With the All-Star Game in the books, it’s time to reset the NBA’s title race heading into the stretch run of the regular season.
The Boston Celtics, preseason championship co-favorites with the Milwaukee Bucks after adding Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis, have lived up to that billing by taking a four-game lead over the rest of the league with a balanced combination of offense (No. 1 on a per-possession basis) and defense (No. 3) that augurs well for a deep playoff run.
Out West, the race for the top spot is more competitive. Although the Minnesota Timberwolves have opened up a 1½-game lead over the Oklahoma City Thunder, the top four teams — including the defending NBA champion Denver Nuggets — are separated by just three games.
Meanwhile, three of the teams with the most playoff experience in the field, the Golden State Warriors, Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat, lurk in play-in range after the Heat and Lakers rose up through the play-in a year ago to reach the conference finals (and, in Miami’s case, the NBA Finals).
Now that rosters are largely set with the trade deadline complete and the buyout market unlikely to yield any other players of note, let’s look at who is most likely to hoist the Larry O’Brien Trophy in June by sorting the contenders into tiers based on their chances of winning.
Stephen A. Smith stands by his early-season prediction and says the Celtics are “knocking on the door” of a championship.
Tier 1: The favorite
Boston Celtics (+260 odds at ESPN BET)
It’s possible we’ll look back in June at an 18th Celtics banner — which would edge them past the Lakers’ total across Minneapolis and Los Angeles — as inevitable. Quietly, Boston is putting together an all-time regular season. The Celtics are threatening to become just the 13th team in NBA history to outscore opponents by at least 10 points per game.
At one time, that all but assured a title. Through the first Warriors trophy in 2015, the only team in the plus-10 club not to win the championship was the 1971-72 Bucks — who happened to run into another member of the group (the Lakers) in the conference finals. Since then, just one of the past four teams to accomplish the feat (the 2016-17 Golden State team that added Kevin Durant) has actually completed the run in the playoffs, with the 2015-16 Warriors and San Antonio Spurs as well as the 2019-20 Bucks falling victim to upsets.
Despite the recent disconnect between regular-season success and the playoffs, there’s reason to believe in Boston. The Celtics’ offseason moves addressed their biggest postseason shortcoming: mucky late-game offense. Boston’s offensive rating ranks fifth in what NBA Advanced Stats defines as clutch situations (when the score is within five points in the last five minutes of regulation or any overtime) after finishing 11th last season and 26th in 2021-22.
Tier 2: The inner-circle contenders
Denver Nuggets (+450)
LA Clippers (+500)
Milwaukee Bucks (+650)
This tier could be defined as the teams in position for home-court advantage in the opening round with a track record of playoff success.
Nobody’s recent results are better than those of the Nuggets, who return the starting five that went 16-4 in the 2023 playoffs. That lineup remains elite, having outscored opponents by 13 points per 100 possessions, which is fourth best among units with at least 250 minutes together this season, according to NBA Advanced Stats data, and almost identical to last year’s plus-13.1 net rating.
The question is whether Denver can fill out a rotation as productive as last season’s, when Christian Braun and Jeff Green joined Bruce Brown to give coach Michael Malone enough postseason options off the bench. Brown and Green left in the offseason, and Braun hasn’t taken the step forward the Nuggets expected in his second NBA season. Additionally, a deeper Western Conference means Denver might not have the benefit of home-court advantage beyond the first round, let alone the entire run like last year, when the Nuggets went 10-1 at altitude in the playoffs.
The Clippers have climbed out of an early 3-7 hole into third in the West, which would be their highest seed since finishing second in the 2019-20 campaign that concluded in the Orlando bubble. With Kawhi Leonard healthy and performing at a top-five level, plus James Harden fitting in, this looks like the Clippers’ best shot at a title since Leonard’s partial ACL tear during the 2021 playoffs.
As uneven as Milwaukee’s season has been, including a midseason coaching change with Doc Rivers taking over, it’s impossible to ignore the Bucks’ talent. In that same ranking of most effective high-minutes lineups this season, Milwaukee’s starting five rates No. 1 with a plus-15.3 net rating — albeit aided by inaccurate opponent 3-point shooting.
Tier 3: The hopefuls
Cleveland Cavaliers (+2500)
Minnesota Timberwolves (+2500)
New York Knicks (+2000)
Oklahoma City Thunder (+2500)
Philadelphia 76ers (+3000)
Phoenix Suns (+1500)
This tier is largely represented by newcomers to the contender ranks. If the season ended today, four of the eight teams to host opening-round playoff series would have combined for one series win since 2018 (the Knicks last season). By contrast, of the four teams above these hopefuls in the tiers, every one but the Clippers (three) has won eight series in that span all by itself.
Given the importance of playoff experience, it’s fair to be wary of this group, although only to a point. This tier boasts three of the top four teams in point differential this season (Cleveland, Minnesota and Oklahoma City), while New York went a league-best 14-2 with a plus-15.4 differential in January before sagging due to injuries. Home-court advantage is still a massive factor in playoff success, and the odds are good that at least one of those four teams will reach the conference finals.
Rounding out this tier are the Sixers and Suns, in very different positions from the rest of the group.
Phoenix started the season as an inner-circle contender in gambling odds, but the Suns now seem unlikely to earn home-court advantage due in large part to injuries and limited depth. The case for the Suns making a run from the bottom of the bracket rests on their top-end ability when healthy: Phoenix’s starting five has a net rating of plus-14.9 that’s right there with the best in the NBA.
In Philadelphia’s case, Joel Embiid’s health is a wild card. If he’s back at an MVP level for the playoffs after knee surgery earlier this month, the Sixers will remain scary opponents. However, at best, Embiid’s injury and Philly’s fall in the standings mean a more difficult postseason path that would almost certainly require beating three other teams from the top three tiers to get to the Finals.
Tier 4: The long shots
Dallas Mavericks (+3500)
Golden State Warriors (+5000)
Los Angeles Lakers (+2500)
Miami Heat (+4000)
New Orleans Pelicans (+6000)
Given the Heat’s run to the Finals last year, there’s precedent for considering these long shots as title contenders. Still, it would be surprising if any of them actually takes the championship. No team to win it all since the 1994-95 Houston Rockets has played at less than a 52-win pace during the regular season, and the best team in this group (the Pelicans) would need to go 19-10 the rest of the way to get there.
Despite that track record, the ESPN BET odds still give the Lakers a better chance of winning the title than the Sixers, which feels like too much deference to LeBron James’ history. Yes, the Lakers have righted the ship lately, winning six of their past seven heading into the All-Star break. They’ve still been outscored over the course of the season, and this year’s additions (Spencer Dinwiddie, after he was waived by the Toronto Raptors, and Gabe Vincent’s impending return from knee surgery) are unlikely to have the impact of the team’s 2023 deadline trade.
More than anything, the Lakers are likely to run into far more formidable Western Conference foes. Last year’s play-in victory over the Timberwolves and first-round win over the Memphis Grizzlies were aided by injuries, and the 43-39 Lakers faced a similar Golden State team (44-38) in the semifinals. The Lakers’ path back to the conference finals this year would likely involve multiple teams that comfortably top 50 wins. Although the Lakers and Warriors (also playing their best basketball recently with Draymond Green in the lineup) have history and the Mavericks have star power, it’s New Orleans from this group that actually has played the best. The Pelicans’ plus-4.3 point differential ranks fourth in the West, ahead of not only Phoenix but also Denver.
The Sacramento Kings have the best record of any team left out of this tier, two games ahead of the Indiana Pacers in the loss column. Sacramento also has the playoff experience of a hard-fought, seven-game series against Golden State last year. Still, the Kings’ plus-0.5 point differential ranks 10th in the West, and they’re unlikely to avoid the play-in, meaning a tough playoff road. I don’t think they are title contenders this year.
Out East, the inexperience of the other teams in the mix for the sixth and final guaranteed playoff spot (the Pacers and Orlando Magic) leaves Miami all alone in this tier. Frankly, there’s nothing in the Heat’s statistics to suggest a deep playoff run is coming, and unlike last season, they haven’t underperformed from 3-point range (37%, compared with 33% at this time a year ago). Still, the Heat have surprised us too many times to entirely rule that out.
