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The results of the 2018-19 NBA season are all but confirmed following DeMarcus Cousins' decision to sign a one-year deal with the Golden State Warriors, enabling them to be the only team in NBA history to field three All-Star Game starters and five All-Stars when Boogie stages his comeback from the Achilles injury he suffered late in January 2018.
With this out of the way, however, do keep in mind that there are 14 other teams in the Western Conference. The Warriors will probably take the top seed, health permitting, just like they did for three straight years.
The losses of Trevor Ariza and Luc Mbah a Moute will definitely hurt the Rockets, but despite coasting in the last two weeks of the 2017-18 season, they still finished as one of only 19 teams in NBA history to record 65 wins in a regular season campaign.
This makes them prohibitive favourites to make the playoffs for another season, and they will probably end up winning at least 60 games even if their defense worsens (as predicted).
The rest of the Western Conference playoff picture, however, is shrouded in doubt, and the following 10 teams are the ones with the best chances of making the cut:
#10 Memphis Grizzlies
For a franchise that doesn't have its own first-round pick in 2019, the Grizzlies are in a pretty good position to ensure that the Celtics are unable to extract the full use of their pick.
They are likely to make a concerted effort to make the playoffs, but their lack of squad depth will ensure that this push is negated by the end of the season.
For all of Conley's and Gasol's virtues, and there are many of those, they lost too many players over the past two seasons to be a realistic playoff contender this year.
In all likelihood, they will be fighting over the very last playoff berth, and the likes of the Phoenix Suns and the Dallas Mavericks will be breathing right down their necks.
#9 Los Angeles Clippers
The Lob City era for the Clippers has officially come to an end now that DeAndre Jordan has (finally!) signed with the Dallas Mavericks as an unrestricted free agent.
It is unclear what path the Clippers will take, but it might be a foolhardy bet to try and make the playoffs this season after a failed attempt at the same in 2017-18.
The Clippers cleared part of their guard-heavy logjam by trading for Marcin Gortat and sending Austin Rivers the other way this summer.
This still leaves them with two rookie guards in addition to Lou Williams, Milos Teodosic, Wesley Johnson and Avery Bradley, none of whom can play the small forward position with any kind of success.
They still have sufficient talent on their roster to be a competitive team, and would probably still make the playoffs if they were in the Eastern Conference.
But given the constant injury struggles of their best scorer in Danilo Gallinari, they will likely be relegated to a lower lottery berth just like last year in any case.
#8 Denver Nuggets
A summer that saw some real salary-trimming by the Nuggets in order to make room for Jokic's supermax extension leaves them in a much better state financially.
Kenneth Faried and Wilson Chandler were traded to the Nets and the Sixers respectively, and this hasn't cost them much by means of critical squad depth.
But it still leaves the Nuggets with a tough situation to figure out. Jokic is a transcendental offensive talent but, just like Karl-Anthony Towns, he has been a sieve defensively and is not the ideal anchor for a good defensive team.
That's part of the reason why Mason Plumlee sees significant minutes and often starts for them - he's not a great defender himself, but he's still a better rim protector than Jokic.
Having Paul Millsap in good health through the length of the season has to be among the Nuggets' top priorities, as his absence forces them to field Twin Tower lineups of Jokic and Plumlee way too often.
Gary Harris and Jamal Murray have a great future ahead of them, but given the cut-throat level of competition in the Western Conference this year, I'd rather place my faith on teams and players who've made the playoffs before this than this young core - although the sky is the limit for them.
#7 Portland Trail Blazers
The Trail Blazers' retrospectively disastrous summer of 2016 will unleash the full force of the blows that their cap space has suffered on their on-court results this season, in my estimation.
Paying the likes of Evan Turner, Mo Harkless, Myers Leonard and Allen Crabbe such high long-term salaries has crippled their cap space flexibility, and they have been unable to surround franchise players Lillard and McCollum with anything other than middling talent.
The Blazers were able to re-sign Nurkic to a deal that represents his value far better than the deals they gave the aforementioned players this summer.
But that still leaves Seth Curry as their major offseason acquisition - not a good sign when teams above and below them in pure talent pool terms last season have all made some kind of improvement to their rosters.
Knowing CJ and Dame, the Blazers are going to go all out throughout the season, and given the fact that Lillard has yet to miss the playoffs, there is cause for optimism among their fanbase.
But as of now, they are at a disadvantage with a number of competing teams and will finish outside of the playoff berths in my estimation.
#6 New Orleans Pelicans
The Pelicans are reeling from an offseason that saw them lose DeMarcus Cousins as an unrestricted free agent.
They have, however, done a better job of retooling their roster than the teams we've talked about before this.
In addition to that, Anthony Davis is by far the best player on any of the teams so far, which makes them prohibitive favourites to make the 8th seed over the Blazers in my eyes this season.
Losing Cousins will definitely hurt their ceiling, but they made a great signing in Julius Randle. The No.7 pick in the 2014 NBA Draft is slated to come off the bench and will comprise a sturdy frontcourt alongside Nik Mirotic and The Brow.
The Pelicans replaced Rajon Rondo with another 2014 draftee Elfrid Payton. Payton is a worse player than the former Celtics point guard but will be better suited to the run-and-gun style that they resorted to following Cousins' injury last season.
He's also a significantly better scorer, and that should keep the team at about the same level in terms of point guard play.
The rest of their roster remains virtually the same, but Jrue Holiday averaged All-NBA numbers after the All-Star break last season, and currently smack in the middle of his prime, one can expect him to play at the same level.
#5 Minnesota Timberwolves
Of the teams that we've talked about up until this point, the Minnesota Timberwolves have comfortably got the highest amount of star power on their roster - at least offensively. The Wolves finished with the fourth highest offensive rating of any team across the Association last season, behind only the Warriors, Rockets and the Raptors.
That is due, in large part, to Jimmy Butler continuing to excel in the point forward role that has now become ubiquitous for elite teams in the NBA.
Averaging 22.2 points, 5.3 rebounds, 4.9 assists and 2.0 steals per game, Jimmy G. Buckets revitalized a Wolves offense that opened up the 2017-18 season in a rather underwhelming fashion.
Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins were put under the microscope at the end of last season when Butler missed over a month due to an MCL injury that he suffered after the All-Star break against the Rockets.
For the Wolves to be ranked any higher than this, they're gonna have to rely on Towns progressing on the defensive end of the ball.
Wiggins needs to be more engaged and the ball needs to be in Towns' hands more often in clutch situations - the No.1 overall pick in 2015 earned his first All-Star Game appearance last season and slashed a 50/40/85 line that no player over 7' tall and averaging 20 points per game has ever achieved in the history of the league.
#4 Los Angeles Lakers
Adding LeBron James to the mix is about as good a guarantee as any in NBA history for a team looking to make the playoffs. But the Lakers are about a lot more than just that, as the most successful franchise in the 3-point line era.
However, the reason they are fourth on this list is purely because the Western Conference is the wildest and most competitive that it's ever been in the 71-year history of the NBA.
Every team that made the playoffs last season had at least one player with an All-NBA selection in either 2017 or 2018.
#3 San Antonio Spurs
If there's one Vegas bet that is a no-brainer on this go-around, it is the over/under that they've set for the Spurs at 44.5 games - out of the playoff spots. Losing Kyle Anderson will hurt, and Manu Ginobili has retired, but it'd take a stunning amount of gall to say that the most consistently good franchise in the league will fail to make the playoffs.
Without being overly dramatical about these projections, I guess it suffices to say that Gregg Popovich has posted 50-win or better seasons for 20 straight years, and the Spurs won 47 games last season despite not having Kawhi for the full year.
LaMarcus Aldridge has regained his mojo with the Spurs, and posted the least-appreciated MVP calibre season among all candidates last season, with his elite two-way play guiding the Spurs to a seventh-place finish in the standings.
They just added an offensive hub in The Klaw's place with a trade for DeMar DeRozan and a conventional center in Jakob Poeltl who's one of the most-slept Raptor picks in the past couple of seasons.
If there are three things that are certain in life, those are death, taxes and Popovich making the playoffs with two All-Stars on his roster.
#2 Oklahoma City Thunder
'Addition by subtraction' is one of those fancy phrases being thrown around for the moves the Thunder made in order to trade Carmelo Anthony this summer. But when you look at exactly what they've done with literally no wiggle room in their salary cap situation, you have to applaud Sam Presti's nous at building teams.
For one thing, it wasn't subtraction when they traded Melo to the Hawks for Dennis Schroder and Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot - they got two players for the price of one. Schroder, by himself, is a better player than Melo at this point in both of their careers and is said to be excited about the prospect of coming off the bench for the Thunder.
Few teams in the league can boast of a 20 ppg, 6 apg player coming off the bench like OKC can. Fewer still can say they have untapped potential in their roster which might come in handy during the playoffs - in the form of Nerlens Noel, who signed a veteran's minimum deal for the season with the franchise.
Jerami Grant is a severely limited offensive player who may not be able to replace Anthony as a 3-point shooter, but he's a physical, hustling defender who is up there among the league's best small-ball centers.
Moving him as a power forward into the starting lineup gives OKC an intimidating defensive look, while the likes of Patrick Patterson, Alex Abrines and Raymond Felton could still theoretically be sizeable difference-makers off the bench.
Led by the Brodie and PG-13, the Thunder have gotten significantly better than last season and are poised to post their first 50-win season in 3 years.
#1 Utah Jazz
As a Lakers, Spurs or Thunder fan, you have the full right to remonstrate with the placement of the Jazz over your favourite team as the likeliest bubble team in the Western Conference to make the playoffs.
After all, a team with LeBron, or with 2 perennial All-Stars as the Spurs and the Thunder boast, is supposed to be more talent-laden than a Jazz team whose only All-Star selection in this decade is now a Celtic.
Allow me to clarify my stance with one fact - since losing to the Atlanta Hawks late in January and dropping to a 19-28 record, the Jazz won their 29 of their last 35 games of the season. During this period, the Jazz boasted of a whopping plus-12 net rating during that span, a number that would have led the league by 3.5 points over the whole season.
Utah also posted a 96.5 defensive rating during that time; you have to go all the way back to the Chicago Bulls and the Boston Celtics in 2011-12 to find teams that bested that mark over a full season. This was despite adding Jae Crowder to their rotation during the trade deadline and relying on a rookie Donovan Mitchell for the bulk of their scoring.
Through December, Mitchell's monthly scoring average in the league never dropped below 21 points per game, topping out at 23.1 in the said month.
Gobert won Defensive Player of the Year honours despite missing a third of the season. The Jazz's defence revolves around running shooters off the 3-point line and into the Stifle Tower's path, the kind of responsibility that no other centre has shouldered in the last several years in this league.
The Jazz has no weak spot on their roster, and could arguably have taken the Rockets a lot further than 5 games of the Western Conference Semifinals if they had Ricky Rubio and Dante Exum fit and firing all series long. They are the best defensive team in the NBA at full strength (sorry, Boston), and defence is the surest mantra to making the playoffs.
Guess the Lakers players!
