Earlier today I looked at the best Eastern Conference division bets, now I’ll turn my eye to the West. Let’s dive right in.
Northwest Division
This division is absolutely stacked, but even as such, I’ll be on the favorite. This is less a fading of Minnesota and Denver, and more just a whole lot of trust in the Thunder.
Minnesota basically runs back the exact same squad as last year, just with Joe Ingles in the Kyle Anderson role. Anthony Edwards will be another year older and wiser, but they also had excellent health and shooting luck last season. I still very much see a 50-win team here, but again, I am just even higher on the Thunder.
For Denver, they were one of the more befuddling regular season teams last year—seemingly chasing regular season wins despite being fresh off a title run. This regular season focus seemed to burn them in the playoffs when Jamal Murray was clearly dinged up, and the team as a whole looked gas in the second round against the Wolves.
So, will this team once again burn the candle down in the regular season? Logically, the answer would be no, but this is a team that has gone over their regular season win total in each of the last five seasons under head coach Michael Malone—maybe it’s just his thing.
Even if Denver goes over their win total again, somehow, I’ll still like the Thunder to win the division this year at plus odds. This Thunder team made a massive leap from their win total in 2022-23 to 23-24, but I believe every part of it. And they’ve had the best offseason of any team in the league, maybe outside of Philly.
I mentioned Hartenstein’s insane value when talking about fading the KNicks—well the inverse is naturally true here as well. He’s literally the perfect fit for a Thunder team that struggled on the glass in 2023-24. Alex Caruso isn’t so much of a fit, as just another insane weapon in their two-way, do-everything wings. Depth is king in the modern NBA, and the Thunder depth is absolutely mind melting. Their roster is young, talented, smart, motivated, skilled, and well-coached. I almost couldn’t be higher on this team. They will face questions in the postseason as to whether they can maintain their regular season levels of shooting, and whether head coach Mark DAigneualt is a regular season only coach, but for the regular season itself, I’ll be buying ALL the Thunder stock.
I mentioned in the Eastern Conference article that I am choosing to wait to play most of my division favorite bets, so the same mostly holds up here. The Thunder are technically plus money, but I don’t see the Wolves and Nuggets being priced all that much worse come regular season, so I’m fine waiting until then. But I also wouldn’t blame folks for wanting to get in on them ASAP.
Best Bet: Thunder +150 (DraftKings, could play but also could probably wait)
Pacific Division
The division with the likely tightest spread for regular season win totals when we get them, naturally I am going for the two “longshots” in the division.
The Warriors quietly had one of my favorite offseasons. Losing Klay is obviously a big blow for a fanbase who has some of their best memories with him. But the fact is, his actual on-court impact had massively diminished in recent seasons. Replacing him with: Kyle Anderson, De'Anthony Melton, and Buddy Hield, along with more minutes for their very promising youngsters has me far higher on Golden State than the market appears to be.
And this is all before the fact that they have been the team most closely connected with Lauri Markkanen. If they get Lauri, I”ll be all over their title futures, too.
I have the Warriors projected atop the division, so being able to get them with the longest odds listed is a gift from the Gods. I actually do like Phoenix (the Monte Morris signing is quietly a perfect fit), but as someone who bet the Suns win total under last season, I can tell you that the schedule broke SO perfectly for them last year. They played the easy part of their schedule when they were trying to handle injuries, and then when they were playing at their best was when they were able to at least float against the tough part of the schedule. Play that season over, and I don’t think they get to 49 wins.
I am also lower on both L.A. teams than the market, though that is far from surprising. They always seem to be overpriced. The Clippers, in particular, would seem to have the potential for the bottom to just completely fall out, if it wasn’t for the fact that they have no draft picks to tank for, and a billionaire owner moving into a new stadium.
The Kings are the other team I am intrigued by, but at a much lesser extent than the Warriors. Some folks were out on the DeMar DeRozan signing, but I don’t think those folks have actually been following him lately. DeMar has quietly been putting up excellent seasons in middling Chicago, and a trio of Fox-Sabonis-DeRozan brings an incredibly high regular season floor. DeMar and Damontas in particular are among the most reliable regular season players year after year, and in a squished-up division, I could totally see them emerging on top.
Best Bet: Warriors +475 (DraftKings)
Bet: Kings +425 (DraftKings)
Southwest Division
While the Pacific might have the highest win total floor, the Southwest is easily the most fun division.
It contains the reigning Western Conference champs in Dallas; two consistent NBA hipster teams in Memphis and New Orleans; and then two, young and up-and-coming in-state rivals to Dallas.
Reading that out, maybe it’s not the most fun for everyone, but part of why I see this division as so fun is because it’s where I think I am the furthest off the market, the sharps, everyone!
Dallas are (probably fairly) the preseason division favorites, but I have them projected third. Yes, they hit the turbo button after the trade deadline, but they were a 47-win team by Pythag, and they are now coming off a lengthy postseason run which racked up minutes galore for everyone on the roster including their literally-always-nursing-something (and certainly-always-letting-you-know-about-it) superstar, Luka Doncic. Kyrie Irving was actually very reliable last season, and it could well be a maturity growth and he will now be that guy, but I’d love to see it for more than a few months. Klay intrigues me as a postseason addition, but to reiterate from before, he’s not nearly the night-to-night contributor he once was.
Memphis is the team you’re going to hear a lot of people saying “don’t forget about” this preseason, but I have some doubts. Steven Adams—and to a lesser degree, Dillon Brooks—were very essential to their success when they were racking up 50-win seasons. In 2022-23, when the Grizzlies were a 51-win team, they did a lot of that damage with Adams. In fact, they were 23-17 (46-win pace) without Adams that season, which is around where I see them this season. Solid! But being priced as such.
And while I, for one, welcome our new Wemby overlord, I can’t quite get to them winning this division in 2024-25. Believe, I want to be there, but give it one more season (the Spurs are certainly looking like that’s their approach).
That leaves two teams, and two teams I am quite interested in.
First, the Pelicans are kind of the Hawks West for me, a team I find myself coming back to time and time again. It worked well for the most part last season, with a 49-win season that easily cashed their over before flaming out a bit in the first round against the Thunder.
I actually wanted to be even higher on the Pelicans (if you listened to the first post-Finals Green Dot Daily I mentioned being intrigued by them as title longshots!) but I actually am not in love with the offseason so far. In sending out Dyson Daniels and Larry Nance Jr., they give up two key defensive cogs, albeit to bring in a much bigger name in Dejounte Murray. I do have some hope that head coach Willie Green can get Murray to regain his defensive prowess, because if so, it could raise their ceiling notably.
However, with the question marks hanging over Brandon Ingram, the Pelicans are just a lean right now. I’ll almost certainly find my way to them before the season starts, but I’d rather have the full feel for them before hopping in.
It’s the final team, the Houston Rockets, that are my favorite bet in the Western Conference. I’m amazed I’m here too, as I was giving out Rockets win total unders just a mere 12 months ago. But I’m a convert.
The Rockets took the massive jump from 22 wins in 2022-23 to 41 wins last season, but even more impressive, their net rating went from a -8.6 non-garbage time net rating team to +2.1 last season, a jump of 25 ([) wins, per Cleaning the Glass. (Tell me again, how Ime Udoka didn’t win Coach of the Year?!)
Now, typically with a jump that big, it might make sense to be on the plexiglass side of things, looking for a coming back to earth for a team that jumped so notably. But there are several reasons to believe in the jump, and maybe even hope for more in 2024-25.
For one, the core is in fact young, with many key players in the age range where making a leap could be expected rather than fluky. They also brought in the perfect coach to do so. Going from Stephen Silas (a nice guy but one who was entirely overwhelmed) to Ime Udoka paid massive and immediate dividends. The Rockets also put faith in veterans Fred VanVleet and Dillon Brooks coming in and being the types to instill the right approach at the top of the roster under Udoka—another massive win.
The defense going from 29th to seventh in a single season is absolutely amazing and a credit to those three. (I know a lot of smart folks have qualms with Brooks’ defensive impact but I have always thought that he holds value that is missing a bit in the numbers.)
This year’s roster is going to look much the same (though I do like rookie Reed Sheppard and will still fly the flag for A.J. Griffin as well), but there’s a few factors in thinking they can sustain if not improve. For one, their best player, Alperen Sengun is just 21 years old and was tracking towards a potential Most Improved Player conversation before picking up an injury that cost him 19 games. Amen Thompson (20), Jabari Smith Jr. (20), and Cam Whitmore (21) are also all potential breakout candidates, but there’s one more name who fits both these categories.
TARI EASON SZN!
Not to be the ultimate NBA hipster, but I do absolutely adore Tari Eason. The 22-year-old defensive beast, is absolutely a Jalen Johnson All-Star, and it’s no coincidence he has popped by every impact metric his first two seasons. He played only 22 games last season, and is also primed for a breakout.
If it feels like I’ve mentioned a dozen names for the Rockets, that’s the final point. They have arguably 13 solid NBA rotation players on this roster, and in a league where the two most important regular season factors are depth and coaches who can draw nightly motivation, Houston is quietly a poor man’s version of Boston and OKC. In my initial win total projections I have the Rockets atop the southwest, which is patently absurd, and I will likely tweak as the offseason proceeds, but the point remains that getting them at +1200 to win the division is an absolute steal, and my best bet for the Western Conference.
Best Bet: Rockets +1200 (FanDuel)
Lean: Pelicans +340 (FanDuel)
