A Rare NBA Season, Upheaval in Denver, & Other Final Week Notes

The Celtics currently stand at 58 wins, with four games remaining. If they win two of their final four games, something that seems imminently achievable, they will become the season's third 60-win team, joining the Thunder and Cavaliers. If this seems like a thing that doesn't happen very often, that's because it doesn't happen very often. The last time it happened was the 2008-2009 season, when the Cavs (66 wins), Lakers (65), and Celts (62) all cleared the 60-win bar (ironically, it was the 59-win Magic who reached the NBA Finals).

It is a stark contrast with just a couple of years ago, when no team cleared the 60-win mark during the 2022-2023 season. Two big things happened that changed the equation since. One, the Celtics put the rest of the league on notice with the masterful trades for Kristaps Porziņģis and Jrue Holiday. And second, far too many teams are tanking for Cooper Flagg.

A historic regular season is likely to lead to a historic offseason. There's a very good chance that the league looks dramatically different come October. But we don't need to focus on that now, as it's nearly time for the playoffs!

Upheaval in Denver

The general reaction to the news that the Denver Nuggets fired their coach and GM today were met with shock and surprise in a lot of NBA media circles. But I can't say I was surprised. Here's what I wrote about the Nuggets back in October:

3rd - Denver: I was tempted to drop them even further, but I think Nikola Jokić is good enough to keep them here. The question will be if coach Michael Malone will play Julian Strawther and Peyton Watson enough that they can be trusted in the playoffs, or if he'll just lean on Russell Westbrook and Dario Šarić.

I'm not optimistic about him playing the young guys, and if Denver is bounced before the conference finals again, the team may have a new head coach next season.

As we sit here today, Malone has done a good job of integrating Christian Braun. He's started 74 of 76 games played, and averaged 33.9 minutes per game. Great! But Russell Westbrook has started 36 of 72 games, and averaged 28.1 minutes per game. Terrifying. When Westbrook was supposed to be an energy guy who would get some minutes off the bench, his arrival in Denver was welcome. And that is what happened at the outset. Over the first 20 games of the season, he started only three times and averaged a high-but-reasonable 24.1 minutes per game. Since then, it's been a much different story.

From Game 21 on Dec. 5th to Game 48 on Jan. 31st, Westbrook started 24 of 28 games, and averaged 30.2 minutes per game. He also shot well from the floor, shooting .538, and that was with a .308 3-pt percentage. His .642 2-pt percentage was fantastic. But then he strained his hamstring and missed seven games, coming back after the All-Star break after a solid 20 days off. Since then, he's been horrible. He's shooting just .411 in the second half, and while he's not starting as many games (nine of 24), he's still playing a ton – an average of 29.1 minutes per game. And as you would expect, he's costing his team games, just as he has since Kevin Durant stopped being his teammate nine seasons ago. Since Durant left for Golden State, Westbrook's teams have won a grand total of one game in the second round, and that season he had James Harden as a teammate.

While Westbrook has been playing so many minutes, Peyton Watson, Julian Strawther, and Jalen Pickett haven't been elevated in the way that at least one of them realistically needs to be. All of them are playing more this season, but with the exception of sometimes seeing Watson when Aaron Gordon has been hurt, none of them are consistently playing crunch time. So you're left with a situation where you can't trust Westbrook because he always does stupid things that cost his team games, but you also can't trust Watson, Strawther, and Pickett, because they still don't have the reps.

The bottom line is the coach and the front office haven't been aligned for awhile, and neither party is covering themselves in glory. I harped on the Westbrook stuff, but just as damning for the front office is wasting money and a roster spot on Dario Šarić, who has been beyond useless in a Denver uniform. The Nuggets haven't failed to reach the Conference Finals just yet, and you never say never, but unless Jamal Murray is suddenly 100% – and that sounds unlikely – they have very, very, very little chance of doing that, because they've left themselves very little wiggle room.

Who Deserves to Capture the Flagg

Very soon, the playoff field will be set, and that also means the lottery field will be set. We know that nine teams are locked out of the playoffs, and Phoenix probably is too. One thing I've been thinking about with these teams is which most deserves to get Cooper Flagg. Deserve is a funny word, but in this context what I mean is who has gone about the game the right way. Who has tanked less shamelessly than other teams, in other words. Among the teams we know are out, I think there is one clear choice, and four other deserving teams.

• The Clear Choice – Washington Wizards: The Wizards have put themselves in a great position to tank ethically by trading away their best players and bringing back in return guys who have been injured a lot in recent years. By trading away Kyle Kuzma and Jonas Valančiūnas in season, and Deni Avdija before the season, the Wizards cleared out for their young players in a way that other teams didn't do. It's a notable contrast to Utah, where veteran guys who should be playing like Lauri Markkanen, John Collins, and Jordan Clarkson have suited up for less than half the season, and have sat out a lot of games with what would charitably called phantom injuries. Washington hasn't done that. Khris Middleton and Malcolm Brogdon are always hurt, and Marcus Smart has been hurt quite a bit the last two seasons. As a result, Alex Sarr has really made a lot of strides, and I now don't feel ridiculous to say that I see some brief glimpses of Kevin Garnett in him. Bub Carrington looks good as well, and I remain high on Bilal Coulibaly. Cooper Flagg would drop neatly into a starting five with those three guys and one of Jordan Poole/Middleton/Smart/Brogdon next season, and that is the makings of a respectable team. Washington has done a great job tearing this thing down, and I think are poised to build back up quickly. I hope they get Flagg.
• Deserving Teams – Charlotte, New Jersey, Portland, San Antonio: I think Charlotte just deserves to have something nice happen to them. They saw a year ahead of everyone else that Terry Rozier was turning into a pumpkin, they hired a universally lauded guy as their head coach in Charles Lee, and they handled the Mark Williams trade retraction with class. They'd be my second pick. New Jersey, Portland, and San Antonio all have played hard this season, and haven't tanked on the court even a little bit. They're trying to win every game, and are succeeding more frequently than people would expect. Kudos to them.
• Not Deserving Teams – Utah, Toronto: Both have been intentionally sitting guys out of entire games, and also playing regulars in the first three quarters and then sitting them in the fourth in an attempt to lose games (this is far worse in my opinion, because it involves the coaches in the chicanery). So these are the two teams I don't want to see rewarded for their cowardice, which means it's likely these are one of the two teams who will land Flagg. Such is life.
• Inept Teams Who I Wouldn't Wish My Worst Enemy On – Philadelphia, New Orleans, Phoenix: You could add Dallas and Sacramento here, but Phoenix is so mindblowingly, historically inept that both Dallas and Sacramento are at least going to sneak into the play-in, and maybe even the playoffs.

Jaylen Looks Better!

I don't think Jaylen Brown is truly past his knee troubles, but the past couple of games, he looks to be zoning in on how to play with the knee pain. It's an encouraging sign, and while I'll probably be in Worried Dad mode watching his every move for the entirety of the playoffs, I'm starting to feel better about him. And I'm a little sad that he seems to be getting left out of the All-NBA conversation entirely. It'll be interesting to hear the conversation around him if he pushes himself to play in three of these final four games to reach eligibility status.

I Wish People Could Wait

In that same vein, this week has brought a lot of discussion about MVP, All-NBA, All-Defense, and other awards. But as much is settled, there's still plenty left unsettled, and I wish people would wait for the regular season to end before declaring their picks. Giannis' and Jokic's teams are limping to the finish. So has Cleveland's defense. Houston has come on super strong, as has Indiana, Minnesota, and Golden State. And yet, a lot will change in the final week. Let's just give it one more week!

Making an Example of Ja Morant

I get why the league is making an example out of Ja Morant's gun salute. He's really just kind of his own worst enemy slash may be a very stupid person, but to be fair to him, he's been doing this gesture for as long as I can remember, including the game before he got in trouble for it, against the C's. This is from the second quarter, after he hit a 30' three-pointer:

And if it isn't clear from the TNT logo, this was also a nationally televised game.

I really don't think anyone is asking for the NBA to be the fun police here. The guy hit a great shot, and wanted to celebrate. I may not love this particular salute, but that just ups my engagement level with the product, because I want to see a guy like that get dunked on after he does something stupid like this. It's also a slippery slope. It seems reasonable that a majority of NBA fans think guns are bad. But it's definitely not 100%, and probably not even 75%, and the last thing the NBA wants is to get drawn into a debate about guns. And what about the next celebration they feel crosses some sort of other line? Will it be so black and white next time? If you even think this situation was black and white to begin with.

You can believe that Ja Morant is dumb for making this gesture, and that his response to being fined for it was equally dumb (and tone deaf – no one cares enough about you to make you a villain, dude). But it can also be true that the NBA really doesn't want to wade in too hard on this, especially when the player in question has been making the same hand gesture for years and is rightfully wondering why now he's being fined for it.