Welcome to a new month, ladies and gentlemen. With madness being closely correlated to March, it's only right that we shake up the scene on the NBA end of things and get audacious on what may, or may not be ahead for the remainder of the season. The past few months in the Association have been nothing less than entertaining and we know that was only scratching the surface with playoffs quickly approaching. The real drama awaits as our writers tap into what they believe is in the crystal ball over the next few months.
So let's get bolder than bold and see just what the Action Network crew has in their predictions for the rest of this NBA campaign.
The Philadelphia 76ers were a game away from reaching the Eastern Conference Finals last season. This season, they have aspirations of getting back there and the NBA Finals for the first time since 2001. The Sixers looked like a team with a shot to get there with a healthy Joel Embiid. They got off to a 29-13 start this season and looked like one of the top challengers to the Celtics in the East. However, since Embiid's 70-point game against the Spurs, the Sixers are just 4-13 over their past 17 games.
In their last 15 games, Philadelphia is 29th in defensive rating (120.9) and last in net rating (-9.9). Embiid has missed the past 13 games and he remains out for the foreseeable future with a torn meniscus. He is set to be re-evaluated soon. Pending on that re-evaluation, we are looking at a late March/early April return for Embiid, if he returns at all this season.
Without Embiid, the Sixers are far more likely to fall backwards than return to the top of the Eastern Conference standings. The Sixers are 7.5 games better than the Atlanta Hawks for the 10th seed, so missing the play-in tournament is not jeopardy at this stage. However, participating in it is a possibility.
Philadelphia currently is tied in a three-way tie for the fifth seed with Orlando and Indiana. It is a half game ahead of Miami, who fell to the eighth seed following their 103-97 loss to the Nuggets. Just two of those teams will have to finish ahead the Sixers for them to fall to the seventh seed. Based on combined winning percentage, Orlando has the easiest remaining schedule and Miami has the fourth-easiest. Philadelphia, who has the ninth-easiest, has an advantage on Indiana has the ninth-toughest. In comparison to Philadelphia, these three teams are all trending upward. They have each won at least six of their last 10 games.
Luka Doncic Wins MVP
The perception is that Luka Doncic is a distant third behind Nikola Jokic and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, if even that high. I said on Green Dot Daily two weeks ago that then would be a great time to bet on Doncic, and now it still is.
Ultimately, this is somewhat of a longshot, but I'd argue and project that it's not as unreasonable as it may appear now that we're in March. Doncic has the production, has the star power, and could have just enough in the standings to warrant more than just strong consideration for the honor, of which he's been among the preseason favorites to win prior to each of the last few seasons.
I said it all the time, dudes have been trying to give Luka the MVP for years — rightfully so, he's great, but also, you know — so why stop now? And we have this perception that the MVP needs to come from a top seed. It was true every year at one point, but less so more recently — for example, Jayson Tatum doesn't have a chance at winning this, and you'd figure some of our homies from Boston would loooooove nothing more than to give it to him, but the Celtics are the machine, not Tatum. And the Minnesota Timberwolves might not have a guy who’ll finish top five – they’re tied for first in the west.
Two of the last seven MVPs came from teams who were the sixth seed – Nikola Jokic in 2022 and Russell Westbrook in 2017. The Mavs are tied for seventh but could easily get to five or six, health willing, and their schedule is much easier than some of the teams in their vicinity.
Mavs remaining strength of schedule is nearly a top-10 weakest in the league. The Suns have the toughest schedule remaining, the Lakers seventh, the Kings eighth, the Clippers ninth and the Pelicans 10th. As long as the other shoe doesn't fall on Kyrie Irving, or Dallas' continual battle with the injury report, I think Doncic's MVP case needs to be taken seriously.
Give the Cavaliers More Credit and Crown Them
By Chris Baker
I think the Cavs having the 5th best odds to win the Eastern Conference is ludicrously mispriced given the health of the 76ers and Knicks who both have better odds than them. Even if you want to ignore the struggles of the Bucks all season and say the Knicks are better when healthy, there is absolutely no way you end up with this team anywhere below 4th best in the East.
The Cavs currently have the 2nd best record in the Eastern Conference despite most people completely writing them of after significant injuries to Darius Garland and Evan Mobley. Both guys missed 2-3 months and the Cavs not only weathered the storm but actually remained near the top of the East during their absence. Their offense looks good as they are currently rank 8th in three point attempt rate and #1 in Cleaning the Glass’s “location effective field goal percentage” which essentially helps us get a sense of the shot quality a team is generating. They're also 2nd in adjusted defensive rating despite missing their best defender Mobley for half the season.
People will write this team off because of their embarrassing playoff series against the Knicks last year, but I’d argue this is absolutely not the same team with the addition of spacing and consistency from Georges Niang and Max Strus in free agency. We’ve also seen Isaac Okoro become a legitimate two-way player this season as he is shooting a career high 41% from three on respectable volume (2.8 3PA).
The biggest reason they struggled last year was lack of consistent spacing and terrible defensive rebounding and it appears they solved both those issues as they now rank 3rd best in defensive rebound rate on the season. This is clearly a top-4 team at worst and I think you can make a strong case that they are the 2nd best team in East given all the injury concerns to the Knicks, Bucks, and 76ers. Cavs 30-1 to win the championship and 10-1 to win the East are my bold predictions.
Celtics will do all three of the following: Make the conference finals, not win the title, and lose at least 5 games in the first two rounds
By Maltman
This Celtics team is on a tear, and is going to finish the NBA season with an incredible point differential and the best record in the NBA. They are favored to win the NBA title, and will be small to large favorites in every series they are in. But the playoffs are a different animal than the regular season, and the Celtics have failed to cover the series spread in their last 6 series. Let's dive into these three different legs.
First: The Celtics will make the conference finals. This isn't such a bold predictions — over the last 10 teams, 12 teams have won 60+ games, and 9 of the 12 have made the conference finals. The Celtics are really good, have a great net rating, and should be able to dispatch their first and second round opponents.
Second: The Celtics won't win the NBA title. Of those 12 teams, only 4 won the title. While Tatum is really good, NBA champions almost always have anMVP on the team, and if you ranked each champion by the quality of their best player, Tatum would be near the bottom. It's also always hard to win the title, and I don't believe in this Celtics team, even in a flawed league.
Third: The Celtics will lose at least 5 games in the first two rounds. Since the NBA went to 7 games in the first round in 2003, 13 teams have lost at least 5 games in the first two rounds, made the conference finals, and not won the NBA finals, over a span of 21 seasons. The Celtics don't cover series spreads, and Mazzula showed an inability in the playoffs last season to make timely adjustments, often playing the wrong players or not guarding the right guys. This season, the Celtics have still had difficulty scoring in clutch situations, as they did last year, and still don't have the go-to option. The teams at the bottom of the East, and their likely opponents, are solid enough to give them trouble. Aside from Miami and Philly (who took 7 games off of them last season), thePacers beat them in the in-season tournament, the Hawks took two games off of them last year, and the Knicks have played Boston really tough. It's the exact combination between these that make this a bold prediction.
Collectively, this exact result is bold, but I feel very confident in it happening. For betting, this is my favorite part of the playoffs: betting against the Celtics on the spread in each round, as they continue to fail to cover time and time again.
Monty Williams Lasts One Season In Detroit
By Alex Hinton
On the surface, the head coach on the team tied for the worst record in the NBA is an obvious candidate to be fired. What complicates this situation unique is when that same head coach just received the largest coaching contract in NBA history at that time.
The Pistons do not have Chris Paul, Devin Booker, or Kevin Durant on their team. However, they do have a talented young core with Cade Cunningham, Jaden Ivey, Ausar Thompson, and Jalen Duren. In what was supposed to be a season of growth for the club, Williams' lineups have made life more difficult for Cunningham, often with limited spacing. A primary reason for that was Williams' insistence in playing Killan Hayes over Jaden Ivey. Hayes may finish the season without a team after being waived by the Pistons on February 8th.
The Pistons set an NBA record with a 28-game losing streak that spanned two months. However, they were in many of those games, but faltered down the stretch. In clutch time this season, the Pistons are 6-22 with a -37.4 net rating. That is currently on pace to be the second-worst clutch time net rating in NBA history, a time when coaching is pivotal down the stretch.
The Miami Heat Go Back to the NBA Finals … Again
Every year, the Heat do the thing, and the masses don't get on board until too late, if at all. It wasn't long ago that they lost seven straight games, they looked disconnected, disinterested, and unable to muster yet another one of their runs. Shoot, I was out on this team shortly before the All-Star break.
But now? They've returned to their defensive identity, where they're top five in the month of February. Jimmy Butler cares and is playing like he's ramping up to do 'Playoff Jimmy' things, averaging about 24-8-6 with 2.7 stocks per game on 57/54/80 over his last nine contests — a run that began before the tail end of their seven straight losses last month.
The Heat quietly have the third-best road record in the Eastern Conference behind the Celtics and the Cavs. They haven't been great at home, but with better health and a top three easiest post-All-Star break schedule, they have a great chance to improve upon their 15-13 Kaseya record.
Realistically, there's a clear path to the No. 5 seed, and a shot at No. 4 with the injured Knicks suddenly piling up losses. If the Heat play the Knicks in Round 1 with this version of Butler, I'd favor them regardless of homecourt advantage, which would lead to the Celtics in Round 2, a nightmare for Boston given their last three series, and an Eastern Conference Finals against likely the Bucks, possibly the 76ers or Cavs, but let's be honest — it would probably be Milwaukee barring a bad Giannis Antetokounmpo or Damian Lillard injury.
We're talking about a bunch of teams the Heat have beaten in recent playoff series, and oh by the way, we're talking about the team with the most playoff wins (38), playoff series wins (8) and Finals appearances (2) over the last four seasons — the whole Butler/Bam era. This hinges on health and Jimmy being this Jimmy, if so, I'm in on them to make another run in another weird Eastern Conference year behind their playoff-hardened duo and the league’s best playoff head coach.
