The NBA season tips off in less than a week. The NBA title will be awarded eight months later.
Too often, too much focus is placed on who will finish on top. In the NBA, it makes even less sense to look at the league through a narrow all-or-nothing lens.
Unlike other professional leagues, the champion always emerges from the elite. Only two of the 77 NBA champions were not top-three seeds and both outliers were defending champions led by legends (’69 Celtics, ’95 Rockets).
I’d put a mortgage payment on one of four teams (Nuggets, Celtics, Bucks, Suns) taking home this season’s title. I’d listen to arguments for the Lakers and Warriors. That’s it. That’s the list. And that’s OK.
