Republished with permission from PunditTracker.

Now that the 2012-13 season has come to a close, let’s update the rankings of our NBA Pundits. All the rankings are based on our $1 Yield metric, which measures the average payout had you bet $1 on each of the pundit’s predictions. For details on all the picks and to make your own NBA predictions, click here to visit PunditTracker’s NBA Page.


We classify NBA predictions in two main formats:

“Preseason”: predictions made before the season begins, which includes 11 categories: 6 division winners, 2 conference winners, overall champion, MVP, and Rookie of the Year.

“Playoffs”: predictions made for each playoff series (round-by-round)

Let’s start with the preseason pundit rankings for all the experts that have made at least four seasons worth of picks.


Preseason Pundit Rankings

Pundit 2008-09 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 Cumulative Chris Palmer $1.28 $1.49 $1.85 $1.19 $1.45 Maurice Brooks $0.70 $2.14 $1.11 $1.82 $0.90 $1.33 Chad Ford $1.28 $0.47 $1.36 $2.39 $1.09 $1.32 John Hollinger $0.70 $0.74 $0.98 $2.44 $1.73 $1.32 Vegas Favorites $0.83 $1.73 $1.11 $1.46 $1.19 $1.26 Kevin Arnovitz $0.81 $0.89 $1.85 $1.50 $1.26 Chris Broussard $1.54 $1.08 $0.89 $1.49 $0.94 $1.19 Jalen Rose $1.28 $1.63 $0.40 $1.15 $1.12 Henry Abbott $0.70 $1.08 $1.24 $1.51 $0.94 $1.09 Scoop Jackson $0.58 $1.77 $0.78 $1.12 $1.17 $1.08 Marc Stein $0.96 $1.26 $0.89 $1.12 $1.19 $1.08 J.A. Adande $0.96 $1.29 $0.62 $1.46 $0.94 $1.05 David Thorpe $0.50 $0.67 $0.89 $1.51 $1.24 $0.96 Jack Ramsay $0.50 $0.47 $1.14 $0.94 $0.76 Pundit Average $0.89 $1.13 $0.87 $1.59 $1.07 $1.11

Here is how all 35 ESPN experts we tracked did with their 2012/13 preseason predictions.

2012/13 Preseason Rankings

Pundit Yield John Hollinger $1.73 Kevin Arnovitz $1.50 Nick Friedell $1.50 Dave McMenamin $1.36 Israel Gutierrez $1.32 Brian Windhorst $1.25 Mike Mazzeo $1.25 David Thorpe $1.24 Chris Palmer $1.19 Ian Begley $1.19 Marc Stein $1.19 Royce Webb $1.19 Tom Haberstroh $1.19 Scoop Jackson $1.17 Justin Verrier $1.15 Pundit Average $1.07


Finally, here are the playoff pundit rankings for those who have made at least 25 playoff round predictions.

Playoff Pundit Rankings

Pundit 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 Cumulative David Thorpe, ESPN $1.22 $0.83 $1.25 $1.18 $1.12 Jon Barry, ESPN $1.39 $1.09 $0.98 $1.10 Tim Legler, ESPN $1.29 $0.68 $1.09 $1.34 $1.09 Tom Haberstroh, ESPN $0.53 $1.23 $1.13 $1.09 John Hollinger, ESPN $1.25 $0.88 $1.06 $1.07 Kevin Arnovitz, ESPN $0.94 $1.09 $1.10 $1.05 Henry Abbott, ESPN $1.14 $0.88 $1.09 $1.09 $1.05 Chris Broussard, ESPN $1.17 $0.98 $1.09 $0.79 $1.03 Israel Gutierrez, ESPN $0.00 $1.17 $0.95 $1.03 J.A. Adande, ESPN $0.76 $1.16 $1.06 $1.10 $1.02 Ken Berger, CBS $0.90 $1.14 $1.02 Royce Young, CBS $1.09 $0.90 $1.00 Chad Ford, ESPN $1.05 $0.67 $0.98 $1.28 $0.99 Vegas Favorites $0.99 $1.00 $0.90 $0.95 $0.96 Matt Moore, CBS $0.91 $0.84 $0.88 Marc Stein, ESPN $0.77 $0.95 $0.90 $0.75 $0.84 Michael Wilbon, ESPN $0.72 $0.86 $1.02 $0.84


PunditTracker's mission is to bring accountability to the prediction industry by cataloging and scoring the predictions of pundits.