The season starts in about two weeks and most of the rosters are finished by now with only 14th-15th man spots up in the air for almost every team. In the West the teams that will make the playoffs are ,barring serious injuries- pretty much easy to predict with only one two spots remaining for the other teams. But in the east except the Cavs every other playoff spot will be up in the air with almost every team except the 76ers having playoff aspirations. So who do you think will make the playoffs this year from the East? Atlanta lost Caroll and has a hole at sf and Splitter is always injured and loses half the season. The system and the coach remain the same. Will they be able to repeat such a phenomenal regular season perfomance? Boston has a very deep team with a good coach, but a team with no star only role players- and with only one-oft injured- rim protector. Detroit has SVG and Drummond if he's interested looks to have a breakout year. Their rookie Stanley Johnson looks phenomenal and Reggie Jackson seems to have found a home. Washington lost Pierce and will try to turn Humphries into a stretch 4 (lmao) to keep up Whittman's po coaching revelations. Toronto is banking on internal improvement from Valanciunas but is it treadmilling? Will Derozan be able to play defence again and pass the ball or will he chuck his way into an empty stats contract year? Indiana lost all their frontcourt and has the PG at pf experiment going on with the worst frontcourt in maybe the whole league. Miami has an exceptional starting lineup of Dragic-Wade-Deng-Bosh-Whiteside but how healthy can they remain? Is their bench all that much improved? The Knicks and their fans are already talking about making the playoffs with the additions of Robin Lopez and Afflalo. The Magic are full of young talent and got Skiles to teach them discipline accountabillity and defence -before he inevitably some years down the road fights with the players and gets fired- as he has done in all his previous stops. Chicago remained the same with a very old and injury prone frontcourt and Dunleavy having back problems, but they got a new coach with an exciting offensive plan of shooting as many threes as possible and moving the ball around. Will Rose be able to adjust to a plan that doesn't fit him/requires him to do some things he has never done before and will Pau and Noah be able to coexist and be healthy? The Bucks are young and green and have questions about how to fit Monroe into their defensive plans and how to pass him the ball into the post with Parker coming back under minutes restriction from a serious acl injury. Charlotte has made many win now moves and instead of a defensive no shooting slow pace team, they have started shooting threes from all positions. But they lost their defensive pillar to injury for all season. And they got Lin. Will they be able to make a run for the pos? The Nets have no picks and no starting caliber pg. They still have Brook Lopez and they paid big money to Thad Young as their frontcourt of the future. And Iso Joe is still going strong-for a guy his age. 76ers are not interested. Who do you think will make the playoffs in the East apart from the Cavs?
Cavs will probably be the number one seed. Bulls will probably be second. 3-8 is a toss up, IMO, but I think Boston, Washington, Indiana, Atlanta and the Bucks all make it in. The seeding will be up for grabs from all of them as none of them are particularly good. The 8th seed will be a contest between Detroit, and Miami. It depends on Miami's health and whether or not Drummond can make a big step. Also, the Pistons play in what is easily the toughest division in the East. I think Toronto doesn't get in and ends up blowing it up mid season. Charlotte needs a more reliable scoring option to be serious, I think they've fallen into (and will stay) on the 10th seed treadmill. Knicks and Nets will both be out of it, same with Philly obviously. Magic probably need another year before it all comes together, but they're going to be a scary team in 2016.
Cavs, Heat, Bulls, Hawks, Wizards and Bucks should be safe if nothing extraordinary happens. Last two spots are in gamble between Charlotte, Toronto, Detroit and maybe Boston.
Do you all think that the Craptors will be that bad? They play in the Titanic division and will face the Knicks and the 76ers multiple times. Lowry is in microbooty shape and appears to play the best so far in the preseason out of everyone else. They have Scola Biyombo Valanciunas PPatt and Bennett. Ross and Derozan are in contract years. They got rid of crazy Lou that poisoned the team defence and turned them from team ball into full iso. Casey is walking into his a tight rope and has vowed to change the defence from hedging to iceing to help Valanciunas with pnr defence and to keep him into the 4rth quarters. The AS game will be held in Toronto and everyone has their eyes on the team. I can't see how they will miss the playoffs with all those factors.
I do not think East will change very much this year standing wise. I actually think the Hawks are going to win about the same amount of games, again. Roughly 57-61 wins. I think Cleveland and Chicago will be not too far behind. Both of whom, I see coasting alot. I feel like Miami, Milwaukee, and Toronto will round out the top half of the conference. The wild cards will be amongst Indiana, Charlotte, Orlando, Detroit, and Boston.
How do you talk about the Raptors and not mention Carroll or Kyle Lowry's new body? How do you talk about the Pacers and not mention them adding Monta Ellis, and in some sense Paul George, to the team? It's the east, they could make the playoffs.
1. Cleveland Cavaliers (Team to beat. Will likely steamroll again through the East) 2. Chicago Bulls (Depends on if Rose can get it together and Hoiberg can hit the ground running as an NBA coach. Will likely be the team Cleveland meets in the ECF) 3. Atlanta Hawks (Overachieved like crazy last season, and will miss Carroll.) 4. Miami Heat (Fantastic starting 5, questionable bench. Is Whiteside legit?) 5. Washington Wizards (Still a good, not great team. Always a trendy upset pick, even without Pierce) 6. Toronto Raptors (I want to see them go far but they just don't have the grit IMO.) 7. Milwaukee Bucks (Lower seed this year but a better squad. Major upset potential no matter who they play) 8. Boston Celtics (Better squad then last year, but still not better than the above teams. Will be fighting with Indiana for the 8th seed.)
I think the East may be more interesting this year, as it is completely wide open. Cleveland is still the best team and I fully expect them to rep the East in the finals. I don't think Atlanta wins as many games this year as they did last year, but they'll still make the playoffs along with Washington, Toronto, and Chicago. I think Miami is entering the season as the most overrated team in the league. They're going to rely too much on Wade(who I see having a steep decline this year as the knees get worse and worse) but they're good enough to make the playoffs. The Bucks are the trendy pick this year, and although they have some spacing and interior defense issues I trust that Kidd(the most underrated coach in the league) will figure it out. I think Giannis fully breaks out this year as well. Charlotte will struggle without MKG, he is the leader there and one of the best wing defenders in the league, but I can see them making it too. Detroit depends on Drummond's effort, but they'll be in the race too. Boston is a team full of great role players, and I see Ainge swinging for the fences for a superstar, possibly a disgruntled superstar who doesn't like the fact that he is playing the 4. Speaking of that watch out for Myles Turner. My sleeper pick for ROTY. I do think Bird considers blowing it up at some point. The New York teams are both kind of interesting, I don't think either will do much this year, especially the Knicks. I wouldn't be surprised if Phil decides to call it quits before the year is over, and Brook Lopez is made of brittle glass and ISO Joe shoots less than 30% from the field this year Orlando is still a year or two out, and Philly has no interest in winning games just yet
cavs are the only team that has a chance against the west any other team and the west team wins the championship
Yeah. Anyone who doesn't think the raptors are a shoe in for the playoffs doesn't have an idea of what they are talking about, all due respect.
The East is sooo wide open that a case can be made for 14 teams to make the playoffs. But I can't see how Indiana will make it with such a bad frontcourt. The Knicks as well are banking on Afflalo's defence! and contributions from rookies like Grant and Porzingis. Melo is looking reallyyy good so far and fully recovered from his surgery but can one Melo bring his team to the playoffs in the East surrounded by mostly scrubs overrated players and rookies? The perimeter defence with Calderon+Afflalo => horrible Melos defence=> bad Derrick Williams =>LOL It's really a headscratcher how many Knicks fans are so certain that their team will be a playoff team and will be fighting for even the 5th seed. The Nets have the worst starting pg in the whole league. So I would eliminate those three teams, even tho I think that they can win around 35 games each. That leaves Atlanta, Washington Chicago Milwaukee Detroit Orlando Boston Toronto Miami and Charlotte fighting for the other 7 spots. Orlando Milwaukee and Detroit are banking on internal improvement. But each team has a good reason to be confident. 1)Skiles always makes his team overachieve by playing tough defence. 2)Detroit has a dominant young center that can be an all star this year and has players who fit with the coach system. 3)Milwaukee has a lot of young talent with potential and already made the pos last year. Boston Toronto and Charlotte are the treadmilling teams banking on vet contributions and marginal improvement from their prospects but the are all deep teams. Atlanta Chicago Miami and Wizards are banking on more "star" players. Atlanta will continue to have their system and their frontcourt remains but what if Korver at his old age can't play so many minutes? Chicago will have bad bad defence this year. Rose+Buttler+McDermott+Mirotic+Pau => 3.5 bad defenders. And the Wizards don't have a good pf. I think every team could make the playoffs out of those but if we have perfect health then my guess would be Cavs Miami Atlanta Toronto Washington Chicago Boston Milwaukee It will be a very exciting year in the east. Because even tho there are not so many great teams like in the West there are too many pretty good teams now. Almost every team is about the same level right now.
