The NBA Opens Up Its 75th Season With A New King On The Throne: Welcome To The Giannis Era
I’ve been thinking about how I wanted to write this preview for a while now. Do I go team-by-team, like every other website and publication on the planet? Do I take a gambling angle and focus on futures above all else? There feels like there’s a lot to talk about. Another offseason of movement, as has become tradition. The NBA has done an excellent job of shifting the narrative and making people buy into the idea that more than a handful of teams could hoist the Larry O’Brien at season’s end. That’s not really how I see it and to explain why we have to go backwards to look forward.
The NBA is celebrating its 75th anniversary this season. Lots and lots of new, retro Nike merch to drain your bank account. And I’m all for it. Force feed me that nostalgia. Let me see more Wilt highlights in refurbished HD.
The reason I find that interesting is to know the history of the NBA is to understand how rare it is for a guy to just win one. And by “a” guy, I mean “the” guy. Kevin Garnett’s Celtics and Dirk are the only guys this century to just snag one title. Perhaps we'll touch on the aberration that was the Wallace Brothers’ Pistons squad later. The Raptors, as a franchise, won their one, but that came on the shoulders of Kawhi Leonard, who racked up his second Finals MVP against a hobbled Warriors. LeBron delivered the Cavaliers their first Championship, the third of his career up to that point. Durant got his two, Curry has his three, Wade, Kobe, Shaq, Duncan, you remember how it went down. The point is you’re much more likely to get zero than one. Charles Barkley isn’t in some exclusive club, Shaq just makes it seem that way.
There was a time I believed Giannis’ best shot at winning one - and only one - was the Dirk route. Keep coming up short annually, smashing your head into the wall, definition of insanity type shit, until things finally fell into place in the right year under the right set of circumstances with the proper veterans playing their roles to perfection. Then Kevin Durant couldn’t get hit foot behind the three-point line and that was that. Giannis became a champion, the Bucks didn’t stay stagnant, Khris Middleton still has plenty of excellent ball ahead of him, Jrue Holiday was worth the price of admission. The Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Lakers have won the headlines of the Summer, and understandably so. There’s still a season to sell and market. I don’t feel comfortable picking against the 26-year old multiple time MVP, former Defensive Player of the Year, and reigning Finals MVP.
It’s hard to get a beat on the Nets right now for painfully obvious reasons. If Giannis is the best player on the planet at the moment, which I believe to be true, then Kevin Durant is much closer to 1b than he is a true second best. After tearing his achilles on the wrong side of 30 there were plenty of questions prior to last season about what kind of KD we were going to see. Those questions no longer exist after watching him in the postseason and this summer as the face of Team USA. Durant and James Harden are more than enough to get by in the regular season regardless of what Kyrie Irving decides to do, but without the three of them together come May I don’t know how you pick them over Giannis.
The Lakers have seemingly set up a revolving door of veterans to come in and supplement LeBron James and Anthony Davis, with a new cast of characters every single season. They brought in Russell Westbrook to kick off the offseason to the surprise of many. It wasn’t as much a surprise that Westbrook was traded - this was the third consecutive offseason he was on the move - as it was the Lakers being the team that acquired him. Russ has his flaws, we all know his game by now, but for as many troubles spacing that the Lakers will have come playoff time, they’re going to stack regular season wins behind AD and Westbrook’s pure, cocaine Sonic the Hedgehog-esque, never-ending amount of energy. LeBron more or less being able to coast the regular season without it costing them positioning in the standings could be the thing that vaults them through the West. Though, for as much as they’ve been crowned in the lead up to tipoff, let’s not act as though it’s going to be easy. The Lakers were outright mediocre last year. Their fans will tell you it was injuries that bounced them from the playoffs, which isn’t a great sign if you’re looking forward. They’re as injury prone as they were a year ago. LeBron and Carmelo Anthony were drafted when Anthony Davis was a 10-year old point guard. They added a couple of intriguing young pieces, and by couple I mean only Malik Monk. Kendrick Nunn was getting DNP-Coach’s Decision too frequently in Miami for me to believe he’ll have much of a role on this team. Talen Horton-Tucker should be a solid rotational piece off the bench, and they kinda need him to be in order to give all the geriatrics on this roster a breather over the course of 82 games. The Lakers will be good, they may even win the West, we’ve seen them do exactly this 17 years ago. It didn’t work then and I have my suspicions about it working now.
Perhaps the biggest thing working in the Lakers’ favor is that the rest of the West is weaker than it has been in years past. The Rockets tore it down, well, James Harden tore down the Rockets last year after being a perennial top four team. The Clippers are the largest question mark in the League with Kawhi’s injury being a relative unknown. Anyone who tells you they know for certainty what’s going on there is either Kawhi Leonard or a liar. Paul George and company can certainly tread the regular season waters and keep LAC in the playoff picture, but if Kawhi isn’t back come playoff time then there’s nothing to talk about. Remember, he forced his way out of San Antonio because of injuries. Specifically, how they dictated his recovery. The Clippers won’t make that mistake, he can recover however he sees fit, and if that means missing the entire year, he’ll miss the entire year. The Dallas Mavericks feel like they took a step back. Luka is the truth, there’s nothing to debate there, and he’s an MVP candidate from now until he decides he no longer wishes to be. But he and Kristaps Porzingis seem to have the same on-court chemistry as Baker Mayfield and Odell Beckham, Jr. I know they’re both individually good, but for whatever reason it does not work. The Utah Jazz are the Utah Jazz, until they look in the mirror and realize no one in the history of Utah has ever played jazz music and change their preposterous, ill-fitting name they will never truly prosper.
I don’t know anyone who believes the Suns can run back the season they just had. On paper it makes sense, there’s nothing really stopping them from continuing to be a dominant force in the West. Devin Booker is a young All Star on the rise, Mikal Bridges is a perfect wing for the modern NBA, Cam Johnson, Dario Saric and Landry Shamet add the type of depth you’d look for on a true contender. But Robert Sarver will not get out of his own way. If the Suns played oh, I don’t know, Manhattan, Sarver would be known as twice the villain that James Dolan has been for the last 20 years. The Phoenix Suns enjoyed their most prosperous season since the Steve Nash era and he responds by promptly not giving an extension to Deandre Ayton, making Ayton the second number one overall pick to not receive an extension since the rookie wage scale was implemented. The other? Anthony Bennett. He’ll enter next summer as a restricted free agent, they can match any offer, and any offer they match will be for less money and years than they could offer him themselves. That’s bad business no matter how you slice it. And it’s terrible energy heading into a season that should otherwise be filled with hope and positivity.
The Nuggets, Warriors, Celtics, and Heat all occupy this weird space. They’re all a clear notch below the likes of the Nets and Bucks, but they’re all better than say, the 76ers or the Trailblazers. The Nuggets return the reigning MVP, Michael Porter, Jr. got a fat extension this offseason, Aaron Gordon got a nice raise and will benefit from having a full offseason and camp with the Nuggets, and Jamal Murray will return later in the season as he recovers from a torn ACL. There’s plenty of reasons to be high on Denver, but until we see Jamal healthy and MPJ become more consistent on a game-to-game basis there isn’t a ton of reason to believe they’ll get over the hump. The Warriors are this weird melding of Steph Curry and, uh, let’s call it “stuff.” Kay Thompson, knock on wood, is set to return after missing the last two full seasons. James Wiseman’s rookie season went about as poorly as it could have, there’s no telling what to expect this year. Otto Porter Jr. would’ve been killer on the Warriors three years ago, holy shit what a weapon out of the corner that would have been. Today? Yeah, if everything else around him goes perfectly, he’ll hit some big shots for this team. The Warriors, in order to truly contend, will need two of Jonathan Kuminga, Moses Moody and Jordan Poole to really step up and emerge as consistent, reliable, role players, which feels like a massive ask. Andrew Wiggins is also on the team. Should the Warriors find themselves in the top four of the West, Curry will find himself squarely in the MVP discussion. Should Wiseman fail to take a step, and should the rookies play like, well, rookies, it’s looking like a similar early-exit like last year.
The Heat feel like an off-brand version of what the Lakers put together. Bam and Jimmy are their AD and LeBron. They both brought in veteran point guards to try and be the missing piece (Lowry and Russ) and they filled out their bench with veterans we all know and love. PJ Tucker is there to pester Giannis and KD, and eventually LeBron if everything comes together. Markieff Morris is there to pop threes and lock arms with Udonis Haslem should the need arise. And then there’s Victor Oladipo, who looked OK in 30 games for the Pacers and Rockets last season, and bad in five games for the Heat last season. It’s a lot to ask for a guy to come off another injury and play for three teams in a pandemic season, but he did it. Maybe the stability of one team will help his overall health and mindset and he’ll actually become a weapon for this team, but that does not feel like the most likely scenario. Oladipo is a lottery ticket: a worthy risk for this team, and if he hits they instantly become a real threat to win the East. I just don’t know what we’ve seen in recent years to bank on that.
For as much turmoil as surrounded the Boston Celtics in recent years, I appreciate the calmness that has come with this preseason. No worrying about contract extensions, no major injuries looming as leftovers from last season, none of it. They’re just a good basketball team with two top 25 players and a better complement of role players around them. The backcourt quartet of Marcus Smart, Dennis Schroder, Josh Richardson, and Payton Pritchard doesn’t tout the star power of other teams, but I can’t imagine people are exactly looking forward to facing them for 48 minutes. Al Horford returns to stabilize the depth of the front court behind Robert Williams. The lasting image fans have in their heads with Horford is the Philadelphia 76ers imploding around him, when in reality it should be the Oklahoma City Thunder paying him not to play because he was helping them win games they were trying to lose. This isn’t late-Hawks, early-Celtics era Horford anymore, but he’s still serviceable and will supply a steady consistency that this team has lacked since his departure. The Celtics, much like the other teams that made deep runs in The Bubble, will return back to the top four of the Eastern Conference in Ime Udoka’s first season in Boston. How deep of a run come playoff time relies on the shoulders of Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum. They’re a year, and another star, away from true Championship contention, but a deep run is not out of the question.
It is out of the question for the 76ers, what a clown show. The biggest soap opera in sports added a new chapter to its never-ending saga. Ben Simmons doesn’t want to be there and they don’t want him there. The Process worked, in the sense that it landed Philly two All NBA caliber players. It failed, in the sense that they’ve now successfully wasted multiple years of Joel Embiid’s contending window. Embiid turns 28 this season, and as we creep closer to his 30s it isn’t unfair to wonder how long his prime will truly last. As you go down the roster you see names like Seth Curry, Matisse Thybulle, Tyrese Maxey, Danny Green, and Andre Drummond. There’s more than enough here to contend. Yet, they wont. Not with Doc Rivers constantly driving the bus over Ben Simmons’ hapless body.
We’ll end with the Hawks and Knicks, mostly because I don’t need Hawks and Knicks fans yelling at me for overlooking them. I’m not overlooking either of them, they’ll both be tough outs on a nightly basis throughout the season. Trae Young is inching closer to becoming the NBA’s preeminent villain, especially in Madison Square Garden. Atlanta returns all of the pieces that made them great a year ago, they’ll be in the playoffs and may even snag home court in the first round. They go as Trae goes, if Cam Reddish wants to take a step forward that would be great. If John Collins wants to round out his game a little more in a step to becoming a more complete player, I’m sure the Hawks would appreciate it. Kevin Huerter got his extension, De’Andre Hunter is a name you’ll hear more and more of as the season goes on, the Hawks weren’t a fluke, it’s just not their time yet. I don’t think the Knicks were a fluke, either. I firmly believe they can win another playoff game this year. Two? Well, let’s not get ahead of ourselves quite yet. Kemba’s going to be really good on the Knicks. He’ll be able to run the show, Thibs will force him to play back-to-backs, and that will look fine until it doesn’t. So far the Knicks have performed exactly how Tom Thibodeau teams always perform in the early stages. That, historically, does not last for long. It’s a grueling style of basketball for competitors and his team alike. There’s plenty of youth here to stave off that slide, for now. There’s plenty of reason for optimism for Knicks fans. And, as they’ve come to learn much like supporters of Richmond FC, it’s the hope that kills you. Temper your expectations a smidge and enjoy the ride. RJ Barrett continues to grow and thrive, Julius Randle finally blossomed into an All Star before struggling in his first playoff exposure as *the* guy. Evan Fournier will be loved and hated on a shot-to-shot basis. And while I don’t see any banners being raised in MSG, really any time soon, it is nice to have a level of competence from the Knicks, even if it turns out in the long run to be temporary. Knicks fans are excited, that’s all that matters.
The NBA has always been a top dog with everyone else scrambling to figure out how to dethrone him. It was Russell, it was Kareem and Magic, it was Jordan, it was Kobe and Shaq, it was Duncan, LeBron, and Steph. There was no official passing on the torch, there rarely is, but make no mistake about it: we've entered a new era. While everyone was preparing their goodbyes to LeBron and shifting their focus towards Luka and Zion, Giannis found himself squarely in the right place at the exact right time. It's his turn. Dread it. Run from it. Destiny arrives all the same. And now it's here.
Bucks over the Lakers in 6.