Now that we've clinched our first playoff berth since 2003, I figure now is as good a time as any to throw my own playoff positioning analysis angle into the fanposts here.  It's like the opposite of blazer91's "Taking Care of Business" thread: what happens if everything goes wrong for the rest of the regular season?  What feasible possibilities are there?

To calculate this, I assume that the Blazers will finish the season 3-3 leaving us with a record of 51-31 (losses to Denver, LA and San Antonio).  Then I assumed that all of our other Western rivals win all games against everyone except one another.  I left those games as question marks to establish a range of possibility for each of our rivals in the homestretch.  This is what I got:

PDX:

@MEM W
@SA L
vs LAL L
@ LAC W
vs OKC W
vs DEN L

Record: 51-31

SA:

@ OKC W
vs PDX W
vs UTH ?
@ SAC W
@ GSW W
vs. NO ?

53-29 to 55-27

NO:

@ MIA W
vs. PHX W
@ DAL ?
vs. DAL ?
@ HOU ?
@ SA ?

49-33 to 53-29

HOU:

vs ORL W
@ SAC W
@ GSW W
vs NO ?
@ DAL ?

52-30 to 54-28

DAL:

vs. UTH ?
vs. NO ?
@ NO ?
vs. MIN W
vs. HOU ?

47-35 to 51-31

UTH:

@ DAL ?
@ SA ?
vs. GSW W
vs. LAC W
@ LAL W

50-32 to 52-30

DEN:

vs. OKC W
@ LAL W
vs SAC W
@ PDX W

56-26

If we do indeed finish 51-31, then ANY of the Western Conference contenders could pass us.  However, there is only ONE way that this is possible (hence it is incredibly unlikely):

Assuming Dallas wins ALL of its remaining games, they would finish 51-31 and beat us for the tiebreaker.  That means New Orleans takes two more losses to their maximum win number, having them finish 51-31 as well and also beating us in the tiebreaker.  Utah and Houston also take a hit, and Utah will also finish 51-31 as their maximum (and take the tiebreaker due to division record).  San Antonio finishes with their minimum win possibility at 53-29 and Houston finishes right behind at 52-30.

Worst-case scenario final standings:

LAL 64-18

DEN 56-26

SA 53-29

HOU 52-30

TIE: NO, DAL, UTH, POR at 51-31 (POR ends as 8 seed, someone else would have to sort out how the other ones would end up in this scenario)

That horribly complicated scenario would be the worst for us, because it is the ONLY possible way right now that we can end up with the 8th seed facing LA in the first round.  As fun as that would be, we would totally get creamed.  However, this is especially unlikely because in this scenario Denver would have the 2 seed locked up and would probably rest their starters for the final game against us.

In other words, if you don't want to see LA in the first round, ANYTHING that happens BESIDES the above scenario will keep us out of the 8th seed.  If we drop one of our "gimme" games to close out the season, it becomes much more feasible that we could end up with the 8th seed.

I hope that we all learned something from this exercise.  I think what I learned is that April 15 can't come quickly enough!!!!