NBA Teams That Should/Shouldn’t Be Worried

Nov 6, 2013; Boston, MA, USA; Boston Celtics power forward Brandon Bass (30) reacts with power forward Kelly Olynyk (41) after a play against the Utah Jazz in the second half at TD Garden. The Celtics defeated the Jazz 97-87. Mandatory Credit: David Butler II-USA TODAY Sports

The Tank

What We Expected: Phoenix, Orlando, Boston,Utah and Philadelphia were supposed to throw down their swords and willingly march to the slaughter.

What We’ve Seen: Other than Boston, all three of these teams have overachieved. Phoenix just barely lost to the San Antonio Spurs. A feisty Orlando team just beat the Clippers. This has been a very encouraging middle finger to the cult of losing. I completely understand the tactical value in gunning for a terrible record to get a great player in the draft. However building a team with the idea of coercing horrible play out of your guys is just kind of an ugly concept to grapple with. This is where “sports” and “business” collide and do battle for the soul. I have no idea what the management of these particular teams feels when they see the boxscores, but the give me an awful team playing to win games (“meaningless games” the naysayers will say!) than watching the machinations of losers hoping they MIGHT acquire the right Ping Pong ball combination for Andrew Wiggins.

In One Month: Orlando will have a moderately respectable record. Moderately. Boston should be awful. Utah may put it together, but they’re off to a pretty moribund start. Phoenix will play hard but regress to the mean. Philly will of course win 70 games to end the season with 73 wins and break the previous record. All hail (Magic) Michael (Jordan) Carter-Williams.