Western Conference tiers: Who are the top teams? 🤔🏀 | The Hoop Collective

Western Conference tiers: Who are the top teams? 🤔🏀 | The Hoop Collective

Bon time, you were talking a second ago about um the relative rankings in the West. Let’s just let’s just talk about that real quick. So, the Thunder obviously at the peak, right? One thing I want to cut in with just because it’s funny because we didn’t get to it earlier. When you’re talking about the Clippers having all these guys who are 28 or older, the Thunder had two guys on their entire roster who were over 27 last year. So, it’s a very interesting divergence in strategy. What about when they What about when they bring Russ back? I mean, that’s the trend, right? Dame back to Portland. CP3 back to Lob City. Isn’t Russ going to be an OKC? You don’t see that happening? I’m sure that’s what will happen. I’m sure you don’t think they’d want him to come in there and, you know, shake things up a little bit. There’s much shaking that needs to go on. By the way, I love that the Thunder summer league team continued the tradition of the group interview at the end of the game. You know who else loved it? Mech 10 got more air time, baby. Who was who was doing the interview? Um, all right. So, we got the Thunder at the top. All right. Are we Are you gonna Bontams are you going to have a second tier or are you just going to say everybody else is in the second? I’ll I’ll give you I have a tier. I’ll throw out the Rockets is number two and you boys can agree or disagree. I mean, I have a tier. I would say Houston, Denver, and the Clippers are in a tier. So, were the Clippers in that tier before the summer or did they or did their season did their off season? I mean, I mean, look, I we’ve talked about it a lot. I thought the three best teams in the West at the end of the season were the Thunder, the Clippers, and the Nuggets. And I think you saw it in the way the playoffs played out. Again, like people were clowning on the Clippers for losing that seven game series to Denver because they lost in the first round. It was a hell of a series. If that Aaron Gordon tip dunk doesn’t go in, they don’t win the series. So, I I didn’t think there was any shame in that, but um but yeah, I think the moves they made this summer have only strengthened them. I would if I was power ranking that tier, I might have Houston second. Um because I I just basically going from Jaylen Green to Kevin Durant is going to be I think a gigantic upgrade. That’s not bad. Not at all. Um but I think all three of those teams are really good. I was going to say Jaylen Green’s departure is going to get Reed Shepard a regular role. Yeah. I mean I Houston I’m I’m super super fascinated to watch Houston this year for another team that’s very young by the way. Yeah. I mean it they got some older guys like they you know they got Jeff Green. They brought in Clint Capella. Their average is going to be well they’ve got they’ve got two they’ve got two grizzled Nets in the starting lineup and KD and Van Ble but they’ve got a whole bunch of puppies. Yeah. I would I would have those I would have those three teams in a tier personally. Houston Houston Houston. Let me just comment and I’m not fighting you on this, but I’ll just point out that the team that’s been in the conference finals the last two years, the Timber I just think losing to K Alexander Walker is really going to hurt them. I I I think that’s a big loss and Mike Connley was already taking a bit of a step back. I’m just wondering if there’s only two, you know, not there’s obviously more than two tiers, but I’m just wondering if all I mean like I’m not putting the I mean, where are you putting the Mavericks? I mean, how do you assign the Mavericks? I mean, I’m putting the Mavericks. I mean, I would have the Wolves I would probably have the Wolves in their own tier probably. You like See, I love that you do these tiers. It It’s great content throughout the course of the year, but you you always have too many tiers. It’s my editor’s comments. Got like 15 tiers in the West. No, I I would say that I think that the Wolves are to me a better team than the than all these other teams with questions. And then you’ve got the Warriors, the Lakers, uh the the Mavericks if they get healthy. Um I’d probably have Memphis and San Antonio all in the same group. Like Okay, hold on. You could You’re not putting the You’re not putting the freaking Grizzlies in the same group as the the Warriors for one. What was the Warriors What was the Warriors record? I’m trying to look it up. What was the The Warriors record was 48 and 34. No, with Steph and Jimmy in the start. It was It was up there. I mean, it was a very impressive record. And Yeah. And both of those guys could miss 40 games. I mean, good lord, every player in the league could miss. No, I mean, Jimmy Butler regularly misses a bunch of games. And Steph is now 38 and has fairly regularly missed games. If those two guys are healthy, they’ve got a they’ve got a pretty high ceiling. You can say the same thing about your second tier Clippers. I mean, yeah. I mean, the Clippers are just way deep. The Clippers go 10 deep, though. The Warriors are extraordinarily topheavy and their topheavy is very old and injury pro. If they stay if they’re got if two and five with with the lineup together. Yes, they played great with those guys down the stretch when they were healthy. So you’re not putting me in the same group as a freaking You just yelled at me for having too few too many tears. Now you’re yelling at me for having too few tears. There’s one theme yelling at me. Fair enough. If you want to stop If you want to stop at the Warriors, the Lakers, and the Mavs, that’s fine. I I think Memphis is sort of in the same boat. All those teams could win 48 to 50 games if things break right. They could all win 42 games if things don’t break right. That’s all. There’s just a lot of ver there’s a lot of boom or bust potential for all those. And and what are you what are you saying about the Spurs? If Victor like if Victor and De’Aren Fox come in and really pop, they could be really good. I would not have them in that same group probably just because they’re going to be playing these young guys. Dylan Harper’s going to play. Stfan Castle’s going to play. How is the fit with De’arren Fox and those guys gonna be? They still have some real holes. But look, if Victor is a top five player in the league this year and plays 80 games and is a first team all NBA player, then they could be in the mix for being in the playoffs and being in the mix with those other teams. If the Spurs are a top six team, we will be discussing Victor Wimyama as an MVP candidate. Oh yeah, for sure. Oh, that No, that’s not even that’s not a hot take at all. if they’re top six in the West. Yeah, of course. Of course we will be because that means he’s gonna be one of the five best players in the league easily. That that’s their that’s their path to zooming into one of the top I don’t know six or just like mass injuries for these older teams. But I they just I think have too many holes to quite get there this year. But but they’re going to be super fun and frisky on a nightly basis for sure. Frisky. I give Zack Low credit for bringing that into the NBA lexicon. frisky. I had I had heard it before then. He he popularized it. I I do want to, you know, tie a bow on one of the more interesting um little sagas that we had over the summer that reached finality in the last couple of days. Jonas Valenunis gave an interview where he affirmed that he will fulfill his contract and report to the Denver Nuggets and make his $10 million instead of playing in Greece. He said that he had wanted to play in Greece, which was closer to home. He’s from Lithuania, which is closer to home. Um that, you know, it’s in Europe, I guess. Um but he said, “I’m fully committed to honoring my contract with the Nuggets this season, and I will give my all to compete for a championship.” Um I think this I think this situation is very clear. I think it was Funis wasn’t really all that interested in playing for the Sacramento Kings on a one guaranteed year contract and he had a multi-year fully guaranteed deal from Panathanikos to go back and play in Europe for one of the best teams in Europe and was ready to do that. And then he wound up on the Nuggets. I like, “All right, well, if I’m going to go play for the Nuggets with Jokic, that’s cool. I’ll do that, but I’m not going to be De Manis Bonus’ backup in Sacramento.” That that seems like how this played out to me. Well, he’s got a $10 million non-g guaranteed contract for next year, and I think he would probably have accepted it had the Nuggets been willing to pick that up to guarantee his arrival, which is maybe one of the reasons why he didn’t make this comment for a month. I was going to say, do you think that you think that interview with Basket News would have happened a little bit earlier had that uh had the Nuggets guaranteed? I think so. I think so. because it was less money to play in Greece. You know, the the European contracts, they’re after taxes, whereas the NBA contracts are before taxes. So, the difference, especially, not to get into geopolitics, but the dollar is not performing well. Um, bonds can talk all about that after he’s just spent euros for the last two weeks. Um, father-in-law was picking up all the bills. Don’t act like Bond is spending a dime. [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause]

On The Hoop Collective, Tim Bontemps and Tim MacMahon join Brian Windhorst to discuss the top tiers in the Western Conference and react to Jonas Valanciunas committing to joining the Denver Nuggets.

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