It is way too early to predict how the NBA is going to shake out next year, but that won't stop us from trying. As you saw earlier this morning, the SBN NBA blogs compiled their best guess at ranking all 30 teams for an aggregate power ranking list.
For full disclosure I thought I'd post my rankings (compared to the rest of the list). Why? Well, so you can point and laugh and generally make fun of me - that's why. Some additional thoughts below the list:
| Jeff's Rank | Teams | Final Ranking | Average Ranking | Best | Worst |
| 1 | Heat | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 2 | Thunder | 2 | 3 | 2 | 7 |
| 3 | Clippers | 5 | 4.7 | 2 | 9 |
| 4 | Bulls | 6 | 6.2 | 4 | 9 |
| 5 | Spurs | 3 | 3.8 | 2 | 7 |
| 6 | Rockets | 7 | 6.7 | 3 | 11 |
| 7 | Nets | 8 | 7.5 | 3 | 11 |
| 8 | Pacers | 4 | 4.4 | 2 | 8 |
| 9 | Grizzlies | 9 | 8.7 | 7 | 11 |
| 10 | Warriors | 10 | 9.4 | 6 | 11 |
| 11 | Knicks | 11 | 11 | 9 | 14 |
| 12 | Nuggets | 13 | 13.9 | 12 | 22 |
| 13 | Mavericks | 19 | 18.3 | 13 | 26 |
| 14 | Timberwolves | 12 | 13.5 | 12 | 19 |
| 15 | Wizards | 17 | 17.4 | 14 | 23 |
| 16 | Lakers | 20 | 19.3 | 15 | 23 |
| 17 | Cavaliers | 18 | 17.9 | 11 | 24 |
| 18 | Trail Blazers | 15 | 15.5 | 12 | 18 |
| 19 | Hawks | 14 | 14.2 | 10 | 21 |
| 20 | Pelicans | 16 | 17.4 | 13 | 23 |
| 21 | Pistons | 21 | 20.5 | 18 | 24 |
| 22 | Celtics | 26 | 25.5 | 22 | 28 |
| 23 | Raptors | 22 | 21.7 | 18 | 28 |
| 24 | Bobcats | 27 | 26.8 | 23 | 30 |
| 25 | Kings | 24 | 24.7 | 21 | 27 |
| 26 | Bucks | 23 | 22.2 | 16 | 27 |
| 27 | Jazz | 25 | 25.3 | 22 | 30 |
| 28 | Suns | 29 | 28.1 | 24 | 30 |
| 29 | Magic | 28 | 27.3 | 21 | 30 |
| 30 | Sixers | 30 | 29.7 | 27 | 30 |
It is very possible that I'm underrating the Pacers. I just kind of feel like you can put teams 2 through 8 into a hat and rank them that way and have just as good a chance of getting it right and the Pacers just happened to be the low team in my hat.
The Celtics have a pretty wide range. Someone put them as low as 28. As you can see, I was the most optimistic of their chances (I was the only 22 vote). So don't tell me that I'm not optimistic enough about the team! Ok, you can tell me that if you want. Bill Simmons is trying to talk himself into predicting 45 wins. Maybe everything will fall right and we'll win the Championship this year. I haven't the foggiest. But I think I'll go with an optimistically pessimistic starting point and be pleasantly surprised and/or understandably disappointed. Or something like that. I think I just confused myself. Let's move on.
I keep coming back to my theory of splitting the league into 3 categories of 10. The contenders are up top, then there's the middle ground, then there's the lottery bound teams. There will of course be movement between the various groupings this year, but for the most part I think it will be shuffling the deck within those categories.
Looking back at this, I think I should have ranked the Pistons higher. Not necessarily because of the Jennings trade (which happened after these rankings) so much as the emergence of Drummond and Monroe to pair with Jennings and Smith. That's not a title contender, but they could be a solid 5 or 6 seed.
I probably ranked the Mavs too high and the Hawks too low, but they both changed so much that I'm not sure I could name you either team's starting five off the top of my head.
So enough about me, what do YOU think about me? Or rather, what are your thoughts on any of the rankings.