The NBA Worst-to-First Rankings are here! Peter Klein looks at teams like the Memphis Grizzlies, Sacramento Kings, and San Antonio Spurs to see who could make a surprise run to the top this season. Can Golden State return to form, or will rising teams like Detroit shock everyone? Check out the full breakdown of NBA teams poised to move from worst to first and stay ahead of the game for the upcoming season.
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Apple Pod: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/couch-potato-diary/id1564122189
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Twitter: twitter.com/primetimeklein
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We Had No Idea: every Wednesday morning,
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SportsTranscript
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.