Roundtable: 8 big questions as the NBA enters training camp
Four teams (the Boston Celtics, Charlotte Hornets, Los Angeles Clippers and Orlando Magic) have their media days on Friday, with training camp opening Saturday. For the rest of the NBA, the season officially begins with media day on Monday. Our NBA crew -- Jovan Buha, D.J. Foster, Fred Katz, Brett Pollakoff and Michael Pina -- offer their takes on eight questions headed into camp:
1. If you could hang out with one NBA team to maximize your fun on media day, which would it be?
Buha: The Golden State Warriors. The Dubs are the most exciting team in the league, not only for their 3-point barrages, flashy passing and vicious defense, but also for their off-court camaraderie. Whether it's playing cards on the team plane, making fun of each other in film sessions or belting rap anthems, this team knows how to have a good time when it's appropriate. I mean, does any other team love the CoCo this much? The Warriors are young, fun and they just won it all: Why wouldn't you want to hang out with them?
Foster: It's always really scary going to a social event when you don't know anyone there, so that rules Philadelphia out. Let's see...Dallas might be fun! All you have to do is avoid saying "DeAndre Jordan" and you'll instantly be everyone's favorite person. Dallas it is.
Pina: Without question, the Sacramento Kings. A collection of boundless personalities that are propped over unreasonable in-house expectations, the Kings were assembled to dominate meaningless events like Media Day. From Boogie Cousins to Rajon Rondo to Willie Cauley-Stein, every question is an adventure waiting to happen.
2. It's training camp time, too! Which team is going to have the most interesting camp experience?
Pina: The Los Angeles Clippers are an ostensible powder keg. Sky-high expectations, rumors of internal discontent and the addition of Paul Pierce's no-nonsense personality with Lance Stephenson's all-nonsense personality could initially strain one of the league's very best teams.
Katz: The Suns. The trade to clear cap space for LaMarcus Aldridge obviously didn't sit well in Phoenix. At least, Markieff Morris wasn't particularly happy about the team trading his brother. Now, Morris is using Twitter as a way to toss daggers not just into the back of the Suns front office, but also the arms, legs, head ... anything you can throw a dagger at, really. These have been unprompted attacks, but once the season begins, he's going to be asked about his desire to be traded over and over again. It's a bad look for him, for the Suns, for everyone. But if Morris has his way, it doesn't seem like this situation is going anywhere.
Pollakoff: Has to be the Lakers, right? Kobe Bryant being back in the fold for what is likely his final season, along with new pieces like Roy Hibbert and D'Angelo Russell in the mix should make for one of the more entertaining starts to the season.
3. Which team stands to gain the most from the practice time during camp?
Buha: The Heat. No team enters the 2015-16 season with more question marks. How will Goran Dragic and Dwyane Wade coexist when both need the ball? Is Hassan Whiteside for real? Will Chris Bosh return to his pre-Miami dominance? What does Luol Deng have left in the tank? Can Josh McRoberts, Amar'e Stoudemire and/or Gerald Green give them anything off the bench? How can this team contend when it lacks 3-point shooting and above-average defenders? That said, if Erik Spoelstra can figure out how the puzzle pieces fit together, the Heat have as much potential as anyone in the East not named Cleveland.
Foster: Milwaukee. Successfully integrating Greg Monroe into the offense will require spacing and precise offensive timing, and Jabari Parker could use all the reps he can get as he recovers from his ACL tear. The Bucks are expected to make the leap this season, but Jason Kidd has his work cut out for him early.
Pollakoff: The Spurs, for the simple fact that they'll be integrating such an important new piece into their system. San Antonio plays system basketball more than any other NBA team, and LaMarcus Aldridge is going to be an offensive focal point for them after signing in free agency. This time will be extremely valuable for him to get to know his new teammates, and just how high the expectations are under Gregg Popovich.
Katz: The Magic. Orlando has an outside shot of nabbing that eighth seed in the Eastern Conference, but everything is going to have to go right, and it'll start in training camp. The Magic have lots of defensive personnel -- from Victor Oladipo to Elfrid Payton to Aaron Gordon and more -- and if a squad of young athletes can buy into new coach Scott Skiles' proven-to-work style, we could all find ourselves caught off guard by some unexpected success in Orlando.
4. Which team would be best served skipping camp completely?
Pollakoff: Probably the Cavaliers. With so many guys coming off of injuries, including Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love, there's no need to push themselves with intense training in advance of what should be a very long season. The expectation is that Cleveland will be playing into June once again, so being as ready as possible when the playoffs begin in April is far more important than being prepared to compete on opening night.
Foster: Cleveland. Let's just fast forward to the playoffs and save LeBron James the trouble, right? Give Matthew Dellavedova the green light to shoot 30 times a game while Kyrie Irving is out and while LeBron stays on ice.
Pina: The less prepared the Philadelphia 76ers are, the wider Sam Hinkie's smile stretches. What good can training camp actually do for this team? (Bonus answer: On the opposite side of the spectrum sits the Golden State Warriors. Outside of Jason Thompson relieving David Lee and Alvin Gentry's move to New Orleans, they're back with the exact same group that won last year's title.)
5. Vancouver, Honolulu, San Jose, Cincinnati and Boulder, Colo., are among the locations that will have a preseason game. Which makes the most sense as an NBA city, if any?
Foster: Write-in vote: Seattle. The NBA needs to go back to Seattle. This is the only correct answer.
Buha: Louisville. The Vancouver experiment didn't work -- though it might be worth another try -- and San Jose (Golden State/Sacramento), Cincinnati (Cleveland) and Boulder (Denver) are too close to other teams in their states. Honolulu would be awesome, but traveling there could be an issue (not to mention the stark time-zone difference). Louisville is great because the state of Kentucky clearly loves basketball, the team would have a built-in rivalry with the Oklahoma City Thunder, and I'm personally in favor of expansion to 32 teams (Seattle, of course, would need to be the other franchise added).
Pina: Vancouver deserves another shot. It's a beautiful city (so I've heard) that stumbled through six miserable seasons before the Grizzlies moved to Memphis and immediately obtained Pau Gasol and Shane Battier. It'd give the league another franchise that's essentially in the Pacific Northwest, which is really close to Seattle -- the real answer to this question.
Pollakoff: Let's see: Vancouver had an NBA team already (shoutout to Steve Francis), Honolulu would be rough due to the time zone, there are already like 10 teams in California so San Jose is out, and Boulder is too small population-wise for that to make any sense. Louisville seems like it might be able to support an NBA team given the love for college hoops in the city, but honestly, none of these cities has any real hope of gaining an NBA franchise in the foreseeable future.
6. Is Harrison Barnes making a huge mistake by reportedly turning down the Warriors' offer (4 years, $64 million)?
Foster: It feels like the answer should be YES in capital letters, but with the cap jumping up, it's almost always a better idea for players to wait, especially if you're a 23-year-old who shot over 40 percent from behind the arc last season. I don't think Harrison Barnes is a very good basketball player, but like Tristan Thompson, he's wise to wait it out.
Pina: Saying yes to the deal would've been a (financial) mistake. As a restricted free agent next summer -- when the salary cap hits $90 million in a seller's market -- Barnes may be in line for a maximum contract that's worth well more than $20 million more than what Golden State laid on the table, especially if the Warriors repeat as champions.
It also creates an opportunity for the 23-year-old to develop as someone else's first or second option, away from Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green's collective shadow.
(Whether Barnes would succeed outside Golden State's system is a different conversation for a different day.)
Pollakoff: Players shouldn't accept contract extensions that are at or even slightly above market value this year, for the simple fact that the salary cap is going to spike upwards of 30 percent next summer, and multiple teams will have a ton of cap space to use to overpay free agents who wouldn't otherwise consider them as an option. Barnes would certainly be a candidate to be on the receiving end of one of those deals, so he should play out this season before completely cashing in.
7. Pau Gasol dominated at EuroBasket 2015. Tony Parker was on the other end of the spectrum. Is there anything meaningful in those performances for this coming NBA season?
Pollakoff: It could be meaningful for the Bulls, if Gasol is gassed later in the season following his Herculean EuroBasket performance. You can see why NBA owners aren't thrilled with their stars playing internationally during the offseason. We're talking about training camps getting set to open, and Gasol just finished at EuroBasket this past weekend. The Bulls are hoping for a deep playoff run, and will have to manage Gasol's minutes carefully during the regular season so he's fresh when the time comes.
Buha: I think Parker's performance is more disconcerting. Parker quietly dropped off last season, and if he continues to decline, the Spurs might not be as good as most people think they'll be. International play is generally when All-Stars like Parker shine -- see Gasol, Pau -- so the fact that he's continued to struggle is somewhat of a red flag. This -- and not the integration of LaMarcus Aldridge -- is the storyline to watch for the Spurs this season.
Katz: Pau is going to be Pau, but Parker worried me, for sure. We're talking about a guard who has made a living getting into the paint and finishing around the rim. But in Eurobasket, he was legitimately struggling to blow by bigs who were switching onto him, settling for off-balance, 12-to-18 footers instead. That's a foreboding sign for someone whose game is most dependent on penetration, even if his jumper has improved over the years.
8. One of the NBA's greatest logos is back: The Suns' sunburst mark. What other classic NBA designs need to make a comeback?
Foster: Denver's retro white rainbow jersey should be worn all 82 games of the season and then gifted to the Oklahoma City Thunder for the playoffs so they don't look like hall monitors ever again.
Pina: I'm a fan of powder blue in just about every context, and generally enjoy how the Denver Nuggets currently look. But let's bring back the rainbow skyline that's been out of all our lives for far too long. That, right there, is/was true beauty.
Buha: I miss the Orlando Magic's black-and-blue pinstripe jerseys of the early-to-mid 90s. Shaq. Penny. Dennis Scott. Nick Anderson. Scott Skiles. Horace Grant. That's an iconic team, and the jerseys are even better -- especially when compared to the Magic's current getup. Yes, they have pinstripes, but it's not the same. Perhaps it's as simple as the silver star replacing the "A." I'm not sure. But it looks better. Bring it back. (Side note: I'm also a fan of the San Antonio Spurs' fiesta logo. Bring it back).
