Southeast Division Preview

The Southeast is the true middle class of the NBA. There are no 1% title contenders to be had down in Coke country, but there shouldn’t be any pan handling ping-pong ball beggars either. Miami figures to return to the playoffs, but can they stay healthy enough to reclaim the now meaningless division title from Atlanta? Charlotte may have righted a wrong in shipping out Lance Stephenson, but their wrongs have outweighed their rights for a decade and counting. Do any of them pose a realistic threat to the Cavs in the playoffs? Probably not.

Atlanta Hawks 

Additions: Walter Tavares (draft), Tiago Splitter (Spurs), Tim Hardaway Jr. (Knicks), Justin Holiday (Warriors), Paul Millsap (re-signed)

Subtractions: DeMarre Carroll (Raptors), Pero Antic (Istanbul)

Storylines:

1.  Can the Hawks match their unexpected franchise best 60-win season from a year ago? The Cavs are still atop the Eastern Conference rolling hill (can’t really call it a mountain), but the rest of the conference figures to be a wee bit more competitive.

2. This is the final season of Al Horford’s scratch and dent bargain contract. We now live in a world where Enes Kanter is going to make $4.4 million per year more than Al Horford for playing basketball. With the plethora of teams that have significant cap room next summer, Horford will be a high free agent priority for many. Will he pull an Aldridge and bolt to a team with a proven record of playoff success?

Player I’d Love to Have: Kyle Korver. The Cavs are well-stocked with guys who can get hot from downtown, but none provides the reliability Korver does on a nightly basis. He’s shot over .375 in 12 of his 13 seasons, and rang up a bonkers .492 on six attempts per game last season.

Player I Love to Hate: Al Horford’s sister. Most of the celebrities that I’ve met are genuinely nice folks. Their relatives on the other hand, can be steaming puddles of community Slumdog Millionaire diarrhea muck. The worst of which I had the displeasure of meeting was Leon Hendrix, the brother of Jimi Hendrix—which is exactly how he introduced himself after his opening pitch of “do you know who I am?” Leon is currently touring the fair circuit across the country, bastardizing his dead brother’s music for money because, and I quote, “Jimi came down to me in a purple haze of a dream, and told me that I had to be keeper of the flame for his music for a new generation.” Just before he walked out on his bar tab, I did a quick Google search and discovered that Leon has a long history with drug abuse, and that he was in jail for stealing a fur coat when Jimi died. From the realm of divine intervention that would make a stone cold atheist sing a gospel, Leon was shut out of the insanely profitable Jimi Hendrix estate. Leon may have lived in the same uterus as Jimi Hendrix, but Jimi sucked all of the talent out of that womb. At least Leon can play guitar, though. Anna Horford appears to have fewer talents.

Prediction: 52-30 Eliminated in the second round

Charlotte Hornets 

Additions: Frank Kaminsky (draft), Nicolas Batum (Blazers), Spencer Hawes (Clippers), Jeremy Lamb (Thunder), Jeremy Lin (Lakers),

Subtractions: Lance Stephenson (Clippers), Gerald Henderson (Blazers), Bismack Biyombo (Raptors), Noah Vonleh (Blazers), Mo Williams (The Land of Believe)

Storylines:

1.  Does Rich Cho get fired during the season? A team that once looked like they were on the way up, now looks like first round fodder as a best case scenario.

2. How bad will the trade they turned down from the Celtics look in a couple seasons? That could have been a franchise altering deal, and they turned it down to keep Frank Kaminsky, who doesn’t appear to be a franchise altering player.

Player I’d Love to Have: I’ve wanted MKG since the 2012 draft. I get that his jumper looks like he’s giving the invisible man a cross-face chicken wing, but you can play four on five on offense when LeBron, Love and Kyrie are on the court. MKG is going to be an elite perimeter defender for the foreseeable future, and with the cap bump coming, his 4-year, $52 million contract will be an absolute bargain. Would the Hornets trade MKG straight up for Tristan Thompson? It might make sense for the Hornets, so I doubt it.

Player I Love to Hate: Tyler Hansbourgh if for no other reason than his eyes always look like he just left a bar loaded and he’s looking in the rear view mirror at a police car behind him.

Prediction: 36-46

I’m intrigued by Batum and MKG on the wing, but Charlotte will struggle to find balance between units that can defend and units that can score. I lived in near by Gastonia in middle school, and I was genuinely pumped when the Hornets got their nickname back. A year later, they appear to be the Denver of the East, with an island of misfit toy roster. Another rebuild could be in play in the near future.

Miami Heat 

Additions: Justise Winslow (draft), Gerald Green (Suns), Amar’e Stoudemire (Mavericks), Goran Dragic (re-signed), Dwyane Wade (re-signed)

Subtractions: Michael Beasley (malcontent blackballed), Shabazz Napier (Magic)

Storylines:

1. Can they stay healthy? A year removed from LeBron’s exodus, the Heat struggled with health and missed the playoffs for the first time since 2008. If everything goes right for them, they could be a problem. If house cats had thumbs, and could fire hand guns, they could be a problem.

2. Will we finally see a Cavs/Heat playoff series five years into the making? I’ve wanted this for years. I would day dream constantly about it during the dark ages. Last year it looked it was going to happen in the first round, but Miami couldn’t keep up their end of the deal.

3. Will Riley be able to lure Kevin Durant to South Beach? The roster might need some heavy augmentation, but the franchise has a history of success that the Thunder can’t come close to.

Player I’d Love to Have: Justise Winslow. Pat Riley’s pact with Satan was renewed on draft night, as the versatile wing fell all the way to the 10th pick, right into Riley’s lamb blood stained lap.

Player I Love to Hate: Riley. I love to have someone to hate. Heels tell the story, and Riley is a great one. He’s an arrogant opportunist with a history of being a backstabber, and he’s universally praised for it. Watching his press conference where he basically said any player who leaves the Heat is a coward is hilarious in retrospect.

Prediction: 48-34 Eliminated in the first round

My disdain for the Miami Heat is well documented, and while I’d love to have a soap box to show the world how much hate I have in my heart, I have a pretty severe tension headache at the moment. The headache led to me vomiting up stomach acid into my nostrils, and the intense burning in my nasal passage, just magnified the crippling vice on my nerves. I wouldn’t wish this pain on my worst enemy—I would wish this pain on ALL of my enemies, which includes every single member of the Miami Heat organization from Mickey all the way down to the cats who clean the arena in the fourth quarter after everyone has left early.

Orlando Magic 

Additions: Mario Hezonja (draft), Jason Smith (Knicks), C.J. Watson (Pacers), Tobias Harris (re-signed)

Subtractions: Kyle O’Quinn (Knicks), Ben Gordon (malcontent blackballed), Luke Ridnour (Grizzlies/Hornets/Thunder/Raptors)

Storylines:

1. Will new coach Scott Skiles’ fourth head coaching job follow the script of his first three gigs? In each of his previous stops he has taken the squad a step towards contention, then he eventually burned his team out and they gave up on him.

2. Will the Magic make a move for a playoff push? They have the assets needed to pick up a player in his prime.

Player I’d Love to Have: Victor Oladipo. You already know. Don’t bother comparing them.

Player I Love to Hate: I can’t say I really hate a player on their roster, but I do hate that Stuff the Magic Dragon, the team’s mascot, appears to have a pair of busted up straws coming out of his nostrils.

Prediction: 35-47

They’ll have a growth spurt towards relevance under a credible NBA head coach. I love their youth, and regardless of whether they make the playoffs, they have a great foundation to lure their biggest free agent since T-Mac.

Washington Wizards 

Additions:  Kelly Oubre (draft), Jared Dudley (Bucks), Alan Anderson (Nets), Gary Neal (Hornets), Drew Gooden (re-signed)

Subtractions: Paul Pierce (Clippers)

Storylines:

1. Will Bradley Beal’s contract extension become a distraction?

2. Will Randy Wittman become the NBA’s Marvin Lewis? Wittman seemed on the verge of being canned during the 2013-14 season after an 0-12 start, then the Wizards surprisingly advanced to the Conference Semifinals, and he was granted a stay of execution with a two-year contract extension with a year three team option a few months later. This past season, the Wizards blew a 2-1 series lead to the Hawks squad that got promptly dusted by the Cavs. If the team formerly known as the Bullets fail to advance to the Conference Finals, Wittman could be shown the door in favor of whoever Kevin Durant wants. Which leads us to…

3. Will Kevin Durant go home? It won’t garner the hoopla of LeBron’s return, but it will be boiling under the surface of everything the Wizards do this season.

Player I’d Love to Have: Beal. If the ping pong balls would have dropped a little differently in 2012, he probably would be a Cav. If he would have been a Cav, Colin McGowan never would have established the cult anti-hero of Saint Weirdo, and I wouldn’t have written a follow up article on December 2nd, 2014 pathetically pleading Griffin not to trade Waiters, that was spookily published on January 5th, 2015,  mere hours before Waiters was dealt. The article is spooky in it’s own regard, and for a brief time it made me think I mysteriously controlled the fate of the Cavs via this blog, like some horrible television series that will be debuting this fall on CBS.

Player I Love to Hate: John Wilkes Booth. He was born in nearby (okay it’s like an hour away) Bel Air, Maryland. Either way, he’s an all-time evil-doer and he deserves our hate and so do the Wizards.

Prediction: 51-31 Eliminated in the Conference Finals Conference Semifinals

The last time the Washington professional basketball team reached the Conference Finals was 1979. Jim Henson’s first full-length feature The Muppet Movie, was also released in 1979. In a few hours, The Muppets return to the small screen. My parents actually had Miss Piggy and Kermit on top of their wedding cake…

On second thought, my parents haven’t spoken to one another in 19 years. I already know that I’ve built up The Muppets sitcom so much in my head that it will never meet the unattainable expectations that I’ve set for it like… The Swedish Chef ditching the rest of the Muppets to becomes a Gordon Ramsey reality TV tyrant (Is Ramsey actually based on The Swedish Chef?) with Stadler and Waldorff as the judges on his cooking show. Then Gonzo challenges TSC and becomes a Guy Fieri-like pop culture icon…Fozzy becoming a internet sensation via stealing others jokes al a Josh “The Fat Jew” Ostrovsky, then being brutally mocked by the comics he wished were his peers at The Comedy Store (So Fozzy)… and many more that walk the line on being too inappropriate for this blog, thus they will be omitted. Those Wizards fans hoping that Durant becomes the centerpiece of new D.C. dynasty are probably setting themselves up for disappointment too.