The NBA is Back

The NBA offseason is normally filled with drama, and this summer was no different. Kevin Durant asked for a trade. The top three draft picks were leaked seven hours before the first pick was made, and all of a sudden the picks were different. Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert were traded away from the Utah Jazz, and much, much more happened. Finally, Tuesday night the NBA is back.

There are quite a few things that will make this season spectacular. First, the Draymond Green saga with the Golden State Warriors. If you haven’t been online in the last week, you probably have no idea what I’m talking about.

Yes, that is Draymond Green superman punching Jordan Poole in the face at a closed practice. Just a few days later. Poole and Andrew Wiggins signed new deals with Golden State worth a total of of $249 million. That potentially leaves Green as the odd man out of the money this upcoming summer.

The Warriors are still set to be an incredibly good team for the next few years as the youth mixes in with the Splash Bros, but what happens if their defensive anchor, and frankly, team leader, decides to take money elsewhere? Only time will tell.

In the East, the Brooklynn Nets have been a shit show basically ever since they signed Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving in the summer of 2019. The Nets didn’t give Irving the contract extension that both he and Durant wanted, and consequently Durant asked for a trade out of town.

Of course, the Nets had the upper hand because Durant had just signed a new extension earlier and had zero leverage. No team in the league could put a package together that was suitable enough for either superstar, and thus, we are left with the same old Nets team with Ben Simmons! What a rollercoaster.

Will the Nets have the same team at the end of the season, or will there be some blockbuster trades at the deadline?

LeBron James is headed towards a few more NBA career records this season, but the Los Angeles Lakers don’t seem to be headed towards success. Russell Westbrook is going to be coming off the bench, and Anthony Davis is seemingly always hurt. Time is of the essence for LeBron, and the roster constructed around him doesn’t look like they’ll give him the best shot at title number five.

Lastly, the race to the bottom is going to be astronomical this season.

There is a literal alien waiting for whoever ends up winning the lottery in May. Victor Wembanyama is like if you turned on your preferred gaming console, fired up 2K, and created a player that is nine-feet tall, and had 99’s for every stat category.

Wembanyama can defend the paint like an elite center, dribble and run the floor like an elite guard, and can shoot from anywhere on the floor. It’s absurd what he’s done in just a few games in the last few weeks, and teams will be sitting players left and right.

There are a number of teams that have potential to be bad, and then there’s teams like the San Antonio Spurs that are just going to be bad. Can you imagine if Pop won the lottery and got a brand new toy like Wembanyama? He may never retire!

This is the deepest the NBA has arguably ever been. There are superstars, stars, and elite role players all over the league, but there are going to be at least five to 10 teams that throw away games all season long for the alien prize next summer. The NBA is back, and my body is ready.

For more NBA coverage make sure to follow @ApolloNBA, @ApolloHOU, and @SummitSOMpod.