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04/05 Season Preview - East

First, a look at the Power Rankings (which you've already made me show you, you spoiler-hungry sluts).

Again most good teams with Cafites on them are in the West, so we might have another season of Cafite-on-Cafite action to decide who gets to represent the West, and then maybe no Cafites making it to the finals from the East. There are a couple with an okay chance, though.



Team Finances

I am not aware, game mechanics wise, whether teams can swap strategies mid-season or not. If they can, some of these might be read to be updated. If not, it's a weird choice by the newly founded Charlotte Bobcats to try to be bad and also sign maybe the strongest player in NBA history.



Let's get to the players in the Eastern Conference.

@Salt Bailly on the Washington Wizards (39-43)



Salt Bailly is like a fine vintage, he just gets better as he gets older. Actually, he was pretty good to begin with, but then I don't know a lot about wine so for all I know that's a thing they do too. He's spent his entire playing career in the 60s ratings wise. Not that he's old, it's just that this is around the time when the game decides that getting better over the span of a few years is not at all a guarantee. With Salt Bailly's improvement comes the strong improvement of several other teammates, and no significant decline. That means that the Washington Wizards are actually a rather strong team, if one with a distinct lack of a good Center (FAO hobbers/The Cat/Stobzilla)


@V.O. and @Skizzo on the Cleveland Cavaliers (31-51)




The Cavaliers are a funny old team, if you ignore the fact that they're actually quite young. But they can't seem to decide if they're good or not. On paper they have no clear weaknesses and a borderline superstar in V.O. - though borderline might be harsh given he just won the scoring and assist title. He got a little bit worse over the summer though, which he'll hope Skizzo's improvement can compensate for. They fact that they both play in the same position seems not to bother them to any great extent, though it means Skizzo's stats are worse than they would have been otherwise. Can he carry a bit more of the burden this year?


@weetee on the Indiana Pacers (45-37, Conference Finals)



The Pacers were actually quite decent last year, so you can imagine weetee's surprise when he's traded there and they are suddenly not that good, on paper. I don't actually know exactly how the game calculates the rating, because they don't seem that bad. Not good, certainly, but no very obvious weaknesses. Whatever the case, I think weetee is going to have to accept the fact that he won't be fighting for his third NBA championship this year, having been traded by Seattle. He had a good run though, and he's still 24, so let's not overreact. He's also hasn't seemed to happy with his stats so far, so maybe life without stat vampire Solius has some benefits?


@sebsheep on the New Jersey Nets (43-39, 1st Round)



sebsheep is another one who is slightly surprised that his ostensibly playoff-quality team - given they made the playoffs, I mean - is now counted among the worst in the entire league. I think the fact that several of the players declined a bit has something to do with it, and that includes sebsheep. Very similar stories to weetee, though, in that he's also 24, also has a contract for only two more years, and is on a team where he'll be pretty important. Also he won't win anything.


@oneniltothearsenal on the Miami Heat (39-43)



The betting markets are predicting Miami to have their worst season in a while. Their case is different to the others though, as there's no dearth of top quality players. Both oneniltothearsenal himself and his new teammate Tim Duncan are very solid players. But the rest of the starting 5 consists of two decent players and downright terrible player. oneniltothearsenal himself is bound to the team for a few more years, but there are a lot of expiring contracts otherwise, so this doesn't have to be the end of onenil's playoff ambitions. Just, you know, a hiatus of his playoff ambitions.


@BenitoSTARR on the New York Knicks (41-41, 1st Round)



Speaking of playoff ambitions, here's the guy who has gone all the way twice. Last season his Knicks were suddenly not all that good, and they got swept by an almost-champions Chicago Bulls in the 1st Round of the playoffs. All of that despite BenitoSTARR becoming the regular season MVP, which should tell you how good they would be without him. This season they still have him (only very slightly diminished), and even an improved Tyrone Nesby. Hell, Brad Miller is decent. But they are the only three players on the entire 16-man roster who have a higher than 50 rating. That's... not ideal.


@hobbers on the newly formed Charlotte Bobcats



What is there to say, really? The Charlotte Bobcats are not good. Except... are they? The power rankings certainly seem to think they're not all bad. And the fact that now hobbers-less San Antonio Spurs are by far the worst team in the league makes you wonder, doesn't it? The current version of hobbers is incredibly even better than the Spurs one, so if anyone can drag a bad team to the playoffs, it's him. I have no idea what's going to happen here. Well, I'm pretty sure one amazing player isn't enough to make you title contenders, not in the West, but this should be interesting either way.

The West is going to come a bit later today, don't expect it right away.

04/05 Season Preview West

Again, here are the Power Rankings. Go to the East preview to find the team finances.



@reelworld on the Phoenix Suns (37-45)



reelworld has finally made it to his dream team, the Phoenix Suns. They're perhaps not as good as he could have wished they would be, but they're not exactly bad either. In fact, they're pretty much exactly in the middle of the pack. At least that means reelworld has a decent chance at making the playoffs - something he's only done once, and he's a much better player this time around.


@Samid on the Houston Rockets (37-45, 1st Round)



Only a small improvement for Samid, but his team remains fundamentally okay. They're not really expected to get to the playoffs, but they might. They were even worse last season and still managed to make it (albeit with a pretty poor record for a playoff team), so what's going to stop them this time? Whatever happens, we know that Samid is going to score quite a lot of points and do very little else. But that just might be enough.


@Stobzilla & @P-Nut on the Memphis Grizzlies (40-42, 1st Round)




The Memphis Grizzlies were another not-quite-impressive playoff team last year. But obviously that means they did make the playoffs - and this year they might be marginally better. It's all about the margins here. P-Nut got marginally better, Stobzilla got marginally worse. Large portions of the team have expiring contracts this year, including P-Nut, so we might see a very different Memphis next year. Right now they would probably have to do quite well for P-Nut to consider re-signing, though Stobzilla is locked in on a very cheap contract for a few years. That sounds bad (because money good), but that also means they have more money to spend on other players.


@altodevil on the Los Angeles Lakers (33-49)



altodevil has finally made it. Not necessarily to a title contender, but at the very least to a team that spends a good amount of money on stuff that isn't wages. Like training facilities. And physios. The team itself isn't half bad either, but as we've seen with altodevil in the past, that will heavily depend on whether or not they have at least a couple very reliable scorers to pick up the slack. altodevil is going to keep the other team from scoring too many, but you have to put the ball in the net to win, as Michael Owen would say. Probably.


@Solius & @The Cat on the Seattle Supersonics (64-18, NBA Champions)




It almost feels sad to do one of these for the Supersonics without weetee. They might still be the Supersonics Boys, but there's one less Boy. As if inspired by the heartbreaking sacrifice weetee made (by being traded against his will to Indiana), both Solius and The Cat have made some significant improvements over the off-season. This means that Seattle are the champion favourites for the I-don't-even-know'th year in a row. Can they make it three rings? They have the formula of one superstar and no clear weaknesses.


@Dr. Dwayne on the Denver Nuggets (47-35, 2nd Round)



Speaking of Solius, here's Dr. Dwayne. If that sounds like a strange transition to you, that's only because you don't know what I know. Which is that Solius and Dr. Dwayne two out of only four Cafites in the top 100 of career progression in overall rating (and in this case it includes everyone, since the game has ratings and stats for every season since the first NBA season). They're currently joint 4th, with a 31 increase since they were drafted. The Nuggets were decent last year, and look even better this year. The only thing that might keep them back is the fact that they have 3 Short Forwards in the starting lineup and a single god-awful Center on the entire team.



@Dan on the Utah Jazz (45-37, 1st Round)



Dan is kind of like Salt Bailly. He's not the best player around, but he's still pretty good, and he's never bad. Like Salt Bailly he also keeps getting marginally better. The Utah Jazz are one superstar away from actually being quite good, and they're probably not going to get one unless they make some very clever trades. But while 7 pretty good players probably isn't going to win any titles, it might just be enough to get back to the playoffs.