What should we expect from the Knicks this year?
ESPN Forecast predicted the Knicks would win 25 games in the upcoming season, an eight-victory increase from last year's total, but still one which would have fans pretty upset with the organization's progress.
Over at ESPN, Ian Begley writes about the fairness of that prediction. Are the Knicks actually going to be this bad again? What does history say? Here's more from Begley:
Don't forget about last year's Bucks, either, who jumped from 15 wins in 2013-14 to 41 this past season. That's a massive increase, but it was also a young team with a new coach making a jump after an underperforming season.
The Knicks will be better after signing Robin Lopez, Kyle O'Quinn, Kevin Seraphin, Arron Afflalo and Derrick Williams. They'll be better with a presumably healthy Carmelo Anthony, but this team is still far from great. 25 wins may be harsh, but 45 is optimistic.
(h/t ESPN)
Thirty-seven* teams have finished with 20 or fewer wins since the 1979-80 season.
Those 37 teams experienced a win increase, on average, of 10.7 games in their next season.
There were outliers in this group, of course.
In 1986-87, the Golden State Warriors won just 20 games. The next season, the club went 43-39.
The 1997-98 Boston Celtics won 36 games a season after winning just 15.
The same season, the San Antonio Spurs won 56 games after winning just 20 the season prior. That team featured a healthy David Robinson (Robinson missed all but six games the previous season due to injury) and rookie Tim Duncan.
More recently, the then-New Orleans Hornets increased their win total by 20 after an 18-win season in 2004-05 and the Miami Heat won 28 more games in 2008-09 than they did the season prior, when they were 15-67.
