2024 NBA Season

[Yogee]

[....]Do you think there is a team other than these 6 who can be the champions? Lakers, Warriors, Heat?

Hard to say at this time since teams haven't settled yet. I mean I can have a better idea once all teams were done with their trade business.

Lakers and Warriors are expected to at least make it to the playoffs and who knows what's going to happen after that. I'm doubtful on Heat's case after they broke their core. There's always that air of uncertainty when you bring in new players.

[1715303222]

1715303222

[Pamadar]

Yeah, and as Paul George, shout out to WB for taking the minimum just to stay with the Clippers at least for this year.

No, he will stay for 2 years as that's what his contract says.

Free agent Russell Westbrook has agreed on a two-year, nearly $8M deal

https://www.nba.com/news/russell-westbrook-2023-free-agency

If he cannot make it next season, he still has one more season to help the Clippers win a championship. I think it's possible as long as Leonard stays healthy. Actually, even without PG, Leonard and Westbrook would already be enough to lead the team.

Money is not that important to him anymore because it seems to me that Westbrook is on a revenge mode to gain his confidence and reputation again, and I believe that he still got a chance if he will be given an enough time to play as a main role with Kawhi Leonard because being a 6th man in the team was seriously not suitable for him. He just needed some time to take care of his own business to bring back that old version.

He needs that playing time to showcase again his talent, this new season may give him that chance if the coaching staff allow him to play more minutes.

He may negotiate about the money if he plays well in this upcoming season and make a big impact
for the Clippers, but without anything we may not hear anything about that salary, it might be
possible that he will end his career and think about it after the contract.

[inthelongrun]

Which teams are closer to the championship this season? Tell me first 6 teams please so I'll refresh our poll.

Nuggets
Suns
Sixers
Celtics
Mavericks
Bucks

Do you think there is a team other than these 6 who can be the champions? Lakers, Warriors, Heat?

Interesting to talk about. For now, these are my top favorite picks:
Denver Nuggets
Boston Celtics
Phoenix Suns
Milwaukee Bucks

I don't see Dallas Mavericks as a threat in the west unless injuries are happening. I really doubt Luka-Kyrie works and the latter will always have something dramatic if in case he is not injured next season. They just came from western conference champions into failing to qualify in the playoffs when Kyrie joined them sacrificing some key players Finney-Smith.

Philadelphia 76ers will most likely lose Harden before the trade deadline if in case no team can satisfy Philly's trade demands. So I also doubt this team is capable of beating Boston and Milwaukee.

There are still key players that need new teams like Lillard and Harden. If Miami can get Lillard then they can be a force to be reckoned with. If Harden lands with LA Clippers, I still doubt their capability since both PG13 and Kawhi are always not able to remain healthy and play a full season. Maybe PG13 can but  Kawhi is a no-hoper IMO.

[yazher]

Westbrook can receive a lower salary as he already made a lot of money during his time with OKC. On the other hand, in the cases of Oladipo and Dennis Schröder, they were at their best when the contract was offered, but they gambled and got a bit greedy, looking for bigger offers. Unfortunately, it didn't happen, and for sure, they regretted that decision.

Since Westbrook hasn't won any championship till now, it's pretty reasonable that his salary has gone down lower that how it used to be because the way he plays is not helping anymore like how he used to be in the OKC. Now he is lucky that a team signed him despite the rumors spread against him these days that wherever he goes, he curse that time to lose the NBA playoffs and not gonna get to the NBA championship ever. The Lakers truly made some huge mistakes to acquire him last time and they were lucky enough to trade and get rid of him.

[OgNasty]

I’m just now reading about the Bronny James story. Bronny apparently suffered a cardiac arrest yesterday during a workout at USC. This is horrible news and I’m sure LeBron James missed a lot of sleep last night. Insane that these athletes are having so many heart problems suddenly. We all know it’s the vaccine, but that doesn’t make it any less heartbreaking.

[ChiBitCTy]

I’m just now reading about the Bronny James story. Bronny apparently suffered a cardiac arrest yesterday during a workout at USC. This is horrible news and I’m sure LeBron James missed a lot of sleep last night. Insane that these athletes are having so many heart problems suddenly. We all know it’s the vaccine, but that doesn’t make it any less heartbreaking.

Dude c'mon we do not all know it's the vaccine.  I mean do you know if he ever even took it?  Not really the place to discuss this, but I certainly can't agree with you here.  It's not like this has been a big issue with a lot of people all of a sudden. 

That said, it's definitely a sad situation and one I'm just hearing about.  I know he's continued to improve, but do you know if he's going to be starting?  I've just been curious how much better he's truly been getting, like I know on his HS team he wasn't even starting for a while.  The younger James apparently might end up being the better of the two.  I'm sure you've seen how tall he's gotten.  Could be a beast. 

One thing is for sure in my mind, MJ is the undisputed goat, but Lebron's (2nd best ever imo) kids will certainly have better careers than MJ's did lol.

[MK-74]

Jaylen Brown has extended his contract with the Boston Celtics for 5 years and $ 304 Million.
Jaylen Brown will earn $60.8 Million annually.

Bronny James was hospitalized for cardiac arrest during training.
His condition is stable now.

[OgNasty]

Jaylen Brown has extended his contract with the Boston Celtics for 5 years and $ 304 Million.
Jaylen Brown will earn $60.8 Million annually.

Bronny James was hospitalized for cardiac arrest during training.
His condition is stable now.

Big news of the day already it seems. Jaylen Brown’s contract gives him an insane 70 million dollars in the final year. Absolutely crazy money. I know we have all been commenting on that possibility, but it’s now official. Jaylen Brown is the highest paid NBA player of all time. Given that he isn’t the most talented player in the league, I suspect the next couple of years are going to have some contracts that will begin to rival global soccer stars.

[Yogee]

[....]
Given that he isn’t the most talented player in the league, I suspect the next couple of years are going to have some contracts that will begin to rival global soccer stars.

I doubt that but maybe it will happen if oil money enters the NBA. French football star Kylian Mbappe has been recently offered by a Saudi team with an annual salary of $221M and that could rise to $774M according to reports so compare that to the $304M 5-year deal. I read that even Lebron and Draymond jokes about moving to Saudi after that news.

I don't expect salaries of top paid footballers in Europe to stagnate given the sponsors their league and team gets. It will only go higher in the next couple of years.

[dwyane36]

Which teams are closer to the championship this season? Tell me first 6 teams please so I'll refresh our poll.

Nuggets
Suns
Sixers
Celtics
Mavericks
Bucks

Do you think there is a team other than these 6 who can be the champions? Lakers, Warriors, Heat?

All of these teams look good on paper. So it's hard to decide which one will be the better team. At this point, I'd call the Nuggets the team that will be close to the championship next season, although it's worth noting that the offseason is still in full swing, which means that unexpected trades can happen, and some teams can become much stronger than they are now.

[bitgolden]

I don't think he will ever achieve that triple-double consistency now that he is not the main star of the team. Westbrook was the main star in OKC, but now he is with the Clippers, where many stars are playing, so he plays based on the role given to him. For Westbrook, what matters now is winning a championship, as he has already achieved his goal as an individual player. But the biggest goal is to win a championship.

Yeah, and as Paul George, shout out to WB for taking the minimum just to stay with the Clippers at least for this year. Because if that is other players, he might look for still a good contract as WB can still play and become a star in any other team.

So obviously, by now his biggest goal is to win a championship ring with PG and Kawhi. It might be a tough road in the West, there are a lot of great teams. But who knows, maybe the 3 can make it to the finals.

I highly doubt that westbrook could be any star in any team after what happened at Lakers. We have seen him become worse and worse, his shooting is getting more and more awful each year, and he is not a scoring threat anymore.

This is the end of every explosive guard, if you do not learn how to shoot lights out, eventually your legs will grow old and you won't be able to get inside quickly and dunk, he is not capable of doing that as much as he used to and because of his agility getting worse, that means he had to rely on his shooting a lot which resulted with him missing a lot of shots. That's why people called him "westbrick" and that made him quite angry as well but it's true that he missed a lot hence the nickname.

[rhomelmabini]

Which teams are closer to the championship this season? Tell me first 6 teams please so I'll refresh our poll.

Nuggets
Suns
Sixers
Celtics
Mavericks
Bucks

Do you think there is a team other than these 6 who can be the champions? Lakers, Warriors, Heat?

All of these teams look good on paper. So it's hard to decide which one will be the better team. At this point, I'd call the Nuggets the team that will be close to the championship next season, although it's worth noting that the offseason is still in full swing, which means that unexpected trades can happen, and some teams can become much stronger than they are now.

Still Nuggets on that list tbh, I don't think I'll put Mavericks on that list unless they pull something off in the playoffs. I think speculating on the championship right now doesn't mean anything, maybe in the middle of the season that will have more clearer things than right now, teams are still rebuilding their rosters and signing players aren't done yet or some other crazy trades.

[YuginKadoya]

They just need a floor general that willing to distribute them the ball and also a solid rebounder which also can do the dirty work for them and they became a solid team. So celtics management should develop their roster and find those people who's perfect fit for them so that they can perform very well. If they get serious injury then maybe this will be a deciding factor for Celtics to change their roster since this could change their performance and might ruin their potential to became a great player in their era.

Yup! They should follow what the Golden State Warriors are doing right now they are enhancing their bench so even if their main players are injured they still got a solid team bench I really think this is where Chris Paul the Veteran may enter they will need Chris Paul to take on Stephen Curry shoes when Curry needs rest, and yeah I think that the Management of the Boston Celtics needs this kind of mentality for their team to be successful for sure,

This is why they worth so much, maybe they didn't win a title just yet, but that duo looks like a duo that could end up winning a title and I believe that they are going to end up being a lot better if they could go on to grow together as well. Sure they were unlucky to face some serious trouble so far and they have faced with some good teams, but I believe that they are going to end up winning eventually and if Celtics could put some decent players around them, then they are going to be able to get a ring.

Just two good superstars is not enough these days, it might be depending on the situation but you need proper role players around them. Marcus Smart is much worse than people think he is, and Horford is way too old.

Yup! For me I think the Boston Celtics need to do is to center their focus on the Duo of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown and on that focus build a roster that could help them in winning more buckets, for sure these two are the focal core of the Boston Celtics and Jayson Tatum is the 1A and Jaylen Brown is the 1B for the team if the Celtics could play and revolutionize a game surrounding this two maybe they can have a much bigger chance for the Champion,

I doubt that but maybe it will happen if oil money enters the NBA. French football star Kylian Mbappe has been recently offered by a Saudi team with an annual salary of $221M and that could rise to $774M according to reports so compare that to the $304M 5-year deal. I read that even Lebron and Draymond jokes about moving to Saudi after that news.

I don't expect salaries of top paid footballers in Europe to stagnate given the sponsors their league and team gets. It will only go higher in the next couple of years.

Now that many are talking about the Salary worth of the NBA players I have recently seen this news and after some NBA players notice that kind of Salary of Kylian Mbappe Social Media was exploding with the funny reactions of the NBA players well because Saudi club Al Hilal has offered to pay the French soccer star $766 million for one season

Well, the NBA player's reactions were really over the top because comparing the offer of Mbappe to Lebron James's initial earnings in 20 years was $531 M while Kylian Mbappe's offer was $776 M in just 1 year,

Here are the Best Reaction of the NBA players

[wheelz1200]

Jaylen Brown has extended his contract with the Boston Celtics for 5 years and $ 304 Million.
Jaylen Brown will earn $60.8 Million annually.

Bronny James was hospitalized for cardiac arrest during training.
His condition is stable now.

I've heard people say that contract is crazy but that's the going rate for super Max's.  He's a top 20 player in his 20s if they didn't pay it someone else would have.  They couldn't lose him otherwise they would have fallen out of the top echelon of teams.  They are all in now.

[danherbias07]

Which teams are closer to the championship this season? Tell me first 6 teams please so I'll refresh our poll.

Nuggets
Suns
Sixers
Celtics
Mavericks
Bucks

Do you think there is a team other than these 6 who can be the champions? Lakers, Warriors, Heat?

Denver Nuggets will be my first pick, no doubt.
Milwaukee Bucks will be my second.
Phoenix Suns is my third.
Sacramento Kings will be my fourth.
Dallas Mavericks is my fifth choice.
Boston Celtics is my sixth pick.

I am taking out of the picture the Philadelphia 76ers, Embiid cannot carry that team alone although he won the MVP last season.

Jaylen Brown has extended his contract with the Boston Celtics for 5 years and $ 304 Million.
Jaylen Brown will earn $60.8 Million annually.

Bronny James was hospitalized for cardiac arrest during training.
His condition is stable now.

I've heard people say that contract is crazy but that's the going rate for super Max's.  He's a top 20 player in his 20s if they didn't pay it someone else would have.  They couldn't lose him otherwise they would have fallen out of the top echelon of teams.  They are all in now.

Crazy, indeed.
I don't know about losing him. Top 20 yes, but not top 10. I'll understand this if Luka Doncic received such an amount, that guy had been carrying the Dallas Mavericks on his shoulders every time the management messed up with the roster.
I will also understand if Nikola Jokic gets that amount as he also carried the Denver Nuggets while Jamal Murray and MPJ are out with an injury. Better, he took the team to the playoffs while undermanned.
JB has JT and I prefer Tatum as the face of the Celtics. This is madness, which is why many players are overreacting to the contract. Well, we will see if he is worth it this upcoming season, all I can say for now is he has a good agent to make that contract possible.

The best joke I have read on Twitter so far is this "Imagine how much money he'd get if he could go left."
https://twitter.com/SleeperHQ/status/1683856271890432000?s=20

[passwordnow]

I am not sure why there is this trend of retired great players having the comparison of their careers to the ones that have also retired. Like having a great player on their roster when they're in their prime. I am talking about Pierce talking about Wade he's saying he could do the same as Dwayne did and will probably have a better run because of having good teammates. I have no idea why there are beefs like this or it's just to make themselves relevant from the news we're having in the NBA.

That's just Paul Pierce being Paul Pierce. He's said a lot of stuff over the years but that's just what he thinks or believe. I wouldn't say it's a "beef". I guess it's in athletes' nature to be competitive in general even after their professional playing years.

Yeah, you guess that's right that even though they're no longer in the scene the name that they've left is still there and the respect is still there though.

On the other hand, GSW is rumored trying to get Howard while him wants to go back in the Lakers.

I've seen this too. He'll probably get more playing time as a Warrior.

I am waiting for some news about him and it's not just him who wants to get back to the NBA but also some other players that have played overseas like Cousins.

[harizen]

JB has JT and I prefer Tatum as the face of the Celtics. This is madness, which is why many players are overreacting to the contract. Well, we will see if he is worth it this upcoming season, all I can say for now is he has a good agent to make that contract possible.

The contract was made possible because Brown is really eligible for the super-max contract. I just don't understand why Celtics granted that kind of huge contract even though Brown was eligible for it. They can use instead the large space of their cap to fish for some good role players in the market.

Moving forward, Tatum is also expected to have the same huge max contract in his final year with the team and not exercise his rights on his Player Option.

I am not sure why there is this trend of retired great players having the comparison of their careers to the ones that have also retired. Like having a great player on their roster when they're in their prime. I am talking about Pierce talking about Wade he's saying he could do the same as Dwayne did and will probably have a better run because of having good teammates. I have no idea why there are beefs like this or it's just to make themselves relevant from the news we're having in the NBA.

Just take it with a grain of salt, bro.

Veterans will always have to say to each other regardless if those are towards their fellow retired players or active players. Wade and Pierce have lots of trash-talking during their active days and Heat and Celtics have formed a rivalry too during both players' prime seasons.

Anyhow, Pierce also clarified that he is not comparing himself to Dwayne Wade and the respect is always there.

“I never compared myself to Dwyane Wade, I was asked a question how would u answer if u were me I would never disrespect him he is an all-time great. All I’m saying is the narrative surrounding me would be different if I was lucky enough to play with all-timers earlier in my career.”

[OgNasty]

I don’t know what Dwayne Wade ever did to Paul Pierce but he’s occupying some series space in his head. I’ve heard Paul Pierce make this argument before and was promptly embarrassed live on television by Jalen Rose when he compared their two careers. Paul Pierce was good, ya. He was never best in the league good though and besides his petty terrible takes on himself, he’ll be known for shitting his pants and being rolled off in a wheelchair during a game.

[Yaunfitda]

Yeah, and as Paul George, shout out to WB for taking the minimum just to stay with the Clippers at least for this year.

No, he will stay for 2 years as that's what his contract says.

Free agent Russell Westbrook has agreed on a two-year, nearly $8M deal

https://www.nba.com/news/russell-westbrook-2023-free-agency

If he cannot make it next season, he still has one more season to help the Clippers win a championship. I think it's possible as long as Leonard stays healthy. Actually, even without PG, Leonard and Westbrook would already be enough to lead the team.

Money is not that important to him anymore because it seems to me that Westbrook is on a revenge mode to gain his confidence and reputation again, and I believe that he still got a chance if he will be given an enough time to play as a main role with Kawhi Leonard because being a 6th man in the team was seriously not suitable for him. He just needed some time to take care of his own business to bring back that old version.

Yes and that's what I'm trying to say, as compare to other players who made a bad decision early on and they can't recover from that. And he still chasing that one ring so he needs to be healthy as well throughout out the season and not just Paul and Kawhi.

But there could be a lot of changes in the Clippers for the next season, it's going to be a lot of experiment I reckon. And maybe WB will have those numbers that he produces before and he could be another success story if the Clippers reach the finals and WB the 3rd option behind PG and Leonard.

[danherbias07]

The contract was made possible because Brown is really eligible for the super-max contract. I just don't understand why Celtics granted that kind of huge contract even though Brown was eligible for it. They can use instead the large space of their cap to fish for some good role players in the market.

That's what I am thinking about. After letting Marcus Smart go for Kristaps Porzingis they could finally add more firepower or defensive players to increase their chances in the Finals or in the playoffs. That 0-3 against the Miami Heat is proof that something is missing on their team. I doubt it's just KP that they need, it's going to take more than that to beat the teams in the East. What more against the West?

Moving forward, Tatum is also expected to have the same huge max contract in his final year with the team and not exercise his rights on his Player Option.

Well, that should be given. They cannot just let Tatum be left with a contract that is lower than the number 2.
He also did so much for the team I think he will be the future of it if they want a higher possibility of a championship. Locker room issues will become the Celtics' management problem if they won't do the same favor for him.