10 NBA Teams That Are Resetting Our Expectations
Just over three weeks into the 2014-15 NBA season, a number of teams have already rendered preseason prognostications somewhat obsolete.
Who foresaw the Sacramento Kings as a potential playoff contender out West? Who expected the Memphis Grizzlies, Golden State Warriors and Houston Rockets to be battling it out for the conference's top record? Did anyone anticipate the Milwaukee Bucks being on pace to match their 2013-14 win total by mid-December?
Some things haven't come as a major surprise—see: the Cleveland Cavaliers struggling on defense, or the Philadelphia 76ers being historically awful—but many more teams are resetting our expectations with their early-season play.
Before abusing your favorite NBA writers for their off-base preseason predictions, keep the season's small sample size in mind. After all, at this point last year, no one would have assumed the Toronto Raptors and Washington Wizards, owner of sub-.500 records at the time, would emerge as the third and fourth seeds in the East.
Still, based on what we've seen so far, some trends appear here to stay. Let's take a look at 10 teams that have fared either far better or worse than a majority of NBA observers would have guessed heading into the season.
Better: Sacramento Kings
1 of 10
The Sacramento Kings, who haven't topped the .500 mark since 2005-06, have been one of the NBA's best early-season surprises. Despite playing the league's second-toughest schedule to date, they're a respectable 7-5, with wins over the Portland Trail Blazers, Los Angeles Clippers, Phoenix Suns, San Antonio Spurs and Chicago Bulls.
DeMarcus Cousins has been a force of nature for Sacramento, averaging 22.5 points, 11.8 rebounds and a career-high 1.4 blocks in just 30.8 minutes per game. He's the league leader in total rebounding percentage (22.5) and is posting career highs in player efficiency rating (26.5), true shooting percentage (.570), block percentage (3.8) and win shares per 48 minutes (.201).
Rudy Gay, fresh off inking a three-year, $40 million extension, is off to a sizzling start as well. He's averaging career highs in points (21.7), rebounds (6.6), assists (3.6), free-throw attempts (7.1) and free-throw percentage (.871) and, like Cousins, is posting career bests in PER (20.7), free-throw rate (.440) and true shooting percentage (.564).
Perhaps the most surprising of all, however, has been the strong play of Darren Collison. Though many NBA observers panned the Kings for signing Collison and allowing Isaiah Thomas to walk in free agency, the UCLA product has Sacramento's offense humming at its best rate since the mid-2000s.
It's too early to call the Kings a playoff lock, as they dropped four of their next six games following their 5-1 start. However, the days of Sacramento being a Western Conference pushover appear to have come to a sudden and shocking end.
Worse: Los Angeles Lakers
2 of 10
Though the Los Angeles Lakers are 2-0 since the return of Nick "Swaggy P" Young, their pre-Swaggy play this season was nothing short of horrific.
The Lakers started the year 1-9, their worst-ever start in the first 10 games of a season. They're hemorrhaging points defensively, allowing opponents to score a league-high 113.4 per 100 possessions, and they tout the NBA's second-worst net rating (minus-9.0), ahead of only the 0-11 Philadelphia 76ers.
Kobe Bryant leads the league in scoring with 27.5 points per game, but he's jacking up 24.2 shots per night, his second-highest mark ever, while shooting a career-low 38.6 percent from the field. His sky-high usage rate—he's gobbling up 37.8 percent of his team's possessions when on the court, the third-highest mark in league history—is sowing the seeds of the Lakers' dysfunction.
As Bleacher Report's Kevin Ding writes:
"You want to build the team around Bryant's free rein on offense while he is encouraged to 'rest'—[Byron] Scott's own word—on defense, yet every other guy is being held to fantastic standards that must be met for the team to overachieve?
How is anyone besides Kobe ever going to think that's cool? Resentment is bound to build.
"
Before the season started, oddsmakers pegged the Lakers as winning somewhere between 31 and 33 games, per CBSSports.com's Matt Moore. At this point, even with the power of the Swag, a 30-win season appears increasingly unlikely due to the team's defensive struggles.
Better: Milwaukee Bucks
3 of 10
Like their counterparts in Sacramento, the Milwaukee Bucks have gone from laughingstock to shockingly feisty seemingly overnight. One year after winning a league-low 15 games, the Bucks are nearly halfway to matching that total less than a month into the season.
Injuries (Larry Sanders) and apathy (O.J. Mayo) wreaked havoc on Milwaukee's playoff aspirations last year, but those struggles did help the franchise secure the No. 2 overall pick this past spring. The Bucks used it to select Duke forward Jabari Parker, who experts and his fellow rookies widely deemed to be the Rookie of the Year front-runner.
Parker hasn't exactly burst onto the scene—he's averaging just 11.8 points and 5.7 rebounds in 29.8 minutes—but Milwaukee does have reason to be optimistic about his long-term future. As Bleacher Report's Daniel O'Brien recently noted, "He's noticeably quicker and bouncier than he was during the predraft process and probably more than any other point in his life."
Though Parker, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Brandon Knight are attracting most of the headlines, it's Milwaukee's defense that deserves the lion's share of praise. The Bucks are allowing opponents to score just 97.7 points per 100 possessions, the fourth-best mark in the league, ahead of traditional defensive stalwarts such as the Memphis Grizzlies, Chicago Bulls and Indiana Pacers.
If the season ended today, the Bucks would have home-court advantage in their first-round playoff matchup, as hard as that might be to believe. Like the Kings, it's too early for Milwaukee fans to start reserving their late-April availability, but the Bucks' return to respectability has been a pleasant early-season surprise.
Worse: Charlotte Hornets
4 of 10
Heading into the season, the Charlotte Hornets had the look of a franchise on the rise. They were fresh off their second playoff berth in the past decade, inked Lance Stephenson to a team-friendly three-year, $27 million contract in free agency and had snagged two draft-day steals in Noah Vonleh and P.J. Hairston.
Instead, the Hornets have badly stumbled out of the gate, winning just four of their first 12 contests this season. They've snagged impressive wins over Miami, Atlanta and Phoenix but have dropped games to the New York Knicks, Indiana Pacers and Los Angeles Lakers; the latter loss is perhaps the most embarrassing of all.
The Hornets have battled through the league's sixth-toughest schedule so far, but with upcoming tilts against Miami, the Los Angeles Clippers, Portland, Golden State, Atlanta and Chicago, there isn't much reprieve on the horizon. If Charlotte has any chance of righting the ship, its offense needs to get on track ASAP.
At the moment, Michael Jordan's team is tied with Detroit for the league's third-lowest offensive rating, averaging just 97.5 points per 100 possessions, and ranks 26th in points per game (93.9). The Hornets are 27th in both true shooting percentage (.505) and effective field-goal percentage (.467), which underscores just how much they're struggling on that end of the court.
Stephenson and Kemba Walker are shooting 37.4 percent and 38.5 percent from the field, respectively, while attempting nearly 24 shots per game combined. Until those two can significantly boost their offensive efficiency, the Hornets will remain on the periphery of the Eastern Conference playoff race.
Better: New Orleans Pelicans
5 of 10
Heading into the season, some NBA observers expressed concern about heaping too much praise on Anthony Davis, in fear of him being unable to match such heightened expectations. Ten games into the season, the third-year New Orleans Pelicans big man has officially put those fears to rest, to put it kindly.
Davis has been a one-man wrecking crew for New Orleans this season, averaging an otherworldly 25.5 points, 11.4 rebounds, 3.9 blocks, 2.3 steals and 2.0 assists. Not only is he leading the league in PER (36.1), but he's threatening to shatter Wilt Chamberlain's single-season PER record of 31.8, set back in 1962-63 with the San Francisco Warriors.
"I don't pay attention to (the hype)," Davis told USA Today's Sam Amick. "I go out there and make sure I do what I've got to do on a nightly basis. Like coach said, I don't try to listen to what they're saying—third-best player, second-best player—whatever they're saying. I go out there and play."
With Davis single-handedly destroying everyone who dares stand in his way, the Pelicans are off to a 6-4 start to the season, despite facing the league's fifth-toughest schedule. They're seemingly intent on proving last year's 34-48 finish was an injury-riddled anomaly instead of the status quo in New Orleans.
Tyreke Evans is back to his stat-stuffing ways, averaging 16.1 points, 7.0 assists and 6.5 rebounds, while Ryan Anderson has emerged as a serious Sixth Man of the Year candidate, chipping in 16.4 points and 5.4 boards in just 27.4 minutes off the bench. With Jrue Holiday and Omer Asik each posting career-best PERs, New Orleans' top six suddenly looks like one of the league's very best.
The Pelicans are tied with Portland for the league's second-most efficient offense, averaging 109.1 points per 100 possessions, and rank among the top half of the NBA in defensive rating, too. They're quickly emerging as a squad no opponent would enjoy seeing in the first round of the playoffs this spring.
Worse: Oklahoma City Thunder
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Through no fault of their own, the Oklahoma City Thunder have dug themselves a major hole in the early portion of the 2014-15 season. As insane as it might sound, they're no lock to even make the playoffs, much less go on another deep run.
With a foot fracture sidelining Kevin Durant, and Russell Westbrook being out due to a broken bone in his right hand, the Thunder have badly stumbled, going 3-10 in their first 13 games. As Daily Thunder's Royce Young noted, they'd have to go 47-22 from this point forward to get to 50 wins, which will likely be the postseason cutoff in the uber-competitive Western Conference.
Until KD and Westbrook return, there's not much reason for optimism in OKC. The Thunder don't have a single active player with a PER above 16.8, as the rest of the roster has struggled in the absence of the two injured superstars.
Reggie Jackson is leading the Thunder with 19.8 points per game, but he's shooting just 40.0 percent from the floor and 26.9 percent from three-point range, both of which are major regressions from the 2013-14 season. Serge Ibaka is shooting below 50 percent for the first time in his career, and the 1.7 blocks per game he's averaging is his lowest mark since he was a rookie in 2009-10.
Durant and Westbrook should return within the next few weeks, but who knows how far the Thunder will have sunk by then? If they're unable to string together some wins without their two leaders, the odds could be stacked against OKC making its sixth straight trip to the postseason.
Better: Memphis Grizzlies
7 of 10
Heading into the season, a number of front-office personnel tabbed the Memphis Grizzlies as the 2014 Western Conference playoff team most likely to slip out of the postseason picture, according to Grantland's Zach Lowe. Those executives might want to recalibrate their projection systems.
At 10-2, Memphis currently owns the league's best record, punctuated with a blowout win over the Houston Rockets on Nov. 17. The Grizzlies haven't exactly faced a murderers' row of tough teams yet—their schedule is the league's 18th toughest to date—but they tout the fifth-highest margin of victory (6.08 points).
Unsurprisingly, a ferocious defense is largely to thank for their early-season success. The Grizz are limiting opponents to just 97.8 points per 100 possessions, the fifth-best mark in the league, as Marc Gasol and Tony Allen are once again proving to be terrors in the paint and on the perimeter, respectively.
It's the offense that's been the surprise, as Memphis is tied for 12th in offensive rating, averaging 105.1 points per 100 possessions. That's the Grizzlies' best offensive mark in the Gasol/Zach Randolph era, which speaks to a newfound sense of balance for this squad.
As Bleacher Report's Zach Buckley notes, nine of the past 10 NBA champions had top-10 rankings in both offensive and defensive efficiency. The grit-and-grind Grizzlies can always rely upon their defense to keep them in close games; however, a newfound sense of offensive potency could help them make a surprisingly deep run in the 2015 postseason.
Worse: Denver Nuggets
8 of 10
You know things aren't going well for your franchise when an ESPN article describes it as "one of the NBA's biggest disappointments." That's exactly the scenario in which the Denver Nuggets find themselves early in the 2014-15 season.
ESPN.com's Kevin Arnovitz extrapolated on those thoughts Nov. 18:
"Today, Denver is getting smoked nightly. It's a 2-7 team with no discernible identity, redundancies all over its roster and a morose, first-time coach who has expressed frustration with the fortitude of his team. Several sources around the league, a few close to the Nuggets, say the organization is 'rudderless' under the controls of a young front office, led by general manager Tim Connelly, that has neither the experience nor the savvy to survive in a league whose executive ranks are teeming with predators.
"
Naturally, the Nuggets knocked off the Cleveland Cavaliers, 106-97, just hours after ESPN posted Arnovitz's article. Still, the underlying issues that Arnovitz raised—a mishmash of incompatible parts, a distinct lack of a superstar player—have Denver looking nowhere near being able to compete for a playoff spot.
The Nuggets are conceding 107.5 points per 100 possessions on defense, the sixth-highest mark in the league, and rank among the bottom half of teams in terms of offensive efficiency. Even after back-to-back wins over Cleveland and the depleted Oklahoma City Thunder, Denver is only 4-7, with four of its next five games against New Orleans, Chicago and Phoenix.
With Danilo Gallinari, JaVale McGee and Nate Robinson all returning from last year's season-ending injuries, oddsmakers pegged the Nuggets as a 40-plus-win team, per CBSSports.com's Matt Moore. Anyone who bet the under on Denver must be feeling prett-ay, prett-ay good.
Better: Chicago Bulls
9 of 10
Under head coach Tom Thibodeau, the Chicago Bulls have long been one of the league's top defensive squads. This season, they've added a stunningly potent offensive attack, making them one of the league's top two-way threats.
Heading into their Thursday night contest against the Sacramento Kings, the Bulls were averaging 106.8 points per 100 possessions (tied with Boston for seventh) and allowing just 100.4 per 100 (also seventh). Considering Chicago scored only 99.7 points per 100 possessions last season, the third-worst mark in the league, this offensive explosion has been nothing short of a revelation for Thibodeau and Co.
Chicago's improved offense isn't a total surprise, as the return of Derrick Rose coupled with the additions of Pau Gasol, Aaron Brooks, Doug McDermott and Nikola Mirotic was bound to help this offensively anemic squad. However, not even the most optimistic of Bulls fans foresaw Jimmy Butler's sizzling start to the season.
To date, Jimmy Buckets is averaging career highs in points (21.5), rebounds (6.4), assists (3.6) and field-goal attempts (14.0) while shooting a career-best 52.1 percent from the field. He's also shattering his personal bests in PER (22.5), true shooting percentage (.623) and win shares per 48 minutes (.229).
"The skills of Gasol and Butler intersect with the rest of the roster in a way that highlights Chicago's brilliant construction," wrote Sports Illustrated's Rob Mahoney. "…With Rose sporting business casual, these Bulls are already a stout offensive team. When he's incorporated fully, they could be legitimately great—if only for how his absence changed everything."
Before the season, Chicago and Cleveland were widely considered the Eastern Conference's two top teams and the front-runners to clash in the conference finals. While Cleveland has gotten off to a slow start this season, Chicago looks every bit the part of a legitimate championship contender, largely thanks to Gasol and Butler.
Worse: Los Angeles Clippers
10 of 10
With former owner Donald Sterling finally deposed, the Los Angeles Clippers appeared primed for a monster season. Bleacher Report's Kevin Ding described the post-Sterling Clippers as "one of the greatest opportunities any group of people in sports has ever had to capitalize."
However, in the early portion of the season, the Clips haven't been nearly as dominant as expected. They're 7-4, sure, but they've largely feasted on cupcakes in the early portion of the season, picking up wins against the likes of the Lakers, Utah Jazz, Orlando Magic and a Dwyane Wade-less Miami Heat.
Oddsmakers tabbed the Clippers as a 57-win team, per CBSSports.com's Matt Moore, putting them in a clear upper echelon with the San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma City Thunder in the West. Moore described them as "unquestionably the third-best team in the West"—a rather popular sentiment heading into the year—as Los Angeles would seemingly tout one of the league's best offenses.
Through 11 games, the Clips do have the sixth-best offense, averaging 107.2 points per 100 possessions, but defense is another story entirely. After boasting a top-seven defense last season, they rank 22nd in defensive efficiency this year, allowing opponents to score 104.5 points per 100 possessions.
The small forward position has been a major headache for the Clips, as Matt Barnes has been struggling offensively, while Jamal Crawford has never been known for his work on the less glamorous end of the court. As Bleacher Report's Dan Favale recently wrote, Los Angeles "look[s] to be two or more players shy of genuine title contention," despite what its success last season might have otherwise suggested.
Unless otherwise noted, all statistics via Basketball-Reference.com or NBA.com/stats and are current through Thursday, Nov. 20.
