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You’ve likely heard it repeated that this NBA season has no obvious front-runner, but the parity runs quite a bit deeper. We could, in fact, argue that this season contains more parity than any other in NBA history. Here are some relevant numbers:
The Boston Celtics lead the NBA with a net rating of plus-6.1. If that holds, this would be the first season this century in which no team managed to crack plus-7. A typical champion is pushing double figures.The defending Western Conference champion is below .500. The three preseason Western Conference favorites have a combined record of 72-72.Two games separate the No. 2 and No. 5 seeds in the Eastern Conference. One of those teams gets to host a play-in team in the first round. The other won’t even have home-court advantage.The No. 6 and No. 13 seeds in the Western Conference are separated by one loss.
There will be no complaints of a predictable NBA this season. There’s no obvious answer for who will win the championship, and as such, more teams than ever are going to convince themselves between now and Feb. 9 that they can be the team that wins the championship. As such, we should expect a relatively active trade deadline.
But who is going where? We’ve covered the key sellers already, so now, let’s talk about the buyers. With so many teams in the hunt, we’ll limit things to the top six seeds in each conference as well as a few stragglers who have an increased urgency to win this season, and we’ll cover what they need, where they might get it, and what it might cost.
Boston Celtics
What they need? A shooting forward. Boston signed Danilo Gallinari in the offseason for this exact purpose, but a torn ACL knocked him out for the season. Sam Hauser filled the role beautifully early in the season, but he’s barely shot above 30 percent from deep…
Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/2023-nba-trade-deadline-buyers-guide-what-each-contender-needs-how-theyll-get-it-and-what-theyll-give-up/
Author : Sam Quinn
Publish date : 2023-01-25 14:32:25
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