NBA Preseason Rankings - 2019

The NBA season kicks off on Tuesday, so it's time for my preseason rankings. I took last season's final rating, made adjustments for all roster changes, and came up with each team's projected season record. It's the first time in a long time that the Golden State Warriors won't be huge favorites entering the season, and last season's champs lost their best player, so the league is more wide open than it's been in a long time. Here are my full preseason rankings and playoff picks:

				Record		Proj
Rank	LW	Team	Rating	W	L	W	L	MOV	SOS	Seed
1	5	Utah	-12.7			70	12			W1
2	7	Denver	-6.07			58	24			W2
3	1	Milwaukee	-6.04			60	22			E1
4	4	Houston	-5.29			56	26			W3
5	10	Philadelphia	-5.07			57	25			E2
6	11	San Antonio	-4.96			55	27			W4
7	22	LA Lakers	-4.62			54	28			W5
8	13	LA Clippers	-4.24			53	29			W6
9	16	Sacramento	-3.29			51	31			W7
10	14	Orlando	-1.8			49	33			E3
11	2	Toronto	-1.42			47	35			E4
12	8	Boston	-1.13			47	35			E6
13	17	Brooklyn	-1.09			47	35			E5
14	6	Portland	-0.46			43	39			W8
15	18	Detroit	-0.05			44	38			E7
16	30	New York	0.49			43	39			E8
17	3	Golden State	0.723			39	43
18	21	Dallas	1.635			37	45
19	9	Oklahoma City	3.097			32	50
20	12	Indiana	3.097			35	47
21	20	Minnesota	3.204			32	50
22	27	Chicago	3.384			35	47
23	24	Memphis	3.781			31	51
24	15	Miami	4.404			32	50
25	23	New Orleans	5.569			26	56
26	26	Atlanta	6.535			26	56
27	28	Phoenix	7.53			21	61
28	19	Charlotte	9.287			20	62
29	29	Cleveland	10.42			17	65
30	25	Washington	12.5			14	68

The Utah Jazz made huge improvements this offseason, adding Bojan Bogdanovic, who was Indiana's best player last year, along with Mike Conley, a clear upgrade over Ricky Rubio at point guard. They also brought in Jeff Green to replace Kyle Korver, and grabbed Emmanuel Mudiay from the Knicks. All 4 of those newcomers are coming off their best individual seasons, and the Jazz still have one of the best defenders in the league with Rudy Gobert and a rising star in Donovan Mitchell, along with a great outside threat in Joe Ingles. This team has the potential to be scary good.

Denver made very few changes to a team that was very good last year, essentially just switching out Isaiah Thomas for Jerami Grant, which is a nice upgrade. This team already has great chemistry and won a playoff series last year, so it would not be a surprise to see them make it farther this year.

Milwaukee is the favorite in the East, with Malcolm Brogdon the only notable loss from last year's top-seeded squad, who brought in veterans Kyle Korver and Robin Lopez, who will be playing with his twin brother for the first time since college. With LeBron and Kawhi both gone to the West, the Bucks only competition to reach the Finals should be Philadelphia.

The Rockets roster is also largely unchanged this year, with one notable exception, which is Chris Paul being traded away for Russell Westbrook. The move will probably help them somewhat on offense, but hurt on defense, so this should still be the same contending team we've seen for a few years, but it may not be enough in the loaded West.

The Lakers and Clippers should both be much better this year with their huge additions, but there are only a few bad teams in the West, so they will have to fight to get to the level where most experts are already placing them. Golden State could still make a run, but with more than half of their core gone, they will probably not make a 6th straight trip to the Finals.

Playoff Picks

First Round

(1) Bucks over (8) Knicks
(2) 76ers over (7) Pistons
(6) Celtics over (3) Magic
(5) Nets over (4) Raptors
(1) Jazz over (8) Trail Blazers
(2) Nuggets over (7) Kings
(3) Rockets over (6) Clippers
(5) Lakers over (4) Spurs

Second Round

(1) Bucks over (5) Nets
(2) 76ers over (6) Celtics
(1) Jazz over (5) Lakers
(3) Rockets over (2) Nuggets

Conference Finals

(2) 76ers over (1) Bucks
(1) Jazz over (2) Rockets

NBA Finals

(1) Jazz over (2) 76ers