2021–22 NBA Preview: Sensing a Bizarro Western Conference

The NBA’s West is going to be all jammed up and full of stressed out fan-bases. Parity is good. Too much parity makes for seeding chaos. Klay is out for another couple of months. Kawhi is out. Jamal Murray is out. Damian is still in Portland. The Suns hope to repeat last year’s success. Here we go.

Los Angeles Lakers (o/u 53.5)

It’s the aging veteran experiment. Maybe LeBron wants to feel young again, so he surrounded himself with graybeards. Maybe he was tired of the young fellas. Nine Lakers were born in the 1980s and have NBA careers lasting 11 years or more. Celtics fans will be confused seeing both Rajon Rondo and Avery Bradley wearing Lakers gold. The depth chart suggest an NBA2k player with a deep sense of nostalgia for the early 2010s.

I have few answers here, only questions. Will Russell Westbrook be able to replicate last year’s success? It seems unlikely. He’ll have to slow down in order to let Carmelo and Dwight Howard catch-up. On the other hand, Kendrick Nunn, Malik Monk and Kent Bazemore are all speedy and ready to launch from deep.

The logic behind adding Westbrook to LeBron and Anthony Davis is this: rest LeBron by keeping him off the ball or limiting his minutes in general. Let Russ take charge of the offense and let the young fellas run with him. When the games get serious, bring in the wily veteran playoff lineup, which might even relegate Russ to 6th man status.