Erik Spoelstra said something interesting to a group of reporters I was in the other day. He wouldn’t go so far as to say his Miami Heat could flip the switch come playoff time, but he did acknowledge that he takes the regular season in phases.
Teams know who they are more than three-quarters of the way through the NBA season. Lottery teams start looking ahead to the draft and prioritize developing young players, play-in teams gear up for a run at some playoff revenue and contenders like Spoelstra’s Heat typically start tightening the screws on things that could become issues in the postseason. Or, at least, they try.
Depending on who you ask, there are between 10 and 14 contenders this season. Some have dominated the regular season to the point that they are undeniable threats while others get a little more benefit of the doubt based on their core’s shared history.
We’ll be diving into each contender’s potentially fatal flaw – the screw they need to tighten – that could prevent them from winning the 2024 NBA championship.
• Boston Celtics: What if they go cold?
Scan any Celtics blog or podcast long enough and the first major red flag they’ll throw out is Kristaps Porzingis’ health. No doubt that Porzingis suffers from a checkered injury history, but injuries happen (or don’t) and aren’t worth spending time on here.
Beyond injuries, the Celtics could run into trouble if the three-point shot suddenly goes cold.
The Celtics have been the best three-point shooting team in the league this season, averaging more made 3s per possession than any other team in the league. They are fourth in percentage and first in attempts. They are built to win games with their three-point shot, and they have won more games than any team in the league this season and are out-scoring teams by more than 10 points per 100 possessions. They have dominated.
The problem is that when those 3s aren’t going in, they resemble more of an average team.
Half of Boston’s losses have come in games in which they have made fewer than 15 3s (they are 7-6 in those games). When the three-point shot isn’t falling they don’t have much recourse. The Celtics rank in the bottom 10 in free-throw attempts rate and rely a lot on isolations and post-ups. If their opponent gets hot, they can beat those 2s with 3s of their own.
The Celtics are a very different team than they were last season, but in their 2023 playoff run, they made fewer than 15 3s in nine games. They went 2-7 in those games, which ultimately cost them a chance to repeat as Eastern Conference champs. The Celtics are the team to beat in the East and, if they execute, they will likely make the Finals. But they aren’t perfect.
• Oklahoma City Thunder: Have they reached their ceiling already?
We see it every year: A team that wins more games than expected at least in part to great health. Last year, it was the Sacramento Kings. This year, it’s undeniable that the Thunder have been the beneficiaries of good health. No starting lineup has played more games together than Oklahoma City’s. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Josh Giddeny, Lu Dort, Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren have started in 47 of 57 games this season.
To be fair, that lineup is also beating opponents by 6.4 points every 100 possessions. The Thunder are a terrifying team with multiple ways to beat you. But it’s also worth wondering if this young team has another level to get to in the playoffs.
They might not need one. The Thunder and Celtics are the only teams in the league that rank in the top four in both offensive and defensive ratings. Gilgeous-Alexander is a bona fide MVP candidate with a game that should blossom in the postseason, and Williams isn’t far behind him in star potential. Holmgren impacts nearly every possession he’s a part of.
But what happens when opponents start being more careful with the ball and OKC’s transition opportunities dry up? In a halfcourt game, can the Thunder grab enough rebounds (29th in defensive rebounding rate) to prevent potentially crippling putbacks?
• Los Angeles Clippers: Transition defense
As the Clippers morphed into one of the best teams in the league after the James Harden trade, one thing hasn’t changed: This team still doesn’t get back.
The Clippers rank 29th out of 30 in transition defense, according to Cleaning the Glass. That’s worse than the Indiana Pacers. While their offensive and defensive ratings have surged, that stat has remained consistently bad.
It’s a surprising stat considering the leadership (championship-winning coach Ty Lue) and defensive talent (Kawhi Leonard, Paul George) but this is not a team that wants to run, which is essentially the first rule of transition defense.
The Clippers, who have the league’s second-oldest roster, rank in the bottom eight in pace and 29th in distance traveled and average speed, per Second Spectrum data.
Maybe they’ll ratchet up the intensity in the playoffs, but that wasn’t the case last year when they actually got slower in the postseason. They are legitimate contenders now and should be motivated to get back in transition if nothing else, but seeing it over the next two months would give Steve Balmer and Co. some peace of mind.
• Minnesota Timberwolves: Turnovers
The Timberwolves turn the ball over on nearly 15 percent of their possessions. That’s just a hair better than lottery-bound teams like the Trail Blazers and Pistons. What those turnovers hurt is the offense – especially late in games. The Timberwolves are getting out-scored by 8.2 points per 100 possessions in the final five minutes of games within five points, per NBA.com, and are turning the ball over at the fourth-highest rate during those stretches.
The culprits are Minnesota’s best players. Anthony Edwards leads the Wolves in clutch-time turnovers, Karl-Anthony Towns sees his shooting percentages drop, and Jaden McDaniels leads the team in fouls.
The Timberwolves have been impressive this season (NBA.com ranked them second in their most recent power rankings) but the playoffs bring close games, and the Timberwolves will need to play as many as they can between now and the end of the season to get better in those situations.
• Cleveland Cavaliers: Will playoff schemes hurt them?
The Cavaliers have been one of the hottest teams in the league since the turn of the calendar, but they were hot last season too before flaming out in the first round of the playoffs.
As good as lineups with Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen have been on paper, one has to wonder what happens when opponents scheme against them in the playoffs. Teams will be able to hedge off either one and make things difficult for Donovan Mitchell, potentially grinding Cleveland’s offense to a halt.
Shooters like Max Strus, Dean Wade, Georges Niang and Sam Merrill could be subbed in, but now the Cavs are taking one of their best players off the floor.
J.B. Bickerstaff is aware of this concern, which is why he’s empowered Mobley to be a more active part of the offense since returning to the lineup.
Here’s Mobley’s per 36 averages from before and after his left knee injury:
Before: 17.2 PPG, 12.7 FGA (0.5 3PA), 3.3 FTA, 3.1 AST
After: 20.3 PPG, 13.3 FGA (1.7 3PA), 4.3 FTA, 3.4 AST
Everything has ticked up, including his 3s and free-throw attempts, since coming back. Bickerstaff is doing that now in hopes of Mobley being ready to put pressure on defenses in the playoffs.
• New York Knicks: Halfcourt offense
The Knicks have an average offensive rating in the halfcourt and are over-reliant on putting back shots off opponent misses. Last year, they had one of the worst offensive ratings of any team in the playoffs and it’s hard to see how they’ll be good enough this postseason.
The additions of OG Anunoby and Bojan Bogdanovic will help, but are opponents scared of those guys? Jalen Brunson has been incredible this season and the addition of a pull-up 3-pointer should loosen things up in the playoffs, but this team is still missing a second star to take the pressure off of him.
Maybe the incremental improvements of adding Brunson’s pull-up game, Anunoby, Bogdanovic and Alec Burks are enough to overcome the lack of a co-star, but if the Knicks stall in the playoffs it’ll be because they couldn’t score with teams like Boston and Milwaukee.
Lightning round in no particular order
• Denver Nuggets: There are no questions about what Nikola Jokic and the starting five can do in the playoffs and this team still ranks in the top 10 in offensive rating and defensive rating despite not going full tilt in the regular season. But can they replace the minutes Bruce Brown and Jeff Green gave them last postseason in a deeper Western Conference? It’s popular to say that Michael Malone can move Aaron Gordon to center when Jokic is off the floor in the playoffs, but who fills in the rest of the lineup? Peyton Watson? Christian Braun?
• Phoenix Suns: Once a week, the Suns look unbeatable. In the other games, they look like a finesse team going through the motions. Where’s the oomph with this team? Trading for Royce O’Neale was supposed to help, but it hasn’t exactly translated. The Suns rely too much on isolations and long 2s, rank near the bottom of the league in drives and shots at the rim, and there are questions about how Jusuf Nurkic will hold up in a playoff series.
• Philadelphia 76ers: If Joel Embiid returns at 80 percent of what he was before the injury, the 76ers have a shot. Anything else, and they could be S.O.L. The Sixers' offense has gone in the toilet over the last few weeks. Lineups with Tyrese Maxey and without Embiid are scoring a pedestrian 117.2 points per 100 possessions. Even when Embiid returns, he’ll have to play a ton of minutes in the playoffs for the Sixers to have a chance, which isn’t ideal considering his history of wearing down.
• Milwaukee Bucks: After an initial surge in defensive rating after hiring Doc Rivers, the Bucks have settled back to being merely average on that end and still rank 18th in halfcourt defense. Patrick Beverley isn’t enough to save them.
• Dallas Mavericks: Is the defense real? Before Wednesday's buzzer beater loss at Cleveland, the Mavericks have won seven of their last eight games and have the fourth-best defense during that stretch. But from October to the end of January, the Mavericks ranked 23rd in DRTG. They have been helped by unlucky opponent 3-point shooting during this stretch, but the eye test also shows better communication and the trade deadline additions of P.J. Washington and Daniel Gafford should help going forward. But it remains to be seen if this unit is good enough in the playoffs.
• Miami Heat: Their shot profile is problematic. The Heat rely too much on inefficient mid-range shots and rank near the bottom of the league in shots at the rim and the offense tends to go long stretches without scoring because it struggles to generate easy looks. Last season, they needed Jimmy Butler, now 34, to morph into Michael Jordan for a couple of series and role players to catch fire from three-point range to make their Finals run. They’re a better three-point shooting team this season, but they’ll still likely need to find lightning in a bottle to make another deep run.
• Golden State Warriors: Size to match up with the West’s top teams and the lack of a true No. 2 scorer next to Steph Curry to out-score those teams.
• Los Angeles Lakers: Everybody knows you need shooting around LeBron James. Everybody except the Lakers, who rank 29th in 3-pointers made per possession.
