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​Arithmetic Shows Why it's Basically Impossible for Zaza Pachulia to Become an All-Star

Math, like Father Time, remains undefeated.
This is what crushed Georgian dreams look like. Photo by Kyle Terada—USA TODAY Sports

Zaza Pachulia, the Warriors' only starter without an All-Star berth, was thrust into the spotlight yet again this year. After making a shocking fourth place showing in the Western frontcourt of All-Star voting last year, Pachulia came in second among Western Conference forwards in the first tallies earlier this month.

Zaza's surprising showing essentially was the cause for a voting change for this year's game, and now—despite people heralding the second coming of Pachulia—those rule changes are effectively going to work against his chances of making the team.

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Starting this year, the NBA split up the All-Star vote among fans (50 percent), media (25 percent) and the players themselves (25 percent)—as opposed to the fan-heavy formats of yesteryear.

But when Pachulia again came back as the No. 2 forward in the Western Conference in the fan voting tallies released on Thursday, some started to worry.

The latest #NBAAllStar Voting presented by @Verizon returns! Vote: https://t.co/7SYpaqHa1f & the NBA App. pic.twitter.com/SXXAebaxx9
— 2017 NBA All-Star (@NBAAllStar) January 12, 2017

Is Zaza an All-Star? No, Zaza—who is averaging 5.6 points and 5.7 rebounds in 18.1 minutes per game with the Warriors this year—is not an all-star. Sorry to tell the 823,876 fans who've voted him an All-Star starter so far this year. He is a quality pro. That's why executives were so ticked off when the Warriors—fresh off acquiring Kevin Durant last July, thus assuring Andrew Bogut would flee—landed Zaza at the league minimum.

I have gotten almost as many angry texts/etc from team execs about GSW getting Zaza for nothing as I did re: GSW signing KD.
— Zach Lowe (@ZachLowe_NBA) July 5, 2016

But even if Pachulia finishes with the second-most fan votes among frontcourt players, there's almost no possibility he actually makes it. Basic arithmetic and common sense about the player and media voting shows us why.

Yes, the top three Western Conference frontcourt players will be named All-Star starters, but only after the player and media votes are added in.

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So lets be really generous to Zaza and say that both the media and the players themselves vote him as the 6th-best frontcourt player in the West, and the fans name him the second-best frontcourt player. (This is absurd because he might not even be in the top 20 playing in a conference with Kawhi Leonard, Marc Gasol, Kevin Durant, Draymond Green, LaMarcus Aldridge, DeMarcus Cousins, Anthony Davis etc, but we're using an extreme to show you how preposterous it is to worry about Zaza actually being named a starter—regardless of how it might parallel America's current political climate.

Feel like there's a connection between Zaza Pachulia being voted into the All-Star game, Donald Trump and the fall of democracy
— Zito (@_Zeets) January 12, 2017

So here's the methodology. Each voting group's influence is weighted. The fan vote counts for half of the whole, the media vote and the player vote for a quarter. The three frontcourt players with the lowest average final rank are All Star starters.

Let's say, as we discussed in our hypothetical, that Zaza finishes second in fan voting and sixth in both the media and player voting categories. That would mean an average rank of fourth, which is outside the top three. Here's how that works.

First of all, for the sake of simplicity, we're going to break the fan vote (50 percent of the weighted total) into two segments of equal value. Like this:

Fan Vote: No. 2 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

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Fan Vote: No. 2 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

Media Vote: No. 6 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

Player Vote: No. 6 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

Then we're going to take an average of all these ranks by adding them together and dividing by the total number of ranks, just like you learned in school. There are 4 ranks each accounting for 25 percent of the vote. So:

2+2+6+6=16

Then, the average:

16/4 = 4

Zaza would rank fourth in this hypothetical.

Now lets use Kawhi Leonard. The back-to-back Defensive Player of the Year is No. 3 in fan voting for Western frontcourt players. Lets say that's where he finishes and the players and media name him No. 2 out west. Here's how it would break down.

Kawhi voting breakdown:

Fan Vote: No. 3 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

Fan Vote: No. 3 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

Media Vote: No. 2 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

Player Vote: No. 2 (counts for 25 percent of the vote)

3+3+2+2=10

Then, the average:

10/4 = 2.5

Kawhi would rank 2.5th (if that were possible) in voting.

And now we do some compare and contrast:

4 is a higher number than 2.5.

A third grader could conclude: even in this absurd scenario in which players and the media both rank Zaza Pachulia as the sixth-best frontcourt player in the Western Conference, Kawhi gets the nod.

Math, like Father Time, remains undefeated.