No surprise: West still runs through Warriors
A look at the NBA Western Conference, in predicted order of finish:
Playoff bound
1. Golden State: Warriors aiming for their third consecutive NBA championship, something only the Lakers, Celtics and Bulls franchises have done.
2. Utah: Donovan Mitchell is a legitimate star, coach Quin Snyder has been underrated for far too long, and the Jazz went 29-6 to finish last season.
3. Houston. The Rockets have the MVP in James Harden, a leader in Chris Paul and added Carmelo Anthony, but expecting another 67-15 season is a lot.
4. L.A. Lakers: LeBron James is still the best player in the game and shows no signs of slowing down.
5. Oklahoma City: A sign of how loaded the West remains: The Thunder are really good, and that won’t assure them home-court for Round 1.
6. Denver: Losing Game 82 last season to Minnesota and missing the playoffs should serve as a massive motivator. .
7. New Orleans: DeMarcus Cousins is gone, Rajon Rondo is gone, but Anthony Davis is still there and that should be enough for a Pelicans playoff run.
8. San Antonio: Dejounte Murray’s ACL tear is a disaster, but any team with LaMarcus Aldridge, DeMar DeRozan and Gregg Popovich still has a lot.
In the mix
9. Portland: The West’s No. 3 seed last season, the Blazers were only three games ahead of No. 9.
10. Dallas: Luka Doncic is NBAready, DeAndre Jordan will make the Mavs better and Dirk Nowitzki deserves to see his franchise trending up again.
11. L.A. Clippers: A possible transitional year for the Clippers, who should be major players in free agency next summer and could add a lottery pick.
Facing long odds
12. Minnesota: The Jimmy Butler debacle shows that some big changes in direction are probably going to happen in Minnesota, and sooner than later.
13. Suns: Devin Booker got his max deal and the Suns got No. 1 pick Deandre Ayton, but firing GM Ryan McDonough so close to the season was odd.
14. Memphis: Mike Conley and Marc Gasol are savvy vets, but they are going to need a lot of help if Memphis is going to seriously improve this season.
15. Sacramento: Kings had a league-high 44 games last season where they didn’t score 100 points, and a very young team might not change that much.
What to know
Steph rising: Speaking of rising up career charts, Golden State’s Stephen Curry could easily be No. 3 on the alltime list for 3-pointers made by the end of this season. Curry has 2,129 3s in 625 career games, a rate of 3.4 made per game.
Big numbers: The only players in the last 30 seasons to average 30 points and eight assists were Oklahoma City’s Russell Westbrook in 2016-17 and Houston’s James Harden last season. Probably not coincidentally, Westbrook and Harden won MVP awards for those seasons. There are seven active players with at least one MVP award in the NBA right now, and all seven play in the West.
Great coaches: San Antonio’s Gregg Popovich enters the season with 1,197 wins, fifth-most in NBA history – 13 behind Pat Riley and 24 behind Jerry Sloan. Meanwhile, Golden State’s Steve Kerr comes into the year with the highest winning percentages during both the regular season (265-63, .808) and the postseason (63-20, .759) in NBA history.
Versus East: The West beat the East for the ninth consecutive season in head-to-head matchups, winning nearly 53 percent of the cross-conference matchups in the regular season. Over the last nine seasons, West teams have beaten East teams nearly 57 percent of the time.