00:00The NBA Season Preview rolls on today, looking at teams that have a chance to go from worst
00:12to first in the association this year.
00:15And I should kind of clarify on this one.
00:17The original premise for this segment is from the NFL Season Preview.
00:24And the NFL has 8 divisions.
00:26So you have 8 opportunities to go from worst to first in the NFL.
00:30And so that gets a little bit easier to do that.
00:33In the NBA, you only have 4 divisions.
00:36And honestly, in the NBA, I think you could ask some pretty advanced basketball fans,
00:40hey, who's in what division?
00:42Break them down for me.
00:43And you would have some trouble doing that, as division wins have meant less and less
00:48as the years have kind of gone on in the association.
00:52But I do think that there is, you know, at least some importance of that.
00:58And so, for this particular segment, it is titled worst to first.
01:03But it is the worst 2 to first in your division.
01:06If you were in the bottom 2 in your division last year, and have a chance to move up, then
01:10you qualify for this list.
01:12So, coming in at number 5, it's the Detroit Pistons.
01:15It would take quite a bit for them to jump up in the, what is it, central, I think, division.
01:22And yes, like, they would have a steep hill to climb and a lot would have to go right.
01:26Which is why they're at 5.
01:29Because they're ... it does seem almost illogical to assume that it could happen.
01:35But let's go through the scenario.
01:38A, what we have to assume with this is that Detroit gets better.
01:41And that's one of the things I've talked about, is that I think Cade Cunningham finally
01:45is able to take his jump this year.
01:47They were able to put him with some really, I was going to say really good.
01:53That would be an overstatement.
01:54But with some actual NBA talent, which seems like a low bar to clear for an NBA team, but
02:01is not something he has had at his disposal a whole lot.
02:05So, I think that there is a chance, and it's one of the things we talked about from the
02:09lessons we learned last year, that there is a chance for this young kid to really take
02:15that step and help Detroit advance a couple steps beyond what we would think.
02:20Then, a lot has to go right for them.
02:22You don't need to squint too hard to see them being better than Chicago.
02:26We can put that one behind us.
02:28After that, the rest of the Central is Milwaukee, Indiana, and Cleveland.
02:33So, bit of a murderer's row type.
02:36And so for Detroit to get that worst of first, again, everything has to go well for them.
02:41Milwaukee has to have a bit of a season from hell sort of a thing, and you can, I mean
02:45the three teams really would.
02:47But you can see, like, any of Giannis, Middleton, Lillard get injured, and all three of those
02:54are realistic scenarios.
02:55Like, I mean, if we're in January, and all of a sudden Brooke Lopez is the best player
02:59on the floor for the Milwaukee Bucs, like that would suck, but wouldn't be overly like
03:04oh wow, no, all of these prime athletes, how could they?
03:09Middleton has had injury problems before.
03:11Giannis is starting to get a little bit more banged up as the years go on, and Lillard,
03:14I don't think Lillard really falls into a worried about getting injured status, but
03:18again getting a little bit older and a lot of wear and tear and whatnot.
03:21So you would have to have like a bunch of injuries on this team, but we already saw
03:25that that can happen.
03:27For Indiana, it would kind of have to be a, everyone's figured us out, like they don't
03:32defend worth a lick.
03:33And the offensive explosion was fun last year, but they could be a bit of a target for, or
03:38a bit of a candidate for, well the league got the tape and had a full offseason to get
03:42ready for us, and now we can't do half of the shit that we were doing before, and oh
03:45no look at this, now we've just completely fallen off.
03:48And then for Cleveland, I think that it would be a bit of an inner turmoil thing, where
03:52the Garland and Mitchell situation just is not tenable at all, and Mobley has not taken
03:59the steps forward that they needed him to, and it just, it isn't, it isn't working,
04:04to steal the AEW phrase, the conglomeration of talent that they have just doesn't click.
04:11And we have seen at times, like there was one injury last year, and all of a sudden
04:14Cleveland got a whole lot better.
04:15So you would need all of that to happen for the Pistons to make that jump, but I still
04:19think that they have the talent to maybe advance that level.
04:22Coming in at number four on this list, it is the Golden State Warriors.
04:25They are in the Pacific Division, and right now, it just kind of looks wide open.
04:31They did finish in the bottom two in this division last year, but I think, not every
04:37team though, I was going to say, I feel like almost every team in this at least made the
04:40play-in, but for the Warriors, yes, there's no clay, but it would, I don't think you
04:47have to squint to see what would happen, or what would need to happen for this team to
04:51get back to an elite level.
04:52Steph Curry stays awesome, Andrew Wiggins, find whatever he has lost over the last couple
04:57of years, and Kuminga, Moody, and Podjemski continue the progression of young basketball
05:04players.
05:05Or they trade all of them and get someone super awesome, and they just skyrocket.
05:07But I do think that there is an available option for them to be better than the Suns,
05:12Kings, Clippers, and Lakers this season.
05:15At three, it's San Antonio.
05:17I have been telling you guys that I am all in on the Wembley-San Antonio Spurs experience,
05:23and that was one of the things I'm worried I'm wrong about in the episode that we did
05:26there, but this is a team that I think has the capabilities, given that they put a real
05:32point guard with Wembley, and given another year of experience, the Olympic scenario for
05:39Wemba Nyama, and so I think that, again, you can see a very real world where they are better
05:44than the Grizzlies, the Pelicans, the Rockets, and the Mavericks.
05:48At two, it's Sacramento.
05:50They go out and get DeMar DeRozan, and I love this move for them.
05:56They had, at times, like, I think DeMar is one of the best, like, half-court mid-range
06:04scorers in the NBA in the last, like, 20 years.
06:07There's obviously a couple of guys ahead of him, you know, that guy, Kawhi, for those
06:11listening, and LeBron, Kevin Durant, you know, like, those guys.
06:15The guys were just, like, pure scorer types anyway, but DeMar DeRozan is so good in that,
06:20in creating his shots, and getting, just using his high basketball IQ, and obvious
06:27offensive gifts as well, to get into some very good spots to score the basketball.
06:32And so I think that that will help this team if things can kind of bog down on them a little
06:37bit, but the thing that I also think that it helps is that there are a lot of times
06:40where it'd be okay, it's a bonus in the bench, and now it's Fox in the bench, and now it's
06:43a bonus in Fox, and it's just, you have very little time where it was the two of them together,
06:47and now with DeMar, you can basically have two, two very good offensive players out there
06:53at one time, in DeMar, Sabonis, and Fox, and just kind of keep rotating the two, like,
06:59between two of them all game, and that is really difficult to stop, from a defensive
07:04standpoint.
07:05So, I think that they have a chance to just be very difficult to play against for 48 minutes,
07:10and be a very good offensive team, and so again, we went over the Pacific, the division
07:14feels wide open with the Suns Warriors, Kings Clippers, and the Lakers.
07:18And at number one, now this one, I made this list a bit before, and probably could have
07:22adjusted it, but we're going down with the ship.
07:25Made this before we saw John Morant howl off the floor twice in a preseason game, but it's
07:30the Memphis Grizzlies.
07:31If John Morant is healthy, they, I think they nailed it in the draft with Edie, this is
07:36still a really, really talented basketball team when everyone is healthy, and they had
07:40a year from hell year last year.
07:43If they can keep everyone on the floor, then I think this team, honestly, kind of cruises
07:48to a Southwest division title after a really bad year last year.
07:52Like, we talked up the Spurs, but there's a reason the Spurs are behind Memphis on this
07:55list.
07:56I think that Memphis can, I think that Memphis, at their peak, is quite a bit better actually
08:01than San Antonio, and then you only kind of need Dallas to take a bit of a slip, and this
08:06team is right there to win this division.
08:08So I think it is wide open for Memphis to go from worst to first.
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