NBA Atlantic Division: Preview and Win Total Picks
By LARRY JOSEPHSON
The Boston Celtics are about the only certainty in the Atlantic Division. The real battle is below Boston, where New York tries to improve with new parts, Toronto moves on without its franchise player, New Jersey flirts with big-name trades and Philadelphia searches for identity.
Boston Celtics
2009-10: 50-32 straight up, 33-47-2 against the spread
2010-11 season win total: 54.5
It won’t be easy selling tickets for a team that has all but announced that the regular season is a five-month warmup for the playoffs. The Celtics are loaded with names – albeit big ones – as they make a final run or two at another title before the demolition crew comes in and blows the team to smitherines.
Some nights, the Celtics will be able to win on talent alone. Other nights, halfway-decent teams will be able to catch the C’s napping and hang a bad L on them. But nothing of real importance happens until everyone starts jockeying for playoff position after the All-Star break.
Gang Green has all the usual suspects – Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, Rajon Rondo, Baby Davis - and now the locker room will become a real freak show with the addition of Shaquille O’Neal and Delonte West. Jermaine O’Neal is also on board to give Boston another big while Kendrick Perkins works his way back from the knee ACL.
If you’re like a lot of fans and want to throw up in your mouth every time you read about LeBron James or see him in a Miami uniform, the Celtics are one of you few viable options in the East. Even past their prime the Celtics, if properly motivated, can hang with the Heat and the reason is depth.
With a sub package that includes West, Nate Robinson, Davis and whichever O’Neal doesn’t start, coach Doc Rivers can monitor minutes of the big guns in anticipation of circling the wagons again when the snow and ice around the TD Garden have melted away.
Pick: Under
New York Knicks
2009-10: 29-53 straight up, 38-43-1 against the spread
2010-11 season win total: 35.5
The Knicks finally seem to have extricated themselves from the quicksand and headed in the right direction, but just how much of a difference will the additions of Amare Stoudemire and Raymond Felton make?
No one knows for certain, but these guys should be better than the jokers that won just 29 games last season and the group that won 32 games the year before that. And the clowns that won 23 in 2007-08 and 2005-06. And… well, you get the point.
At least last year management could wink and say that they were clearing out cap space to make room on the ledger for LeBron James and it’s pretty evident now that LBJ was playing everyone for fools. With the King saying no thanks to New York, the Knicks moved on quickly by snagging Stoudemire and Felton, hoping to replicate in even a small way the chemistry that Stoudemire had in Phoenix with Steve Nash. Felton is OK, but he’s no Nash.
After Felton and Stoudemire, there is a whole lot of maybe in the Knicks locker room, although coach Mike D’Antoni is convinced that Danillo Gallinari has the tools to be the next big thing. Gallinari is 6-foot-10, which is good. He averages 4.9 rebounds a game, which is not so good. But he’ll give the Knicks 15 points a game and is a stretch 4, which means he likes to sit outside and shoot 3-pointers, where the risk of getting a Kevin Garnett elbow in the mouth is reduced by about 90 percent.
Pick: Over
Toronto Raptors
2009-10: 40-42 straight up, 39-43 against the spread
2010-11 season win total: 26.5
Oddsmakers are pegging the Raptors for 15 or 16-game drop this season, and that may be too big a decline. Yes, the dinosaurs will be without Chris Bosh and Hedo Turkoglu, but those guys weren’t much help anyway. Cynics will say that Bosh never went at it 100 percent as he tried to stay healthy for his free agent payoff and Turkoglu never hit it off with the Raptors fan base.
Toronto will be picking up the pieces with a run-and-gun team built around newcomer and Suns import Leandro Barbosa, who runs the court just about as well as anyone. Andrea Bargnani is a 5 who has the body of a 4 and the mindset of a 3 and point guard Jose Calderon is also a push-the-ball-first and ask-questions-later kind of player. The Raptors will have to run, because they lack size and talent on the front line.
The Raptors own the NBA record with at least one 3-pointer made in 942 consecutive games and don’t expect that streak to be terminated any time soon. But in the long run they will lose a lot of games because most every other team is better and there’s not a heck of a lot coach Jay Triano can do about that.
Pick: Over
New Jersey Nets
2009-10: 12-70 straight up, 30-48-1 against the spread
2010-11 season win total: 24.5
What doesn’t kill you can only make you stronger. If that’s true, the Nets have successfully survived last season’s 12-70 gulag.
In East Rutherford, they’re hoping that Brook Lopez continues to improve at the 5 and newcomer Troy Murphy will be able to replicate the 14 and 10 numbers that he gave the Pacers last season. But the big enchilada (Carmelo Antony) remains in Denver for the time being anyway and new owner Mikhail Prokhorov is still minus the franchise player he so covets.
The Russian billionaire has promised fans a title within five years and if he draws to an inside straight and comes through, it’s a good bet that most of the players on the current roster won’t be the ones hoisting the trophy.
Devin Harris, who has been mentioned in trade talks with the Nuggets, is probably in the top third of point guards in the league, but he’s a score-first guy and only an OK defender. Then again, Harris will have to do some scoring because the Nets traded away their third and fourth-leading scorers from last season – Courtney Lee and Yi Jianlian. There are high hopes for No. 1 draft choice Derrick Favors, but he’s really a project who’ll have to play because there’s not too much else.
The Nets have taken a step in the right direction by bringing in Avery Johnson as head coach. The young roster figures to listen to Johnson and the only questions are whether Johnson will be patient enough with the team and the antsy owner will be patient enough with Johnson.
Change has come quickly for this team, as would be expected for a bunch that piled up losses with alarming regularity last season. The only thing certain is that more changes are on the way. And sooner rather than later.
Pick: Over
Philadelphia 76ers
2009-10: 27-55 straight up, 34-47-2 against the spread
2010-11 season win total: 34.5
It’s hard to figure out why Doug Collins was so keen on returning to the bench to coach this team, because the Sixers don’t really seem on the verge of being able to make any kind of rapid improvement.
Yes, they were hurt by injuries last season and yes, Elton Brand was not completely healthy. But looking at the roster, the ceiling seems to be low-hanging for this bunch.
If fans were disenchanted last season, they’ll get some new faces to look at this time around. Andres Nocioni was a nice pickup and Spencer Hawes is a legit 7-footer, even if he gets overwhelmed in traffic. Top draft choice Evan Turner will start, probably at shooting guard. And Andre Iguodala plays at warp speed 100 percent of the time. Jrue Holiday will get every chance to become the team’s point guard for the next decade.
What it all adds up to is anyone’s guess, although after Boston, Miami, Chicago, Orlando and Atlanta, the Eastern Conference is ripe for any team that would like to make a run at a playoff spot.
The Sixers were that team two years ago and made life somewhat unpleasant for Orlando in the first round before going down in six games. But last year, the air escaped the balloon early, Philly’s win total dropped 14 games from 41 to 27 and that, as they say, was all she wrote. Even bringing back Allen Iverson for a few games didn’t help, although, it may have sold a few jerseys.
It will be interesting to see how Collins structures this team. Iguodala, the subject of trade rumors in late September, remains the focal point and as close to an All-Star as exists on the roster. He loves to run. But Brand, when healthy, is a beast and needs a slower tempo to be effective.
Pick: Under