justice Department has no say. It can try to control federal inquiries to protect political allies as the Trump Justice Department did but its writ simply does not run to the Cambria County Pennsylvania D.A.'s office or the rural Alabama or Texas office. Federal charging guidelines do not apply at the state and local level. There is nothing to prevent a local D.A. from charging Joe Biden, even in complete bad faith, without evidence or law, for any crime the local D.A.'s conscience can sustain. All to state the obvious: a prosecution of a politician is by definition a political prosecution. Political considerations have to be taken into account and political consequences can be expected. Both considerations and consequences rise exponentially with the height of the office the defendant-politician attains. That's just keeping it real.
Therefore, legally, I adopt the Weissmann Test and hold that these charges should not have been brought. Similarly, politically, I agree with Peggy Noonan, Bill Kristol, et al that the charges should not have been brought.
Fair Ask...
Amanda Carpenter
@amandacarpenter
Can I ask one favor?
Every time a Republican says something about how the indictments will set the country on fire, rip it apart, or cause civil war can you ask one little follow up question?
WHO is going to cause the violence and how do you know this to be true?
Pls and thx
7:58 AM · Mar 31, 2023
But is it necessary to ask? We know "WHO"! We are prepared, as we should have been on Jan. 6. This indictment is likely not going to get Trump. I see it more as an invitation to Trump Scum to examine their jail cells before booking their reservations. For us it is an opportunity to rid ourselves of 1,000-2,000 or more of them.
In an interview on NBC, a lawyer for Donald J. Trump, Joseph Tacopina, said that as expected, Trump will not plead to the charges and is instead prepared to go to trial. He reiterated that Trump will surrender to authorities so that he can be formally charged in a New York courtroom.
To a lawyer this is confusing and misleading. The only purpose of arraignment is for the defendant to be formally advised of the charges against him and to plead guilty or not guilty. If the plea is guilty the next hearing is sentencing. The way you go to trial is by pleading not guilty. A defendant can stand mute to an indictment but then the judge enters a plea of not guilty on the defendant’s behalf. One way or the other the defendant pleas. If it’s a trial that he wants then the judge will enter a not guilty plea for him.Stormy Daniels wasn’t an offense against America. Focus on Georgia and the Jan. 6 riots instead.
the subject of the indictment of Mr. Trump — his role in making hush-money payments to a porn star — was “beneath” the United States. Instead, she said, attention should be paid to a Georgia investigation of his attempts to sway the vote there, and a federal investigation into his role at the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
King Charles III Makes New Florida Sheriff His Bitch
“Here you have Gov. DeSantis, a graduate of Harvard Law School,” News 6 political analyst and UCF history professor Jim Clark said. “You have all these lawyers the state has hired. You have lawyers in the Legislature. And every single one of them had missed what Disney had done.”
APPARENTLY!
At Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Camp Is Caught Off Guard
The former president’s aides had believed that any action by the grand jury was still weeks away.
At Mar-a-Lago on Thursday evening, former President Donald J. Trump was still absorbing the news of his indictment, according to several people close to him. Mr. Trump and his aides were caught off guard by the timing, believing that any action by the grand jury was still weeks away and might not occur at all.
Some advisers had become confident that there would be no movement until the end of April at the earliest and were looking at the political implications for Mr. Trump’s closest potential rival, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida.
What I thought.
George Conway
@gtconway3d
it's so good to see that the ol'-drop-it-in-the-mail-just-before-leaving-on-vacation trick is alive and well
6:04 PM · Mar 30, 2023
At his Palm Beach estate in recent weeks, Mr. Trump’s mood has ranged from optimism and bravado to anxiety about his future.
He has been keeping a relatively normal schedule at Mar-a-Lago, which he calls “my beautiful home” — dining with guests at the club, playing golf and telling nearly anyone he spoke to what a good mood he was in and how he believed that the case against him by Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, had fallen apart.
...
For all of Mr. Trump’s outward confidence, the reality is that he has feared and avoided an indictment for more than four decades, after first being criminally investigated in the 1970s. He watched in horror as his former chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, surrendered to authorities, which was shown on television in 2021. Mr. Weisselberg is only slightly younger than Mr. Trump, who told aides he couldn’t believe “what they’re doing to that old man.”
...
At the same time, a large group of former Trump Organization employees was quietly cheering the latest developments via text messages, a reminder of how many people have felt burned in various ways by Mr. Trump over the years.😂
AL-VIN!
This is a very smartly written article by Elie Mystal for The Nation.
The indictment represents the first real attempt to hold Trump legally accountable for any of his many alleged crimes. But the odds that the path to real justice, let alone prison time, runs through the Manhattan DA’s office still seem very, very long.
…
This is the lowest-hanging fruit (or, mushroom, to hear some tell it) in the Trump criminal matrix. This isn’t getting Al Capone for tax evasion; this is getting Al Capone for illegally serving alcohol at his underground poker game. It’s minor, but it’s also obvious. Criminal bookkeeping is just as ticky-tack as it sounds, but all the available evidence shows that Trump did it. If law enforcement has enough time and energy to beat the snot out of a person who jumps a turnstile to get onto the subway (and they do), then they have enough resources to indict Trump for this tawdry crap.
…
It’s not a clean shot: Bragg is trying to bank in a half-court heave off the backboard after the shot clock buzzer has already sounded.
The first issue that Bragg has is time. Trump committed the underlying campaign finance offense in 2016, and the statute of limitations on bookkeeping fraud and campaign finance violations is five years. That brings you to 2021. The statute of limitations for tax evasion is three years. Even if you don’t start the clock on that until the story breaks in the news in 2018, that brings you, once again, to 2021. To get to 2023, Bragg appears to be arguing that the statute of limitations paused while Trump was president and living out of state. That’s… a theory, but not necessarily a good one, and certainly not one that has been tested enough to know how it’s going to hold up in the courts. Remember, the alleged immunity Trump had from prosecutions applied only at the federal level. Local prosecutors, like Bragg’s predecessor Cyrus Vance, who was the Manhattan DA during Trump’s presidency, could have charged him with this crime at any time.
Bragg has left Trump with entirely plausible legal defenses, even though, again, it’s pretty obvious that he committed the underlying crimes.
…I think prosecutors should use every means necessary, fair or unfair, to trip Trump up. If you could get this guy for taking a penny without ever leaving one (which I’m sure he does), I’d want to get him for that.
But I want to GET him, and these charges don’t feel likely to accomplish that. A federal case against Trump for tax and campaign finance fraud two years ago would have been welcome. But going at Trump with shaky jurisdictional authority, two years too late, feels doomed.
…
…Even if everything goes well and Trump is tried and convicted, it’s simply hard to see how any judge or appellate court sentences the Republican front-runner for the presidential nomination TO JAIL during the election, based on these charges.
The indictment represents the first real attempt to hold Trump legally accountable for any of his many alleged crimes. But the odds that the path to real justice, let alone prison time, runs through the Manhattan DA’s office still seem very, very long.
…
This is the lowest-hanging fruit (or, mushroom, to hear some tell it) in the Trump criminal matrix. This isn’t getting Al Capone for tax evasion; this is getting Al Capone for illegally serving alcohol at his underground poker game. It’s minor, but it’s also obvious. Criminal bookkeeping is just as ticky-tack as it sounds, but all the available evidence shows that Trump did it. If law enforcement has enough time and energy to beat the snot out of a person who jumps a turnstile to get onto the subway (and they do), then they have enough resources to indict Trump for this tawdry crap.
…
It’s not a clean shot: Bragg is trying to bank in a half-court heave off the backboard after the shot clock buzzer has already sounded.
The first issue that Bragg has is time. Trump committed the underlying campaign finance offense in 2016, and the statute of limitations on bookkeeping fraud and campaign finance violations is five years. That brings you to 2021. The statute of limitations for tax evasion is three years. Even if you don’t start the clock on that until the story breaks in the news in 2018, that brings you, once again, to 2021. To get to 2023, Bragg appears to be arguing that the statute of limitations paused while Trump was president and living out of state. That’s… a theory, but not necessarily a good one, and certainly not one that has been tested enough to know how it’s going to hold up in the courts. Remember, the alleged immunity Trump had from prosecutions applied only at the federal level. Local prosecutors, like Bragg’s predecessor Cyrus Vance, who was the Manhattan DA during Trump’s presidency, could have charged him with this crime at any time.
Bragg has left Trump with entirely plausible legal defenses, even though, again, it’s pretty obvious that he committed the underlying crimes.
…I think prosecutors should use every means necessary, fair or unfair, to trip Trump up. If you could get this guy for taking a penny without ever leaving one (which I’m sure he does), I’d want to get him for that.
But I want to GET him, and these charges don’t feel likely to accomplish that. A federal case against Trump for tax and campaign finance fraud two years ago would have been welcome. But going at Trump with shaky jurisdictional authority, two years too late, feels doomed.
…
…Even if everything goes well and Trump is tried and convicted, it’s simply hard to see how any judge or appellate court sentences the Republican front-runner for the presidential nomination TO JAIL during the election, based on these charges.
If you shoot at the king, Alvin, you better not miss
13 minutes ago
Mickey Mouse Makes DeSantis His Bitch. What Will Trumpie Do To Him?😂
Over the past two months, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida has repeatedly declared victory in his yearlong effort to restrict the autonomy of Disney World, the state’s largest employer. “There’s a new sheriff in town,” he said numerous times, including at a news conference last month on Disney property, hours before appointing a new, handpicked oversight board.
Nobody seemed to have paid attention, however, to an important detail: Disney had been simultaneously maneuvering to restrict the governor’s effort. In early February — at a public meeting held by the previous, Disney-controlled oversight board — the company pushed through a development agreement that would limit the new board’s power for decades to come.
And now, the governor’s appointees, having belatedly discovered the action, are none too pleased. “It completely circumvents the authority of the board to govern,” Brian Aungst Jr., a member of the new council, said on Wednesday at the group’s second meeting. “We’re going to have to deal with it and correct it.”
…
“All agreements signed between Disney and the district were appropriate and were discussed and approved in open, noticed public forums in compliance with Florida’s Government-in-the-Sunshine law,” Disney said in a statement.
…
…a year ago…DeSantis asked Florida lawmakers to terminate self-governing privileges that Disney World had held since 1967. …
…
The Legislature went along with Mr. DeSantis until it realized there was a problem. The abolishment of the district — set for June 1 — would require taxpayers in Orange and Osceola Counties to pick up the tab for some Disney World services. Under the old setup, Disney paid for fire protection, policing and road maintenance. The district also carried roughly $1 billion in debt. If the district had been abolished, that debt would have been transferred to the counties.
…
So the Legislature tried again, taking up a new Disney World measure in a special session that started on Feb. 6 and passing it on Feb. 10. This time, Disney was allowed to keep the special tax district — which never went away — and almost all its perks, including the ability to issue tax-exempt bonds. But Disney was no longer able to appoint the five members of the tax district’s board. Florida’s governor would now do that.
In the middle of that week, on Feb. 8, the tax district’s board — the Disney-controlled one — passed restrictive covenants and a development agreement giving the company vast control over future construction in the district; the new board doesn’t have any say.
Notice of a hearing on the action was made in The Orlando Sentinel on Jan. 18, according to tax district disclosures. The matter was discussed at a short public meeting on Jan. 25 and approved at a second public meeting on Feb. 8. There was some local news coverage of the matter along the way, but they were primarily focused on Disney giving itself the option to build a fifth theme park on the property if it wants.
On the Evil of Semi-Circular Legislative Chambers
Finally, on October 28 [1943], there was the rebuilding of the House of Commons to consider. ...I sought to re-establish...the two great principles on which the British House of Commons stands in its physical aspect. ...which will command the approval and the support of reflective and experienced Members. The first is that its shape should be oblong and not semicircular. Here is a very potent factor in our political life. The semicircular assembly, which appeals to political theorists, enables every individual or every group to move round the centre...I am a convinced supporter of the party system in preference to the group system. I have seen many earnest and ardent Parliaments destroyed by the group system. :o The party system is much favoured by the oblong form of chamber....Logic, which has created in so many countries semicircular assemblies with buildings that give every member not only a seat to sit in, but a desk to write at, with a lid to bang, has proved fatal to Parliamentary government as we know it here in its home and in the land of its birth.
Thus Winston Churchill. The Second World War, Volume 5, Closing the Ring, (133-4).
Josh Hart, my newest, most favorite NBA baller!
Can’t get anybody to high five him back.
THE LOOK ON HIS FACE!!!😁
Drip, drip, drip
When you survey the sweep of the Miami "Heat" season you are benumbed by the dreary, hope-murdering mediocrity.
One four-game win streak, two four-game losers. Three games below .500 is the worst we have been; seven games above the best. That was immediately followed by a four-game losing streak that brought us back closer to our mean. Six games over we were on March 22. Since, three straight L's.
Some of us saw this coming right out of the box. One guy, I documented it, lol'd at us. "Look at Miami "Heat" fans panicking after two losses lol." We were right, he was wrong.
What I have not been able to get "Heat" cognos and fannies to see is the wider sweep of the team's recent history. The drip-by-drip results this season have been an exercise in reversion to the mean but this season as a whole was a reversion to the mean of the nine seasons inclusive starting in 2014/15, the first season post-Heatles. A couple of months ago I taught myself, via Wikipedia, how to calculate the standard deviation of a data set. I don't know if it was worth the effort but I did it and the standard deviation of 2014/15-2021/22 is 5. For sports fans, including me, the more meaningful metric is average record: 45-37 (shortened seasons extrapolated over 82 games); expressed as a decimal, .544. That's amazing, isn't it? Amazingly consistent? If the "Heat" win all of their remaining games this season they will merely match their previous eight-year average. They can't do better than that average and they can't do worse than 40 wins. They finished 41-41 in 2016/17 ("Team Joy") and 39-43 in 2018/19, the closest analogs. They have not deviated much from their average in these nine years, -8 and +8 are the extremes! It is stunning consistency in the Darwinian world of team sports. Erik Spoelstra repeated the grand sports truth after last night's loss, "You are what your record says you are", and yeah.
My point in doing this, now and previously, is to put before "Heat" fans in irrefutable black and white that Pat Riley, Erik Spoelstra and "Heat" "Culture", the three constants over these nine years, have destined the franchise to finish 45-37. Year after year after year. For the Charlotte "Hornets" that would get Riles and Spo a statue each outside the arena. For some other teams too, Sacramento, D.C. And it will get Riley a statue after he hangs it up. .544 means you were better than 54% of teams every year for nine straight years! Maybe that is how "Heat" fans should look at this history too, but we don't. We have been sold on Hope, on Riles, on another championship just around the corner. It's not happening; no championship is coming. Not until the "Culture" that has created 45-37 disappears and only the statue remains.
