In the words of Paul Ellering, I HAVE RETURNED! I've gotten a little break in the madness that is my semester at RCC so I'll return to the blog by continuing my yearly tradition of predicting the teams that will make the NBA playoffs for the coming season.
I will hopefully have time to revisit this in April to make predictions for the Conference Finals and NBA Finals(Spring 2013 is looking like an even bigger madhouse in terms of classes) but for now, here are my predictions for the teams that will get in. Other than the number 1 seed, these are in no particular order. For the record, I correctly predicted all 16 playoff teams last year and predicted the correct matchup for the NBA Finals, even though my outcome was wrong. I had OKC over Miami in 7 games.
Eastern Conference:
Top Seed: Miami Heat
Indiana Pacers, Atlanta Hawks, Boston Celtics, New York Knicks, Philadelphia 76ers, Brooklyn Nets, Chicago Bulls.
Western Conference:
Top Seed: Oklahoma City Thunder
Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Clippers, San Antonio Spurs, Memphis Grizzlies, Minnesota Timberwolves, Denver Nuggets, New Orleans Hornets.
Of the teams I have listed, without making any official predictions yet, I believe this year is Miami's championship to lose. In the East, they are head, shoulders and chest above every other team in that conference. The only teams I think in the NBA that might give them a run are the Lakers and Thunder and I don't give either of them a very good shot at dethroning Miami. Lots can change due to injuries, team chemistry issues(particularly in the case of the Lakers) and a myriad of other things but all things equal, I don't believe anyone can touch Miami this year.
