Finding a Silver Lining for NBA Teams Approaching Rock Bottom
No NBA team enjoys spiraling down toward rock bottom. Futilely going to war with an overmatched roster and knowing that the number in the loss column is about to grow by one isn't particularly pleasant. But that doesn't mean it's impossible for teams in this unenviable position to enjoy a silver lining.
Every team trending toward the league basement has at least one of those. It may be hard to find in some instances, but it still exists.
Some squads have young players who will grow in due time. Others just have distractions to get them through the day.
But if fans are dedicated enough, they can find something to be excited about for every team in the Association.
Even these six. They're the ones at the bottom of the NBA standings without much hope of immediate turnarounds. And even if there is some on-court hope, there are so many distractions circling the organizations that it still feels like rock bottom.
But nonetheless, they can still find some positives if they look hard enough.
Detroit Pistons: Time
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Nothing is urgent for the Detroit Pistons.
Stan Van Gundy, both the coach and the man in charge of making personnel changes, hasn't had all that long to turn this team into what he desires, after all. He's had just a single offseason, and it's one that was filled with a free-agency saga centered around Greg Monroe, who likely won't be on the roster next season.
Plus, his big signing of Jodie Meeks hasn't exactly paid off yet since a back injury kept the sharpshooter out of the lineup for the first 22 games of the year.
In many ways, this team resembles last year's Milwaukee Bucks.
The Pistons, much like the 2013-14 Bucks, came into the campaign with the intention of competing for one of the final spots in the Eastern Conference playoffs. However, injuries, a roster of ill-fitting pieces and a lack of identity have doomed them to the bottom of the standings.
But the Bucks found themselves on defense this year, and now they're a fairly competitive squad filled with plenty of young talent. Detroit has to hope for similar results when Van Gundy has a roster he's actually built, not inherited from the past regime.
If all teams were doomed forever after just one bad season, no one would ever win a championship again. That's the best news of all for a Detroit team that still has a great deal of talent on the roster, even if none of it meshes together all that well at the moment.
Los Angeles Lakers: All Kobe Everything
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The Los Angeles Lakers, even with Nick Young back in the lineup, don't have much hope during the 2014-15 season. If we treat 49 wins as the benchmark for the playoffs in the Western Conference, as that's what it took to gain entry last year, this team would have to go 41-16 during the rest of the season in order to get to that milestone.
Obviously, that's not going to happen. Not even those completely blinded by purple-and-gold glasses can argue with that.
But how much hope does the team have for a competitive season next year? Even that's not a silver lining, as the Lakers are completely dependent on attracting superstar talent during the offseason and seamlessly incorporating the new arrivals without skipping a beat. It's hard to count on that happening, even given the historical appeal of the franchise.
Instead, the positive in this situation has to be Kobe Bryant.
He's undoubtedly a basketball legend and a lock for the Hall of Fame, and fans have a chance to enjoy one more season of pure, unadulterated Mamba. Bryant can fire away with reckless abandon, play hero ball to his heart's content and put on a one-man offensive show simply because no one is talented enough to force him down any other route.
We've already seen him pass Michael Jordan on the career-scoring leaderboard, and what followed was unlike anything I've ever seen.
Live action actually stopped so that everyone could congratulate Bryant, who was then given the game ball, which he carried to the team bench on the opposite end of the floor as applause from the opposing team's arena rained down on him. Then play just resumed as if nothing had happened.
Seriously, when was the last time such a spectacle took place in the NBA?
Bryant may not have a shot at adding to his ring collection, but he can gun for a scoring title while turning the clock back to 2006—in his head, at least.
Enjoy it while it lasts.
Minnesota Timberwolves/Utah Jazz: The Young Pieces
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We're grouping the Minnesota Timberwolves and Utah Jazz together because they're largely in the same type of situation.
Neither team is supposed to be competitive right now, though both aren't going all-out for the top lottery odds like the Philadelphia 76ers seem to be doing. They're just trying to learn while giving their young talents plenty of opportunities to learn on the job.
The Jazz are 6-18 with only a few impressive victories, but it's hard not to get excited about their long-term potential. Enes Kanter and Derrick Favors are still young and developing into a strong frontcourt tandem. Gordon Hayward has looked much better in his second year as a featured option. Trey Burke, Alec Burks, Dante Exum and Rodney Hood have plenty of potential in the backcourt, and there's no telling how high Rudy Gobert's ceiling may prove to be.
Meanwhile, the Timberwolves are even worse in the present and even more exciting down the road. Though they have just five wins in 23 games, they roster Andrew Wiggins, Anthony Bennett, Shabazz Muhammad, Gorgui Dieng and Zach LaVine. Plus, the team hasn't had a chance to see what it can do once it establishes some chemistry with a healthy Ricky Rubio.
As the losses pile up, there's no real reason to worry. For both teams, it's part of the plan right now, and there are actually some nice stockpiles of talent in each city.
New York Knicks: Signs of Competitiveness
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"Right now we have a loser's mentality because we're not finishing games," Phil Jackson told reporters at a press conference earlier in December, via The Knicks Blog's Adam Zagoria.
It's true.
The New York Knicks have become a breeding ground for dysfunction—see the alleged Carmelo Anthony-Tim Hardaway Jr. spat (via ESPN The Magazine's Chris Broussard) or the he-said-but-didn't-really-say nature of Anthony's no-trade clause—and don't seem to have much confidence. But they haven't actually been awful for all 48 minutes they've spent on the court during the average game; it's closing that gives them so much trouble.
During clutch situations, defined by NBA.com as the last five minutes of games with a five-point margin or less, opponents have outscored the Knicks by 32.7 points per 100 possessions.
Obviously, that's not good.
But if those games go differently—and we're talking about 17 of the Knicks' 26 outings qualifying as "clutch situations"—the record looks quite a bit different. Different enough that there may be some enduring playoff hope in Madison Square Garden, even if that sounds absolutely ridiculous.
Despite its putrid, franchise-worst start to the 2014-15 season, New York is only seven games behind the teams currently slated to be sacrificial victims in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs. It's not entirely inconceivable that the Knicks, as awful as they've been, could make a serious run at a playoff spot.
Thanks, geography.
But even if this team falls short, it can still have confidence in the savviness of Jackson. This still isn't the team he's put together, and he'll have a chance to completely reshape the organization after this season draws to a close.
Philadelphia 76ers: Future Talent
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It doesn't matter how poorly the Philadelphia 76ers play right now. They still possess the ultimate silver lining for the future—the hope that one day, they'll be better than just good and escape the levels of mediocrity that so many teams remain mired in for years at a time.
If all goes according to plan, the Sixers will be rife with stars a few years down the road.
Michael Carter-Williams will continue developing at point guard, benefiting from his years running the show without any threat of being benched for poor play. Nerlens Noel and Joel Embiid will become superstars in the frontcourt, as will Dario Saric when he makes the journey across the pond. And that's saying nothing of this year's inevitable top-five draft pick, as well as the hordes of second-rounders who might give the franchise one or two draft-day gems.
This year's Philadelphia squad could very well be the worst team in NBA history. Frankly, given the number of undrafted players and fringe talents on the roster, it's hard to even call this an NBA team on some nights. Deadspin's Tom Ley even referred to the Sixers as "a godless abomination."
And it just doesn't matter. Not even one iota.
These Sixers are all about the future, and they're making no efforts to do anything but finish at the bottom of the pack during the 2014-15 season. Well, the players and coaches are, while the front office has different ideas. If you're going to adopt this strategy, at least own it like Philly has over the past two years.
Will it work? That remains to be seen, but at least this organization is giving its fanbase one heck of a silver lining.
