In the East, my vote would be Brooklyn or Atlanta.
Brooklyn is deep at just about every position. Mikal Bridges is a very good scorer. Cam Johnson a very talented 2-way player. Dinwiddie a solid 2-guard. Claxton is one of the more impressive young centers in the league. A lot rides on Simmons and if he can be 75 percent of what he once was. At the very least, he looks to be in shape entering the season. Brooklyn looks to have a plethora of two-way players. The question is if Bridges can be the main scorer on a contending title team.
Atlanta has Trae Young, who is now flying under the radar as one of the best scoring guards in the NBA, and many solid defensive pieces surrounding him in Murray, Hunter, Capela. If Trae can get a hot in a playoff series, you never know.
In the West, I think it’s Minnesota. On paper, they are loaded with talent. Ant, KAT, McDaniels, Gobert, Reid, Conley and Anderson might be as good of a first 7 you will find in the league today. Of course, the main question is — can Chris Finch make Towns and Gobert work offensively? We saw how tough Minnesota can be in the Denver series last year. With most everyone on their roster now having multiple years of playoff experience in addition to having continuity among their depth chart and coaching staff, they are my sneaky pick to make the West finals this year.
Who is your sneaky pick in each conference to make a deep playoff run? Or do you believe there’s no logical selection?
In the East the Bucks and Celtics are such heavy favorites you could pick the 3rd best team and they would be considered a Dark Horse. IMO the team with the best chance to upset BOTH Milwaukee and Boston is Cleveland.
Cleveland has Donovan Mitchell who's basically Steph Lite.
Darius Garland will be moving into his prime and be a top 3 PG in the east.
Evan Mobley is already a very good defensive PF that scores above average from the paint we could see a big jump in his 3rd season.
Jarrett Allen a double double machine who's an above average defender.
Caris LeVert a 6'6" glue guy that can do it all for Cleveland.
Anyway they are my choice for Dark Horse as they at least have the size to deal with Giannis.
I love Garland but with Mitchell who absorbs so much usage, Garland won’t reach his his prime yet
exactly this. stunted Mobley's development too.
CLE is going to be dangerous after the Mitchell deal likely coming in the upcoming offseason, but not this year.
Mobley and Allen got physically dominated by Mitch Robinson in the playoffs, what makes you think Giannis and Brook won't do the same thing?
Also, I have zero faith in any Mitchell team being more than a first round sweet heart that gets destroyed in the second round.
Keep counting us out
We were written off because the knicks embarrassed us in the playoffs so everyone forgot how good we were in the regular season. We’ve addressed our spacing issue and at least a bit of our big man depth. But with our young stars getting better and having more chemistry, I think we’re nearing the contender stage.
I think Cleveland is the best answer here.
Hardly anyone has even mentioned Cleveland since their disaster in the playoffs, they get another chance at the playoffs, as even a 3 seed this year and they could be dangerous.
I think the problem with the Cavs is that there starting 4 and 5 can’t stretch the floor. I like the Cavs but I think their playoff success ultimately comes down to Mobley and how much of a threat he becomes on offense. If Mobley can become more of a threat on offense cavs are my dark horse.
If Mobley can start shooting 3s cavs are scary. Mobley is still so young so it’s reasonable that he doesn’t reach his offensive ceiling for a few more seasons, you just hope he can get there while Donovan Mitchell is still around.