Sim 2 (S26)

Swope

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Contender/Pretender Time!

We’ve gotten a small sample size of season 27 now and can see teams start to pull away. For $3M, list 2 sneaky contenders and 2 surprising pretenders for this season.
 

Xxplayerxx23

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Sneak contenders , really hard to say because like Indy isn’t sneaky either are they cavs so I’ll go with bullets. Don’t know how legit of a contender they actually are but 22-9 is impressive to start. I’ll go with, cavs may be a year away but they are a contender to imo. Not really many surprises. West is basically a 2 team race

Pretenders - Pistons. They aren’t there. Not enough fire power to fight off the top teams out east
Any west team outside the rockets and spurs lmao maybe the bucks? Still feel like they’ll get better as the year goes on but not pretty so far
 

LukaSZN

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Magic - I know they are the one seed but this is the first time since they traded Melo that I think they are actually in the mix. Really strong balanced team and FBB loves homecourt.

Bucks - Hard to believe a team with Kyrie and Ayton is actually this mid. I’ll give Hooper the benefit of the doubt and assume he figures it out.

All West teams other than spurs with Marko who was apparently juiced but is somehow fine now that he’s a Spur??
 

SoftLettuce

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Contender:

Pistons. KAT is the best player in the league and he gonna be able to carry the pistons to the promised land! No matter what player says

Bucks: Kyrie and Ayton are too good of a combo for this team to not have it figured out by playoff time. I know hoop always keeps some picks and assets set aside for moves.

Hate to do this to my boy beats but the Mavs looking iffy at best. 16 TO a night is a tough scene. warriors a real meh 2seed out west too. Ebbs is right in that the entire western conference is meh outside of Spurs, butI think the rockets are real good.
 

Xxplayerxx23

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Contender:

Pistons. KAT is the best player in the league and he gonna be able to carry the pistons to the promised land! No matter what player says

Bucks: Kyrie and Ayton are too good of a combo for this team to not have it figured out by playoff time. I know hoop always keeps some picks and assets set aside for moves.

Hate to do this to my boy beats but the Mavs looking iffy at best. 16 TO a night is a tough scene. warriors a real meh 2seed out west too. Ebbs is right in that the entire western conference is meh outside of Spurs, butI think the rockets are real good.
Lol
Pistons are trash
 

Panic!

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Contenders:
Clippers - Weak West + Elite PG can surprise a lot of teams if he tries to win.

Pacers - The team has no weakness. They will win the championship this season.

Pretenders:
Mavericks - Good record but the numbers don't support it. Too many turnovers. No legit PG

Cavaliers - Herro is not a legit PG. Turnovers are a bit too high to be legit contenders. Paul George is cancer.
 

Hooper

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Sneaky Contenders:

Magic: Not even sure who the best player on this team is. It's hard to win without a top 5-7 guy and they definitely don't have one, but they might have enough depth to make it work this year

Hawks: Thought they were done after last year but Player; even though I still disagree with the long term planning he conducts when building his teams, has done a really good job squeezing value out of limited resources. Horford was huge

Surprising Pretenders:

Bullets: Just don't have the top end talent. But Josh is always lurking, so this is based on current roster construction vs the chance they make a consolidating trade at some point

Bucks: Not getting it done as constructed, and if I'm gonna hold Bullets to that, then I have to hold myself to it also. The good thing is we own 6 of my own Bucks picks + Magic 27 and have an expiring good player in Wood and some other players we could break down and trade. Shouldn't be super difficult to figure out when you have two top 5 players.
 

notail

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Pretender
Bucks: kyrie and Ayton duo along with nice complimentary pieces should be contenders. Maybe it’s the East and the number of competitive teams. Still think they should be better than 16-11.

Mavs: I can see them being too 4 seed in the west but I don’t see them going too far in the playoffs given lack of either depth or superstars. Keeshun, Wiggins, Adams core is what i


Contender
Magic: cloud has a fun team that developed through FA and TC. No superstar but multiple all star level players and depth leading to success. Fbb loves superstars so we’ll have to see how they do but they are likely to hold onto #1 seed especially with the depth. They won’t be as affected by injuries as some other teams


Pistons: I like Jason despite him getting flamed. He has a legit big 4 in KAT, harrelson, hield and rose. He’ll need to replace rose next year but there are plenty of PGs who will be serviceable to support the other 3
 
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Xxplayerxx23

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Pretender
Bucks: kyrie and Ayton duo along with nice complimentary pieces should be contenders. Maybe it’s the East and the number of competitive teams. Still think they should be better than 16-11.

Contender
Magic: cloud has a fun team that developed through FA and TC. No superstar but multiple all star level players and depth leading to success. Fbb loves superstars so we’ll have to see how they do but they are likely to hold onto #1 seed especially with the depth. They won’t be as affected by injuries as some other teams
Gotta do 2 each bro
 

yrtb

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This is tough because I wouldn’t consider any of these teams to be sneaky contenders since I already expected them to be contenders: Hawks, Magic, Pacers, Cavs, Spurs, Bullets. Also the West has literally 2 playoff caliber teams.

Sneaky Contenders

Pistons: KAT is good enough to put them in the contender discussion despite a lack of depth and Durant being a shell of his former self. Harrelson is still very good, and Rose hasn’t died off yet.

Bullets: They aren’t as good as the top of the East, but winning this many games still puts them in the discussion, and I could see ebbs making a move to add more talent.

Pretenders

Bucks: The roster outside of Ayton/Kyrie is weak. Vesely is mid, and losing Oden hurt a lot.

Bulls: Turner is not good anymore, Joseph is a turnstyle on D, and Randolph is on the decline. Kawhi is incredible, but he can’t do it by himself
 

mngopher35

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contenders

bucks: I think they still have a legit shot with kyrie and co. Hooper was downplaying his team last year I think they had the best shot even though they ended up losing. Now they are in the mix even if not the favorites necessarily.

magic: I have seen them listed by multiple others so I guess we can include them here. Dame might help a little but they have a nicely balanced roster all around and I think white is legit.

pretender
Pistons: I hate to say it but I told jason the same thing via pm, I just think he has more of an outside shot this year than really being in the mix as a top team:

Bulls: I think their run is done, if they had this version of klay too it would be different. Right now they have their top guys at 30 or older while not having as deep of a team as others listed. I think they missed their shot.
 

Donkey

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Contenders:
Detroit - Sitting at the 6 seed right now in the East, they have a real shot to win it all. They've long had the talent, but they have a GM who is incapable of putting it together. This team might be good enough to overcome that.
Jazz - Luka has arrived, and he is ready to dominate a week conference. Having the best player in a series seems to make the biggest difference sometimes, and Luka is well on his way to being one of the best players in the league.

Pretenders:
Warriors - Sitting at the two seed right now out West, this team just isn't built to win a championship. Air continues to build teams around inside scorers and while they can sometimes win in the regular season, they never get the job done in the postseason.
Bullets - They're currently seeded 4th in the East but they just don't have the front court to go anywhere in the playoffs right now. The Young/Russell duo is pretty lethal but this team is going to fall to the bottom couple of seeds likely.
 

AiRuPtHeRe™

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Contenders
Bucks - 7th seed right now but they are still figuring out their rotation. When you have Kyrie and Ayton, you’ll be a contender.

Rockets - they made a big move to add Al Jefferson next to AD. Kemba is still an amazing player and we’ve seen what he can do in the playoffs. Feel like they don’t get a ton of love despite being 3 seed.

Pretenders:
Warriors - We are the 2 seed but we ain’t really stacking up against the top dawgs. Good story though!

Mavericks - they’ll be fun in the regular season with all the depth and unique pieces they have but I don’t see them being real playoff threats. Impressive turnaround for the meme team.
 

Swope

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contenders

bucks
- lack of depth an issue that hoop is working on but the only reason this team could even called “sneaky” is bc of the negative perception angle that their own GM pushes.

Pistons
- the harrellson move was big time for Jason imo. I don’t think this team will ever put it all together as built right now but definitely a squad that can make some noise.


pretenders

warriors
- Team is built on 4th or 5th type pieces. Hard to even say a pretender bc they’d barely be in playoff out East. Definitely a team that needs quite a shake up

mavs
- this team is def more intriguing than the warriors to me, but another team built of players that are one dimensional. Adams can only rebound. Porzingis can only block shots. Wiggins in just athletic. Keshun is a great shooter. Harden does everything OK abut nothing great. Lack a real star.
 

Username

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contender:
hawks - lots of scoring from this squad, theyre the 2 seed for a reason and theres not many ways to stop them.

magic - the magic are starting to look serious again, and this is the best theyve looked in years so i expect them to make a run\


pretenders:

Warriors - they dont really have a 'guy' that can take over a game and win a series. they just have a few good players.

Jazz - just dont see it yet, they dont have a good enough team around luka yet. but theyll probably cause problems for some teams for sure.
 
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