probably a little low but when I look around at the teams using last season as a gauge, updated for this season, I see a group of 8 bottom dwellers: Indiana Pacers Washington Wizards Orlando Magic Charlotte Hornets Detroit Pistons Portland Trail Blazers Houston Rockets San Antonio Spurs * Charlotte is getting LaMelo healthy, reportedly, and they are getting Miles Bridges back after the first 10 games. They'll be better * Houston added FVV, Dillon Brooks, Amen Thompson, Jeff Green, and Cam Whitmore. They'll be better * Indiana only added Bruce Brown & Jarace Walker. Might not be much better but likely won't be worse than last years 35 wins * Orlando was looking good at the end of last season and added Anthony Black and Joe Ingles. Better * Washington? Added Jordan Poole and Landry Shamet. No change that I can see. 35 wins last year * Detroit? will likely still suck * Spurs added Wemby, Khem Birch, and Cedi Osman. How good will Wemby be? How healthy will Zach be? I can see 2 or 3 of those teams being better than the Blazers. Maybe Blazers can climb to the top of that group; maybe not I don't see Portland catching any of the next tier of lower level play-in teams: Utah, Dallas, OKC...Chicago, Toronto, Atlanta. But I suppose it's possible
I think Utah might get down with being crummy. They might have overachieved with Lauri in All-Star mode. While their overall depth is a better then Portland, I don't see the Jazz sweeping the season series, delivering KO's on the Blazers. The Hawks might be an outlying tanker. A not-so-shocking Trae Young trade would signal a rebuild. Atlanta already has one foot out the door to start over. The Raptors are too good to tank, but major mid-season trades can change everything. The Bulls underachieved. They have All-stars. Chicago looked amazing against Portland last year. Maybe they'll figure out consistent winning? Or just turn into a 2022/23 Wizards. Everyone shoot jumpers and put playing harder in the back burner. Did Houston get better? Egads not really, they signed expensive Free Agents that nobody wanted. Pacers? I'm one of the few that thinks Sacramento got the way better end of the Halliburton trade. Fancy passes, sure. Lot's of stats, OK. How is the win column doing in Indiana? They haven't made any big moves to improve their roster. Tanking opportunities may arise in Indiana. It seems the upper echelon of lottery teams are not set in concrete. The bottom 5 probably are. Spurs, Pistons, Hornets, Wizards, Rockets. The better spectrum of tankers is where Portland is currently at. And expect some variables to shake up the standings.
Wizards will be bad, they lost Beal and Porzingis. Poole is a big step down. In general Id say bottom of the east looks poor, much worse than the west. Nuggets Suns Lakers Kings Grizzlies Warriors Thunder TWolves Pelicans Clippers Mavs Rockets Blazers Jazz Spurs Quick estimate is Id rank the west like this with theee tiers of playoffs playin lottery. I wouldn't be surprised if we're last or if we're 10th and sneak into the playin. Normally 1-2 teams have major disappointment from injuries, 1 team just fails to meet expectations, and a projected bad team or two greatly exceed expectations. If we stay healthy, get good growth from our youth, and keep our vets all year (Brogdon Grant Williams Thybulle) we could greatly exceed expectations. Would love to see that. If not - let's look for growth from our young guys and start looking at the draft in January.
“Do not try and bend the schedule, that’s impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth… there are no losses. Then you’ll see that it is not the schedule that bends, it is only your team.”
I think when we win games this year, it will be with defense more than offense. A real departure from previous years. I assume lots of transition buckets as a result.
