20 and Counting

As most who know me are aware, I generally do not follow basketball.  While the NBA may be lacking popularity these days, I missed out on it from an early age.  The era of Michael Jordan never captured my attention as a kid, and as I grew older, I never took the time to learn the game.  Instead, basketball has become a game that I commit tons of fouls if I would try to play, and rarely do I have any idea what is going on at the NBA or NCAA levels.  March Madness keeps me entertained for a couple weeks until I'm eliminated, but otherwise I could tell you next to nothing about the sport.

Nonetheless, I would like to do some posts on it from time to time.  Maybe I'll learn a little more, but if nothing else it will keep me slightly more up to date on the sport.  Therefore, I have to acknowledge a friend of mine who pointed out to me the dubious record that looks to be set this Wednesday as I would have missed it otherwise.  Back in February, I accidentally stumbled across the cellar-dwelling Charlotte Bobcats.  I find it interesting teams when teams are approaching certain records, so I checked to see if they were on pace to become the worst NBA team in history.  They were doing awful, but not awful enough to warrant that title.

Well since then, the Bobcats have gone on to defy that.  Yesterday, they lost to the Sacramento Kings by a score of 114 to 88, in route to their 20th consecutive loss.  In those twenty losses, which began on March 19th against the Philadelphia 76ers, they have been beaten by a combined 312 points, and average of 15.6 points per game.  Their record stands at 7-56, a winning percentage of .111 with only three games remaining.

The team with the worst ever winning percentage in the NBA belongs to the team that started this losing streak, the 76ers.  In 1973, the 76ers put together a rather amazing 9-73 record for a .110 winning percentage.  Granted, the 2011-12 season began two months late due to a lockout, so the Bobcats will only play 66 games this season.  However, with three games remaining, the Bobcats only need to draw out their losing streak to 23 to grab the title as Worst NBA Team Ever from the 76ers.

The Bobcats will face the Washington Wizards tonight who they are 0-3 against this season.  Nevertheless, the Wizards are another very poor team this year at 17-46 (.270), and could become a difficult obstacle to lose to.  If Charlotte can sneak by them, they should have little issue pulling out losses to the Orlando Magic and New York Knicks, both of whom have winning records and are playoff bound.

They must lose all three of their final games to find themselves atop the losing-est NBA squads.   Their season would end with a miserable 23-game skid which while not a record, would still be good to tie for the third longest losing streak in the history of the NBA.  Currently, their streak of 20 games has them in a five-way tie for 6th longest.  One of those teams of course being the 1973 76ers.  The only franchise with more than 23 losses in a row are the Cleveland Cavaliers who reached stretches of 26 (2010-11) and 24 (1981-82 & 82-83).  Therefore, the Bobcats will have something else  to shoot for at the beginning of next season, if they can hold off everyone else through this week.  After tonight's game against the Wizards, the Bobcats will face the Magic Wednesday and the Knicks Thursday to close out what has been a dreadful year.