Tier 2: Most Caesar Salads
The dressing: Squeamish about raw egg yolks and anchovies? Sorry! Yolks are what give richness to the emulsion, while umami-rich anchovies are the primary reason Caesar salad dressing tastes so good—that, and a good garlicky kick.
Just as Bon Apetit unapologetically points out the obvious, these teams are just missing a little something.
6. Cleveland- Back to the Mean
After being bombarded with a season of "You don't even know how good Darius Garland is" and "Evan Mobley will be a top 5 player" takes the Cavs crashed back to Earth in the playoffs about 10 minutes in to Game 5 when the home crowd threw in the towel. Sadly for them there's a ceiling on starting to short guards- just ask Dame and CJ. And sorry, Max Strus isn't the answer. Cleveland had one job over the offseason and they answered it by resigning the guy they had already decided couldn't solve it in Caris LeVert and Max Strus whose On-Off number was -9.1. 6 might be too high.
Big Question: Buyer's Remorse
Cleveland will struggle this season as those feel good vibes from the Donovan Mitchell trade wear off and the weight of expectations takes its toll. Releasing Kevin Love when he was the exact guy you needed in the playoffs after paying him 100 million to babysit 3 years of bad teams was inexcusable. Heck, who gives Max Stress Kelly Oubre money? Expect a LeVert and Strus trade for Jerami Grant as soon as possible.
7. Indiana- Touch the Sky
Pacers were tied with the Knicks at 23-19 when Halliburton got injured and missed the next ten games. The rest of the team went 1-9 with him out. Despite having nothing to play for but draft positioning, Carlisle kept them playing hard all season and was rewarded by Nembhard and Nesmith along with the more ballyhooed Mathurin.
Big Question: Questionable Bigs- Glad that everything worked out for Turner but neither Obi or their rookie are going to change the defense around. Lots to look forward to and they should be happy to get to the play in.
8. Atlanta- A New Hope
I'm glad I'm doing tiers because these guys could shoot up past the Pacers and Cavs and the sans Lillard Heat. Snyder is a great coach and it says a lot that he jumped into the job mid season rather than wait till the summer to see what other gigs became available. He saw something he liked with this team. Trae's mini playoff resurgence (30/10 averages) is just the kind of catnip a team in the doldrums needed to get them frisky for the new season.
Big Question: Huntering for 3's
It's no surprise that Quinn the Coachkmo wants the 2-4 guys to shoot and hit a lot of 3's. Murray and Hunter went 233/ 677 on 3's last season which isn't a winning percentage. But swapping Collins sub .300 percentage points for Bey's over .400 sure is and the likely motivation behind finally getting a deal done. Expect Bey to be the new star of the show.
9. Chicago: Better than you think.
Fucking NBA media! Everyone is so happy to pile on Chicago that they forget Billy Donovan knows what he's doing. Bulls finished 5th in defense despite all the digital ink spilled on telling you that DeRozan LaVine and Vucevic can't cut it on that end. Jevon Carter is going to do pretty much what Lonzo did. These guys we're up with 2 minutes left on Miami in the play in as we heard every Miami playoff game. Don't sleep on the Bulls.
Big Question: Deadline DeRozan
DeRozan, in the last year of a reasonable 28 million contract which will carry full bird rights is just the guy every playoff team would love to add at the deadline. Chicago can restock that draft cabinet real quick and they probably should. If Ball retires due to injury, he still gets paid but his salary comes off the cap, meaning Bulls could have something like 40 million in space next offseason. DeRozan is definitely a guy you want to trade for picks rather than resign
10. Brooklyn: It's about Dame Time!
Have fun with the leade emphasizing it in different ways. What are you guys waiting for? As long as they can keep Bridges everyone else should be available. Cash in those Claxton checks while you can. No other team can have it's ceiling raised so immediately by a Dame trade because without him, the ceiling is pretty low. Sorry you can't win with just role players in the NBA. For all the talk about Bridges improving post trade, it didn't impact in the wins column. Dame isn't Kyrie KD or Harden. He will leave it out there every night and is the star these Nets need if they want to avoid one of those 3-22 records in games decided by 5 points.
Big Question: Iconic London Timepiece
What the **** is this guy's deal? Is he mentally or physically hurt? Why was he removed from the rotation a month before his season ending injury was announced? Let's not forget that this guy was a two way force whenever a certain oversized Cameroonian wasn't occupying half the paint. I dream of him getting a fresh start somewhere (San Antonio, cough. cough), with a coach that understands him (Brett Brown, cough) in a system where "while other places ask you to get better at what they want, here they get you to do what you do well" (San Antonio, Pop).
7/5/2023 12:14 PM
