Alleged Beef

After eight days in the NBA bubble and some 43 games played, what have we learned about the 22 teams in Orlando? Let’s look at each team and see where they are with another week-plus remaining of the regular season.

We’ll start with the East, and go in order of playoff seeding as of Friday, August 7, 2020.

Milwaukee Bucks (55-14, Clinched #1 seed)

The Bucks continue their very strong season. Not much to say. They looked good in their opening win over the Celtics, lost a frustrating one to the Rockets, and basically took the night off against the Nets. Then they followed this up with a big win over a very good Miami Heat team.

Defenses that are solid on the wing like Miami should, in theory, be able to choke offensive options in Milwaukee’s “5 men outside the 3-point line” system. But that of course is predicated on Giannis’ defender slowing down his freight-train drives or steering him toward a help defender. This hasn’t been the case, since he has scored 36, 36, 16, and 33 in his bubble games (<cough> the 16 was because he only played the first half against the Nets).

Milwaukee closes the season against Dallas, Toronto, Washington, and Memphis. I would not be surprised if they took it pretty easy over the next week.

Toronto Raptors (49-18, 2nd)

Toronto is still the defending champ and my pick to win the Eastern Conference, with all due respect to the Bucks’ historic efficiency and their reigning MVP. The Raptors beat the LA Lakers and the Miami Heat and the Orlando Magic during bubble games thus far.

They defend well, their lineups featuring both Fred Van Vleet and Kyle Lowry are a mismatch nightmare, and they have a deep bench. Their remaining bubble games are daunting (Boston tonight, then Memphis, Milwaukee, Philadelphia, Denver), but I’d be stunned if they didn’t go 3-2 or better in the remainder of the regular season. They can’t catch the Bucks for the 1-seed, but since every game is in Orlando anyway, that doesn’t matter as much. What likely concerns them is that they went 1-2 against both Boston and Miami so far this year, and one of those teams is almost certainly their second-round opponent in the playoffs.

Boston Celtics (45-23, 3rd)

Boston went 2-2 in the bubble so far, losing to Toronto and Miami and beating Brooklyn and fun-as-hell Portland. I like their mix of dudes, especially Kemba Walker and Marcus Smart, and it seems like Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown have leveled up this season.

They have played well against good Eastern competition and after tonight (Toronto) the rest of their regular season is stupid-easy: Orlando, Memphis, and Washington. I don’t see them catching the Raptors for the 2-seed in the playoffs, but I could see them in the Eastern Finals without too much wishful thinking.

Miami Heat (43-26, 4th)

Miami went 2-2 last week, but it was against a ridiculous schedule: Denver, Toronto (loss), Boston, Milwaukee (loss). The Milwaukee loss was frustrating, and they blew the doors off of Denver, so it’s a mixed bag, I guess.

The rest of their bubble schedule sees them against Phoenix, Oklahoma City, and Indiana twice. That feels like another 2-2 to me. The most telling games will be against Indiana, as that is almost surely their first-round opponent in the playoffs.

The Rest of the East

Indiana Pacers (42-27, 5th): Oladipo doesn’t look entirely healthy. Malcolm Brogdon has picked up some of the slack, but without Sabonis to body up on smaller defenders, I’m not sure this team can get past Miami once the playoffs start. Their remaining schedule is Miami twice, plus Houston and the Lakers. Yikes.

Philadelphia 76ers (41-27, 6th) lost Ben Simmons to a knee injury for an uncertain number of games, and it looks like Al Horford will be absorbing a lot of his minutes. Horford is one of my favorite NBA players and I love him just silently shutting down opposing big men. I really miss the days when he was playing against Joel Embiid instead alongside him. However, I don’t know how the shift to Horford helps the offense: Simmons is a good pick-and-roll guy and Horford, despite his defensive prowess and good passing, doesn’t have Simmons’ foot-speed. This should be very weird until Simmons returns.

Brooklyn Nets (32-36, 7th) are looking to close out the season with either the Raptors or Bucks in the first round. Yikes. Next year should be very promising or at the least entertaining, with galaxy brains Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving returning. Until then, just enjoy these young players and new head coach playing spoiler to the contenders in the East.

Orlando Magic (32-37, 8th): I don’t know, man. Annually, the bottom of the Eastern Conference playoff picture is sub-.500 teams that were ravaged by injuries, in the middle of a rebuild, in the middle of developing a new star, or at the end of a dynasty. Orlando is none of those things or all of them or some of them. They went 2-2 so far but are currently in danger of a play-in game against the 24-44 Washington Wizards just for the privilege of being swept by the Bucks. So that’s just… yuck.

Washington Wizards (24-44): They now have a worse win percentage than the Charlotte Hornets, who didn’t even get to play in the bubble. If the Wiz win (LOL) their last four (against New Orleans, Oklahoma City, Milwaukee, Boston) there’s a chance that they could be in the National Basketball Association 2020 Eastern Conference Playoffs with a record of 28-44. The only good thing going for the Wizards is John Wall’s turtleneck game.

 

Now onto the West!

LA Lakers (51-17, clinched 1-seed)

Lebron James and Anthony Davis: hopefully they are both healthy as we wrap up the season, so that it is even more satisfying when Dame Lillard goes supernova on them in the first round. The Lakers are very, very good, yet it feels like they are walking on eggshells despite being, at worst, the third-best team in the NBA this year. It is almost like Lebron is focusing so hard on that ring that everyone is holding their breath.

On paper, 2-3 in the first week of bubble play is bad, but this is a Lebron team. They will probably coast through their last three games too (Indiana, Denver, Sacramento). This Lakers lineup was assembled to win a championship this year, and they have the talent to do it. Just don’t count on them playing especially exciting basketball before the playoffs start.

LA Clippers (46-22, 2nd)

I don’t know exactly what I was expecting out of the Clippers this year, and I guess they met my expectations? Kawhi is more enjoyable when he’s surrounded by flashy players like Kyle Lowry or Manu Ginobli. In LA, it’s just him and Paul George and a bunch of pretty good players. Their most animatd guy is Patrick Beverly, but he is more fun against stars like PG and Kawhi than with them. This team could win the title over the Bucks or Raptors and…no, forget it. I’m not expending mental or emotional energy on this team.

They went 2-2 so far (won against Pelicans and Mavs, lost to Lakers and Suns) and finish out with Portland, Brooklyn, Denver, and Oklahoma City. There’s no way I miss the Portland game. The rest are interesting only because the 2–7-seeds are jockeying for position in this final week.

Denver Nuggets (45-24, 3rd)

The percentage of fun basketball that the Nuggets play overlaps entirely with Nikola Jokic’s minutes. This team, as entertainment, rises and falls with the no-look passes, and reverse pick-and-rolls, and stop-start moves of their best player. Unfortunately, even a slimmed-down Jokic can only play so many minutes.

They went 2-2 in bubble games in the first week, losing to Portland and Miami and winning against the Spurs and Thunder. Not a lot of positivity to be found. They close out with Utah, LA Lakers, LA Clippers, and Toronto, which is brutal. The Nuggets could drop as low as the 7-seed or rise as high as the 2-seed depending on how this stretch goes.

Houston Rockets (43-25, 4th)

James Harden could personally finance a fourth season of Santa Clarita Diet and I’d still root against him. That I simultaneously root for Russ, coach Mike D’Antoni, and Robert Covington and against Harden makes this team too much whiplash for me. If the Rockets were a Magic: The Gathering archetype, they’d be Dredge or Lotus Breach: they operate on an axis that isn’t particularly interesting and feels exploitative even though it is within the rules.

Anyway, they went 3-1 so far against robust competition (wins against Mavs, Bucks, Lakers; loss to Portland) and have a relatively easy remainder of the season (Sacramento, San Antonio, Indiana, a hobbled Philadelphia), so they could slide all the way up to the 2-seed in time for the playoffs. THANKS, I HATE IT.

Utah Jazz (43-25, 5th)

2-2 to start the bubble play, with losses against Oklahoma City and the Lakers and wins over the lowly Pelicans and Grizzlies. This is not where the Jazz want to be. They are still within striking distance of the 3-seed (or even, dare I say it, the 2-seed), but they’ll need to kick the Spurs twice plus find a win against Dallas or Denver.

Finishing 4th or 5th means a first round against the Rockets, and I’m not sure that this is advisable. Gobert may swat every layup into low-earth orbit, but the Rockets would happily take 100% of their shots from beyond the arc and ignore the Frenchman entirely. The Jazz lack the firepower to keep up with the Rockets 3-point shooting, so they really need to win some games in the next week so they can instead face the Mavs or Thunder in the first round.

Oklahoma City Thunder (42-25, 6th)

This was always Russ’ franchise, but it definitively was from the minute that Durant decamped for the team that he could never beat. As an adult I’ve learned that the Derek Jeter “entire career on one team” thing is rarer than a blue sky in Pittsburgh, but still, I can’t wrap my head around Russ on the stupid Rockets instead of on the Thunder.

That said, the Thunder are an interesting team with Chris Paul, Dennis Schroder, Steven Adams, and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. They went 2-1 so far in the bubble, beating the Lakers and Jazz (the loss was to the Nuggets). The rest of their schedule looks like 3-2 or 2-3: Memphis, Washington, Phoenix, Miami, LA Clippers. Unfortunately for the team (but also congrats to the family!), Dennis Schroder left the bubble to be with his wife and newborn.

I think, without Schroder, this team will tussle with Dallas over who gets to be the Clippers’ first-round appetizer.

Dallas Mavericks (41-30, 7th)

I can’t get into this team. Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis should be appointment viewing: they can shoot from anywhere on the court. Plus Boban! What Dallas really needs, though, is to be in the Eastern Conference. No such luck, though, so instead they had a 1-3 week (with an OVERTIME win over Memphis) and an absurdly hard remaining schedule (Milwaukee, Utah, Portland, Phoenix). And their likely first-round opponent is the LA Clippers, against whom they are winless this season.

Memphis Grizzlies (32-37, 8th)

Likely Rookie of the year Ja Morant is fun to watch dunk. However, that’s not enough to win games, and Memphis is 0-4 in bubble play so far, with Oklahoma City, Toronto, Boston, and Milwaukee ahead of them. They will probably end up 1-7 or 0-8. But hey, sweet dunks are still sweet dunks.

The Rest of the West

Portland Trailblazers (32-38): Before the devil came to collect on the faustian bargain that the Warriors had made, I often claimed that the only team in the West with the same nuclear potential was Portland. Steph and Klay (or Steph and Durant, or Klay and Durant… god, I hated the Warriors) went off for a combined 80 points? Cool cool. So did Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum. The Blazers got hit with injury this year pretty hard (Zach Collins and Jusuf Nurkic), so that their 32-38 record is a little misleading. Because right now these guys are healthy and they are going thermonuclear. They sit 0.5 games back of Memphis, with only the bummer of a loss to Boston marring their bubble record. They close the season with the LA Clippers, Philadelphia, Dallas, and Brooklyn, and I’d be gobsmacked if they go worse than 3-1 in those games. This team is the most fun of anyone playing in the West, they are finally healthy, and until further notice, they are appointment viewing.

Phoenix Suns (30-39): They are fun, they are undefeated in the bubble, and I’d be rooting for them to grab the 8-seed were it not for the Blazers. Plus, Jevon Carter! WVU represent! Their remaining four games look challenging (Miami, Oklahoma City, Philadelphia, Dallas), but they look like a real squad for next season.

San Antonio Spurs (29-38): I desperately wanted the Spurs to do well this season. But despite their decent showing in the bubble games, the loss of LaMarcus Aldridge meant that they were devoid of the talent necessary to beat the free agent vortex of the LA teams. They are looking upward at the Memphis Grizzlies, man. This is a bad season for Pop and the Spurs, and it’s a genuine bummer. I’m hoping for something to gel next season, since, on paper, Aldridge, DeMar DeRozan, Patty Mills, Dejounte Murray et al. should be in the playoff mix.

Sacramento Kings (29-39): I can’t engage with this franchise at a level necessary for analysis. They have a mercurial owner who keeps his staff on a short leash and seems to have a timeline for player development that would only work if you could develop the players in Inception’s Limbo.

New Orleans Pelicans (29-39) should have some optimism about next year, as they have a good coach, some decent talent, and another offseason to get Zion healthy and in shape. But for the rest of the bubble games, they are just playing spoiler, with games against Washington, San Antonio, Sacramento, and Orlando.

 

We’ll revisit the teams next week after they wrap up the bubble games and we know whether there will be play-in games for the 8-seeds. Happy viewing!