Week 5 recap and Roze's 5 Things

Conference Standings

Eastern Conference - Through November 24th

1. Cleveland Cavaliers 16- 1
2. Boston Celtics 13-3
3. Orlando Magic 11-7
4. New York Knicks 9-7
5. Milwaukee Bucks 8-9
6. Miami Heat 6-7
7. Atlanta Hawks 7-10
8. Chicago Bulls 7-11
9. Detroit Pistons 7-11
10. Brooklyn Nets 6-10
11. Charlotte Hornets 6-10
12. Indiana Pacers 6-10
13. Toronto Raptors 4-12
14. Philadelphia 76ers 3-12
15. Washington Wizards 2-12

Western Conference

1. Golden State Warriors 12-4
2. Oklahoma City Thunder 12-4
3. Houston Rockets 12-6
4. Los Angeles Lakers 10-6
5. Denver Nuggets 9-6
6. LA Clippers 10-7
7. Memphis Grizzlies 10-7
8. Phoenix Suns 9-7
9. Dallas Mavericks 9-7
10. Minnesota Timberwolves 8-7
11. San Antonio Spurs 9-8
12. Sacramento Kings 8-8
13. Portland Trail Blazers 7-10
14. Utah Jazz 4-12
15. New Orleans Pelicans 4-13

Reaction

The Cavaliers have finally lost, ending their undefeated start to the season at 15-0. They lost against the Celtics Tuesday night in an NBA Cup group stage game on the road. Also don't look now, but the Bucks are 5th after their horrendous start to the season. I will have more on them later in the article. meanwhile both the Pacers and 76ers on the outside looking in this one after a little over a month into the season. The Magic have also shot up to 3rd in the east after going 8-1 in their last 9 games all without Paolo Banchero, their will also be more on them later. I'm not sure how teams like the Nets and Pistons feel being in the play-in spot right now. We also have the Wizards putting on a tank masterclass right now. In the West the Rockets have moved into the 3rd spot after a really good 2 and a half weeks of basketball, however they had a very bad loss to the Trail Blazers last night and Fred VanVleet will probably be suspended after he had some choice words for the referees. Also kind of interesting seeing the two finalist in the Western Conference from last season in 9 and 10 play-in game if the season ended today. Pretty crazy that a .500 has you picking in the lottery as well if you're the Kings. The Suns have really slid down the standings after being 3rd last week. They have dropped their last 5 games without Kevin Durant. The Grizzlies are playing well and getting amazing production from their bench and the L.A teams are both firmly in the playoff picture with the Clippers being a surprise for this season.  The Pelicans however, are the first team that hoped to contend, that's going to have to hit the tank bottom most likely. If you're Brandon Ingram you've to be feeling good considering you've been the most consistent player for them and they didn't offer you a contract extension in the offseason. The West is an absolute bloodbath while the East gives teams some room for error. 

News Recap

Monday November 18th

Moses Brown signs a deal with the Pacers. They are very thin at the center position after Myles Turner got injured causing him to miss a couple games and they have already lost Isaiah Jackson and James Wiseman to Achilles injuries for the season. 

Wednesday November 20th

The Pelicans signed Elfrid Payton after Jose Alvarado injured his hamstring and will miss 6 weeks. Injuries are really stacking up for the Pelicans this season.

De'Anthony Melton has a torn ACL. The Warriors were optimistic it was a sprain, but an MRI confirmed it was an ACL tear. He'll be out for the season. 

Paul George suffered another bone bruise in his left knee after hyperextending it again in their game against Memphis. He will miss at least a week. 

Thursday November 21st

Luka Doncic will miss a week with a wrist injury. He is averaging 28 points, 8 rebounds, and 8 assists so far this season for the Mavericks. 

Roze's 5 Things

1. Magic/Rockets surprise

I will start with the Rockets, because I don't want to tell people I told you so, but the Rockets were my pick of a team I thought could get a top 6 seed and ultimately make a lot of noise in the Western Conference. Part of it is their schedule as been extremely easy so far. However, they do have two wins over the Clippers and have beaten the Knicks as well, but taking advantage and beating bad teams is part of the game to getting a good seed in the playoffs. Beat the teams that are not good and compete against the better teams is the name of the game in the regular season. The main reason they are playing as good as they are is their defense. They are 3rd in the NBA in defense and 1st in rebounding. They get after teams on the offensive glass and don't give up very many offensive rebounds. The tandem of Amen Thompson and Tari Eason off the bench has been amazing. They cause so much chaos on defense and both have been really good at cutting on offense and finishing at the basket. I love the way VanVleet has organized the offense. Dillon Brooks is playing great defense and shooting  the ball well. He's taking shots within himself. Sengun has been putting everyone in the basket and Jabari Smith is taking steps forward with his offense. The offense as a whole is still a little shaky, the lack of shooting scares me a little, but an elite defense can keep you in games. Through the first 18 games of the season the Rockets are exactly who I thought they were. Moving onto the Magic now. If there's a Eastern Conference comparison to the Rockets it's the Magic. They are somehow more furious on defense than the Rockets are cause all sorts of problems for teams. A healthy lineup of Franz Wagner, Jonathan Issacs, Anthony Black, Jalen Suggs, and Paolo Banchero might be the best in the NBA defensively. They are legit on that end of the floor with their size and athleticism give teams a bunch of problems. They're 4th in the NBA in defensive rating, however the offense is pretty bad. I will talk about Franz Wagner as a separate person from their current team, but they do struggle a lot on that end of the floor. They struggle shooting the ball and there's not a ton of spacing in general for Banchero and Wagner. Caldwell-Pope has been pretty meh so far this season for them and Jalen Suggs has cooled off after a hot start. However, if you can be 11-7 and 3rd in your conference only scoring 107 points a game, more power to you. Magic are a legit contender in the Eastern Conference. 

2. Franz Wagner

The Magic have been great in their last 9 games and a large part of this is due to Franz Wagner. Here's some stats in the last 10 games for him, 28 points a game on 47/35 splits from the field and three. He's averaging 7 rebounds and 7 assists and 2.2 turnovers. In the last 5 games the shooting numbers jump to 48/41. He's been fantastic and he's running seemingly the point guard position for the Magic and keeping them in the top 3 with no Paolo Banchero. The shooting numbers is really what I love from him right now. In the offseason, I wanted to see him really improve the numbers after showing some promise in his sophomore year. Shooting 36% from three on 6 attempts a game is perfect and in last 5 games he's shooting almost 9 a game and connecting on them at 41%. He's also shooting 44% on catch and shoots and 37% on pull up threes. Both of these categories for him have taken massive leaps on the season as a whole too. He's a fun player to watch with how crafty his finishes are at the basket and how well he passes the ball. He does really well finishing less than 5 feet shooting above 60% and about 50% in the 10-14 foot range. He's so fun to watch and a big reason why the Magic are as good as they are. 

3. Embiid' return/76ers struggles

The return of Joel Embiid has happened. He opened his season against the Knicks two weeks ago, however it only seems to be more scary for the 76ers. They've been the talk of the NBA for all the wrong reasons. Adding Embiid to the lineup was suppose to improve them overall, but that has not been the case for the 76ers so far. Embiid has looked pretty bad for the 76ers so far. He had 35 points and 11 rebounds in 35 minutes against the Grizzlies on Wednesday, but outside of that game his 3 games before that looked pretty bad. He looked timid, and reserve in hunting his shot. His mobility and condition looked pretty below average for his standards as well. I understand his knees have been through a lot and playing in the Olympics probably didn't help, but the 76ers need him to be good. Even with him on the floor Wednesday, they only had a offensive rating of 111. Now the defensive rating was 101 and that's +10 net rating so obviously that's great in 35 minutes, but we talked about this team and especially the top 3 guys on the team being the best trio in the NBA. The three of George, Embiid, and Maxey have played a total of 6 minutes in 15 games this season. On top of when Embiid plays well, he's not playing back-to-backs anymore so I'm not exactly sure how the 76ers are going to get out of this hole they're in. Load management is great until your team is losing and the that's all the 76ers have been doing this season. Admittingly they've a very tough schedule to start the season and things should lighten up for them in the next month. If they can find a way to get near .500 or somewhere near the play-in by January I'll feel better about them, but I don't think that will happen. They look old and slow on defense and especially in transition. Any athletic guards gets to the basket at will and teams are shooting very well against them. Part of it is teams are shooting really great against them and that's a little unlucky, but they have not shot the ball well at all this season outside of Jared McCain, another separate topic. Look at the beginning of the season I did have the 76ers as a top 4 seed in the east, however I did say they were the best candidate to fall out of the top 4 given the injury history of Embiid and George. Overall, the fix for the 76ers is simple, get Embiid healthy. As of now the success of their team seems to fall on McCain and Maxey having big games. 

4. Jared McCain

I wanted to save talking about the rookies and do a full breakdown in a couple weeks with some rankings and how each of them have been doing for their teams, but McCain has been playing too good to not to mention. He's got 8 straight 20+ scoring outings and has been the only reason to watch the 76ers so far this season. In his last 5 games he's shooting 49/46 splits from the floor and averaging 26!! points a game. He's so fun to watch and goes at anyone guarding him. He's moving so much on the floor and has really diversified his scoring so far. he's taking 55% of his shots from three and still shooting close to 8 twos a game. He's been great at finishing at the basket. He's so strong not letting defender bump him on drives and it clever with different scoop layups and floaters around the basket to avoid shot blockers. He's been great at bumping guys off of him before he goes into his shot and does a great job of getting on balance at the end of his drives. The 76ers have also just let him go and he's taking whatever shots which I think is great. Letting him explore different shots, figuring out different ways to get by defenders, and seeing what spots he likes and doesn't like on the floor is nice. While he' still figuring out the pull up jumper, 40% on the season, he's been fantastic in catch and shot situations, he's hitting above 50% of his catch and shoot threes this season. In the last 5 games he's taking 6 catch and shoot threes a game and hitting 56%!!! of them. His movement on offense is great and is something 76ers really need right now. He's been really fun to watch and someone I was not expecting to have this big of an impact this early into the season. 

5. Bucks finding their groove

After the Bucks were seemingly dead in the water and some people, including myself, were worried they wouldn't make the postseason , that's seemed to corrected itself since then. Maybe NBA Centel's tweet of Doc Rivers taking coaching serious has worked, but the Bucks look much better now. The offense has come alive averaging almost 120 points a game in the last 5 games. The defensive side of the ball has stayed pretty similar. They aren't allowing as many points in the paint and I think they've withstood the unlucky shooting numbers at the fact opponents are just making shots against them. They've gone on a bit of a heater themselves as a team. They're shooting 50/42 splits as a team and Giannis has looked like an MVP and having the best start of his career as far. He's averaging 32 points 13 rebounds and 5 assists all while shooting 60% from the floor. Brook Lopez has played fantastic in the last 6 games. His shooting and rim protection have really picked up, and the addition of Andre Jackson and A.J Green to the lineup has been great so far this year. Jackson has given them some great minutes in the starting lineup and guards the other teams best player. Green has been great off the bench giving them some shooting and Gary Trent, and Taurean Prince have made improvements on their own defense and shooting as well.  While their schedule has lighten up a lot since the beginning of the season the offense looks much better and the defense isn't getting shredded like it use to. I'm still a little worried the Dame shooting numbers won't correct themselves. He's been in a shooting slump for seemingly over a year now and he needs to be the best second option in the NBA if the Bucks want to win in the postseason. The East is obviously not great and it's given the Bucks seemingly a second opportunity. I can see them jumping back into the top 3 with the way their schedule looks for the next 5 weeks.