We’re Changing How We Think About The NBA

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With the NBA preseason officially underway, we’re unveiling something new. Since 2015, FiveThirtyEight has put out forecasts for the NBA season based on player ratings from ESPN and Basketball-Reference.com. But this year, we created our own player rating metric — called RAPTOR — which will power this season’s forecast. FiveThirtyEight editor-in-chief Nate Silver joins for a segment of Model Talk to help us understand how RAPTOR works.

After a pro-Hong Kong tweet from Daryl Morey, the general manager of the Houston Rockets, the NBA found itself plunged into a geopolitical scandal. FiveThirtyEight senior sportswriter Chris Herring joins the show to unpack why a league that is no stranger to political confrontation is struggling to respond.

Finally, our Rabbit Hole pays its respect to Sara’s Minnesota Twins. After a record-breaking season, their playoff hopes ended in a far more unfortunate record.

Here’s what we’re looking at this week:

A well-rounded look at the NBA’s ambitions abroad from The New York Times Magazine.
A focus on the Washington Mystics’ Emma Meesseman as we await Game 4 of the WNBA Finals on Tuesday.