bwoolf2 wrote:bwgood77 wrote:bwoolf2 wrote:
Ya they put in the effort but they aren't a good rebounding team by any means, I just don't see them staying healthy all year their guys are either breaking down or have broken down
Well some of those per game #s will not look good simply due to minutes. Chances are Wiseman will be a very good rebounder, especially if he plays a lot or when he is on the floor. If they go small ball and don't play him and Green at the same time, I imagine they will handily outscore opponents most of the time with that unit, even if they get beat on the boards.
And even with Klay an unknown, the Warriors still have the 3rd best odds in Vegas to win it all, right behind the Lakers.
Vegas gets things right alot but I don't see the Lakers or Warriors as top 3 I don't think anything either of those teams did puts them ahead of the Jazz, Suns, or Nuggets for that matter. Older teams just don't see them making it through and questionable depth behind the starters. Especially the Lakers AD at center no way he stays healthy. Also LeBron, Steph, Harden, and Young could be some of the most affected by the rules changes don't think they get quite as many calls as they are used to, not that they won't get em but it's going to be less. Also I think just the depth of quality teams in the NBA now is going to take a bigger tole on the older teams going to be much harder to load manage on teams with little depth the margin of missing the playoffs is going to be slim
I agree with most of what you said here, I think that the Nets, if healthy, should be the odds on favorites to win. After that it's probably a toss up between the next few teams: Milwaukee, Phoenix, and Utah.
In the West, I think it all comes down to health and depth. If you're deep, you'll do well, if not, you'll struggle.
It's really hard to gauge the Ws, because it all depends on Klay. Depending on how he comes back, they, in my mind, are anywhere from the 3-7 seed. The Lakers are paper thin in terms of legitimate playoff depth, and no one on that roster plays defense at a high level aside from AD. What I think people miss in looking at the Lakers roster, is that if you have no perimeter defense, that means the game plan is going to be to beat your man and get to the rim, which means a lot of jumping and bounce for AD as a help defender and shot blocker. Can his body withstand that?
Denver won't be playing at an elite level until Murray is back. Same for Clips with Kawhi. Dallas should be better, but how much is yet to be seen, since they didn't really make the kind of splash everyone thought they would.
So you're looking at Utah and Phoenix as the teams who are still good enough to be in the top 2, and then everyone else.
Additionally, I think overall the league is tougher. In the West, you've got Phoenix, Utah, LAC, LAL, Denver, Portland, Dallas, Golden State, Memphis, and New Orleans who are going to be the teams competing for the playoffs.
In the East you have, Milwaukee, Atlanta, Brooklyn, New York, Miami, Philadelphia, Chicago, Boston, and Charlotte as your top teams. That's 19 teams with very legitimate playoff aspirations. There might be some surprises as well.
It's going to be a VERY tough road and load management is going to be difficult, which is why, bringing it back to the Suns, I think signing Elfrid Payton was really smart. We know CP3 is going to miss some games, whether by accident or by design. With Payton, we have a low risk (vet minimum) guy who can come in and spot start for 3-4 games and we won't look completely disjointed like we did when Moore tried to spell CP3.
