Stats are more objective. The Sixers are playing better and it's showing up in the objective stats. But you can't assume the team will continue to play the same way or only get better. Those stats and projections change constantly based on what the team has done recently.
The team is still winning but, now they're winning tight games, not blowing teams out. I don't know if that's the schedule, the return of Brand or both. We'll find out tonight. Games against bad teams are a good opportunity to pad the stats. Hollinger would say, that the stats suggest the Sixers will blow the Wizards out of the building.
I thought the Sixers would be about the 4th best team in the East at the beginning, with the hope that they might even be better.
Still too early in the Brand era to tell.