Ahead of Wednesday's start to the 2015/16 NBA season, Kevin Jeffers (Eastern Conference) and Jonathan Raymond (Western Conference) will preview each team in the league. Here, a look at the Dallas Mavericks, Houston Rockets, Memphis Grizzlies, New Orleans Pelicans and San Antonio Spurs in the Southwest Division.
Dallas Mavericks
What's good: This is a veteran team who should know what they're doing, starting with Dirk Nowitzki as the example.
Chandler Parsons, Deron Williams and Wes Matthews at their best give the Mavericks a deep line-up with flexible parts, and the likes of Jose Barea, Jeremy Evans, Devin Harris and Zaza Pachulia round them out solidly.
They may not have the potential that fires up prognosticators like their ostensible play-off spot competition Utah or New Orleans, but they have players who are good right now, and that can keep them in the mix.
What's bad: They have players who are good right now, but it's hard to be sure they can actually play.
Parsons, probably their most important figure, with youth on his side and a mature outside-in scoring approach, is out for some indeterminate time with a knee injury.
Williams, a player they would hope could rehabilitate what was once a superstar career in Utah, and who at least needs to be productive for them to be competitive, is out for some indeterminate time with a calf injury.
Matthews was a 3-and-D killer last year in Portland until he tore his ACL. He signed with Dallas this summer with, you guessed it, some indeterminate time until he’ll actually play for the Mavericks.
Nowitzki meanwhile, at 37, is finally starting to show the signs of his age. He’s adapted in various ways – playing farther from the basket, refining his mid-range shot, perfecting close-range back-to-the basket shots utilising his 7-foot frame, but it’s becoming harder and harder for him to carry the load. He played far fewer minutes in a healthy season last year than in any other campaign of his career.
The short of it is, things are quickly turning ugly in Dallas.
Best-case scenario: The likes of Chandler, Williams and Matthews get on the court in a timely manner, play at roughly peak form and Nowitzki keeps holding off time for a shot at that eighth seed.
Worst-case scenario: It all falls apart – and it looks like that's already happening – and these Mavericks not only miss the play-offs, but count as among the conference's worst teams for the first time since 1999.
Houston Rockets
What's good: Ty Lawson was added this summer in a trade with Denver, giving the Rockets a true third leg they haven't really had during the James Harden-Dwight Howard era.
Lawson for years now has been one of the ultimate do-it-all glue guy point guards in the league, scoring, knocking down the occasional three, finding open teammates. His assist rate was a career-high 43 per cent last year with the Nuggets, and he should find plenty of opportunity to work the floor with the likes of Harden and Howard, not to mention useful scorers like Terrence Jones and Corey Brewer.
Defensively he doesn’t pair that well with Harden, but menace Patrick Beverley will get heavy minutes spelling both and solidifying the backcourt, and Howard is still laying a solid base inside to relieve pressure on others.
Also, the brilliant Harden might have been the best offensive player in basketball last year. Houston will score their points.
What's bad: Lawson was available because he'd been arrested for drink-driving a second time within a year. The Rockets intend to give him a stable support system, but there's no guarantee those demons won't derail his being productive for this team.
Howard’s no guarantee to be on the floor, either, after playing just 41 games last year. Donatas Motiejunas grew into one of their most important contributing players last year, and then he missed the play-offs hurt.
Jason Terry is 38. Clint Capela looked great in the play-offs filling in for Motiejunas, but the 20-year-old only played 90 minutes in the regular season.
The Rockets are, in theory, deep, and in Harden and Howard, with Lawson now, have the requisite top-shelf talent to be title contenders. But that depth could get seriously tested, and Harden aside, their elite talent is on somewhat shaky footing.
Best-case scenario: James Harden does James Harden things, Lawson gives Houston another gear and Howard stays healthy, they scratch and claw their way to a title and vindicate analytics acolyte general manager Daryl Morey.
Worst-case scenario: Injuries or other unforeseen issues turn them into a kind of harmless play-off team like Portland devolved into last year.
Memphis Grizzlies
What's good: This is still pretty much the same team who have won at least 50 games each of the last three seasons, took the champions Golden State to six games in the second round last year and went to the conference finals in 2013.
Marc Gasol has the most refined and well-rounded big man’s game in the league, creating uncanny spacing inside with his passing (19.7 per cent assist percentage last year, as a centre) and ability to work just far away enough from the hoop to keep interior defenders honest. He’s a defensive rock, as well, and enters the season as a fringe-MVP candidate.
Zach Randolph can still get buckets down low, with his crafty head fakes and muscling put-backs, and Mike Conley and Tony Allen continue to be two of the better perimeter defenders for the guard position in the game, Conley also boasting a very good offensive game.
They’ve added nice complementary spare parts, like Brandan Wright and Matt Barnes, and have no reason not to expect to be in solid contention.
What's bad: They're pretty much the same Memphis Grizzlies. Very good, but hard to picture being great enough to actually threaten for the title.
The year they went to the conference finals, Russell Westbrook got hurt in Oklahoma City and the inexperienced Warriors surprisingly took out the dangerous Nuggets in the first round, while the Rockets didn’t have Dwight Howard yet and the Clippers were a year away from DeAndre Jordan fulfilling his potential. You could argue they simply filled a vacuum – and it showed when they were unceremoniously swept by San Antonio.
That might not be entirely fair, but it still remains to be seen if this team have a higher level in them. It might simply be again that they need a few breaks and a vacuum to fill.
Best-case scenario: A couple teams fall to injuries, a couple fall to inconsistency or ill preparation, and the consistent Grizzlies fill a vacuum all the way to the NBA Finals.
Worst-case scenario: They age a little bit, and lose another year in succumbing to a better team in the play-offs.
New Orleans Pelicans
What's good: Oh, man, Anthony Davis is so good.
Davis can drive from the three point line to the hoop like a 7-foot point guard. Davis is stretching his danger zone farther and farther from the basket. Davis can keep an offence flowing with his improving passing skills. Davis will dash all your silly dreams defensively.
At 21 he was a top-five player last year by ESPN’s wins above replacement and BasketballReference’s win shares. He more or less dragged the Pelicans into the play-offs by himself.
It is growing in certainty by the day that Anthony Davis will at some point in the near future be the best basketball player on the planet, and that is a wonderful thing for New Orleans to think about.
What's bad: Right now, the rest of New Orleans really aren't very good.
They have some nice players, but no pillars to prop up Davis. Omer Asik is a nice defensive presence inside but limits what a team can do offensively. Tyreke Evans has adapted well to being a kind of point-small forward, but he’s inefficient. Eric Gordon and Ryan Anderson are borderline one-dimensional perimeter players who don’t offer much defensively. Jrue Holiday can’t stay healthy.
Sometimes they all manage to enhance what each other does and it gives Davis a base to work from. Too often it just becomes disjointed. And their peripheral tinkering, bringing in the likes of Alonzo Gee and Nate Robinson, simply isn’t going to change that calculus.
Best-case scenario: Davis manages to get even better even faster and pulls them up past the seventh seed most have them pegged for, before a short stay in the play-offs.
Worst-case scenario: Injuries or regression leave them unexpectedly fighting hard to reach the post-season.
San Antonio Spurs
What's good: It's San Antonio. Pretty much everything is good.
Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili are back for another year of rolling along with the good times. Kawhi Leonard has grown into a superstar. Another superstar, LaMarcus Aldridge, has come along to replace a merely pretty good player, Tiago Splitter. David West signed with this team for a massive discount just so the Spurs could rub it in the rest of the league’s face.
There’s only really one question lingering, so let’s venture a not-bold prediction: Aldridge will integrate into this team excellently, and it will be clear that’s happening sooner rather than later.
Oh yeah, Danny Green is a genuinely great player out on the wing, Boris Diaw and Patty Mills are good players, Kyle Anderson might become a really good player and Ray McCallum will probably be a good player out of nowhere because why not. Gregg Popovich is also the best coach in the game.
The San Antonio Spurs, proof that you can have it all.
What's bad: As Aldridge finds his way in the San Antonio system, they might be a little leaky inside defensively. Parker looked like he might have lost a crucial step at times last year and Ginobili is probably already there. Duncan will presumably slow down one of these days (we're only pretty sure about that one).
There must be, somewhere in the deepest corners of San Antonio’s hive mind, the realisation that at some point in the near or less-near future age will come upon Duncan and Parker out of nowhere like a wall in the dark. Is the Aldridge-Leonard-Green nexus good enough to withstand that?
And it’s always possible in the play-offs, like what happened last year against the Clippers, all those old legs ultimately have just enough trouble keeping up with a speedy, hyper-physical attack that they can be beat.
Best-case scenario: Aldridge lifts this team to a place that just proves untouchable for other teams and they coast to a sixth NBA title in the Duncan-Popovich era.
Worst-case scenario: They slow down more than expected, Aldridge isn't quite such a perfect fit and they suffer a shock exit in the play-offs.
