10. Shaq's Not Dead Weight Yet
Nothing was more depressing over the last two seasons than seeing Shaquille O'Neal seemingly a husk of what he once was. In danger of becoming as irrelevant as Hakeem Olajuwon and Patrick Ewing at the end of their respective careers, O'Neal has bounced back nicely this season, averaging a healthy 15 ppg and nine rpg for a Suns team trying to remain relevant in Western contention.
9. Oklahoma Football
Hey, until the OKC Thunder become relevant, it's vital that the Sooners remain contenders to distract the fans from their extremely green NBA club. Kevin Durant, Jeff Green, and Russell Westbrook are nice pieces, but the Thunder still have at least two seasons of growth and added pieces before they'll make a dent.
8. Raptors' Relevancy
Time for a little Thanksgiving love for our neighbors up North. For a country that's produced Steve Nash, Canada's seen little love from the NBA lately, losing not only the one-time Vancouver Grizzlies to Memphis, but also the border-friendly Seattle Supersonics to Oklahoma City.
If Chris Bosh and Co. weren't around to make the Raptors decent, David Stern might have decided to pull the plug on the NBA in Canada altogether.
7. You're Not Ernie Grunfeld
$161 million committed to two players over the summer, and 12 games in Grunfeld's team is 2-10. Ouch. The only way he survives scathing summer reviews is a) Gilbert Arenas comes back from multiple knee surgeries better than anyone except Arenas himself expects, or b) the Wiz hit the jackpot in the 2009 NBA Draft Lottery.
Not very good odds either way...
6. The Promise of Cap Space
Seriously, is there any other alternative that could possibly make Knicks fans think there's hope for the future despite their sorry excuse for a roster? New Yorkers are positively giddy about the possibilities...two years ahead of time!
And it's not just the Knicks; the Cavs, Heat, Nets, Trailblazers, and half a dozen other teams are convincing themselves they have a shot at a superstar or three and automatic championships that come along with it. The NBA: where hoarding cap space happens.
5. The Pacers and Blazers' Makeover
These two teams have done little in the past decade to sway the opinion that the NBA employs greedy, self-serving, cocky ballers. Shawn Kemp, Rasheed Wallace, Ron Artest, Stephen Jackson, Jamaal Tinsley...the list goes on and on.
Luckily Kevin Pritchard and Larry Bird have done everything they could possibly do (including swallowing a couple losing seasons, which has to really sting Bird) to clean up the mess that was their respective teams. Now, their fans love them, pundits pick them as "sleeper teams," and they can only improve from here.
4. The Rookie Class of 2008
Michael Beasley was supposed to produce statistically. After that, it was kind of a crap-shoot as far as who would produce, when, and how much.
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