The NBA regular season is barreling towards the finish line, with each team having played roughly 60 games to this point. In what has been a year of genuine surprises across the conference, a lot has changed over the course of the season.
This is the point in the season where the teams at the bottom of this list have to be examined with an eye towards the future. What is their purpose in the final quarter of the season? Is there a foundation in place to build on as we head into next year? Those questions are much more pertinent than just evaluating the basketball being played at the current moment, as those teams try to manufacture as many losses as possible to increase their draft odds.
Here are the current Eastern Conference power rankings as the NBA Playoffs approach:
If the NBA were like the Premier League, the Nets would be at risk of relegation. What the heck are they doing? Since their KD/Kyrie/James Harden experiment blew up in their face, they have been a downright laughing stock. They do not deserve the good fortune of a top pick in this upcoming draft, and they also do not deserve a second paragraph like every other team on this list received.
The Chicago Bulls organization deserves some credit for finally committing to being bad and seeing if they can land a top pick to begin a true rebuild. For so long have the Bulls been content with mediocrity, constantly shuffling the same pieces with different names, hoping that something would stick at any point. After so many attempts, they bit the bullet.
If the ping-pong balls are kind to them come the Draft Lottery, the Bulls can find themselves right back in the middling tier next year but with actual reason to believe they can climb up the ranks in years to come. If they do not, at least they know they will be bad again next year.
Despite acquiring Trae Young and Anthony Davis, the Wizards remain toward the bottom of the East. If they can sustain good health next year, there is a chance this all works. For a team that has been as downtrodden as Washington, it was worth the risk.
They have some nice young pieces in Tre Johnson and the ascending Alex Sarr. One more good draft pick could set us up for a nice present with and future after Davis and Young, but that, of course, is no guarantee.
The Bucks are headed towards a lengthy rebuild, but they differ from the other teams in this tier for two reasons: they won a championship, and Giannis Antetokounmpo will be a coveted asset on the trade market in the offseason. The rest of their roster is clunky and ill-fitting, but that does not matter because they are not going anywhere this year.
The Bucks are probably already canvassing the league to figure out what will be available to them in a potential Giannis trade. It will be interesting to see whether they go the draft-haul route or target a specific group of players for a return. Given the state of the roster, it would behoove them to net as many draft picks as possible and start over.
Onsi Saleh and Quin Snyder are cooking up something in Atlanta. The Hawks may be more of a slow simmer in the Crock-Pot as opposed to a quick flash in the air fryer, but the moves they made to get off Trae Young and Kristaps Porzingis while bringing in Jonathan Kuminga at the trade deadline will pay massive dividends for them down the road.
The Hawks are officially Jalen Johnson's team now, and that was unequivocally the best decision the franchise could have made. Johnson is averaging 22.7 points, 10.9 rebounds, and 7.5 assists per game this season while playing stout, rangy defense. He is no longer the stud athlete with untapped potential; Jalen Johnson is quickly becoming one of the best players in basketball.
They may have the worst record in the conference, but the Indiana Pacers are one of the smartest organizations in the league and they refused to let an awful year detract from their eventual goals. Their trade for Ivica Zubac to anchor their defense and work the two-man game with Tyrese Haliburton when he returns is proof of just that.
The Pacers are also in prime position to add a blue-chip prospect in this draft that could cement their status as a conference elite for years to come. This team could have won a trophy last June and could have the number one overall pick this upcoming June. That type of talent influx may be the only thing missing.
Arguably, no team has had a more disappointing season than the Orlando Magic. Their two best players have not been able to stay healthy, and they traded a king's ransom for Desmond Bane to be a tertiary offensive option that too often has had to play up in the pecking order. It is fair to wonder if Jamahl Mosley will be their head coach next year.
The Magic should have been vying for home court advantage in the first round and maybe more. They should have been the team nobody wanted to see in a seven-game series. Instead, they will be left searching for answers, headed into a dark and dreary offseason that could begin before the playoffs do.
The Miami Heat have the chance to do the funniest thing. Most other teams in their position would be resigned to the fact that this is not their year and would have an eye towards how they can improve next year, but the Heat are not most teams. Erik Spoelstra has been here before and prevailed.
It is unlikely that they win a playoff series, but if there is one coach and organization that can never be counted out, it is the Miami Heat. They are an imperfect roster lacking a true superstar, but do not be surprised if you see them giving the Detroit Pistons all they can handle in a first-round nightmare.
The unquestioned greatest surprise of the Eastern Conference is the ascension of the Charlotte Hornets. After an awful start to the season that made everyone think this was just going to be another year of the same poor product, the Hornets have been one of the better teams in the entire conference since. They are 14-6 in their last 20 games, and have moved up five spots on this list since the mid-season rankings.
With LaMelo Ball, Brandon Miller, and Kon Knueppel all healthy and playing well, the Hornets' offense has evolved into one of the best in the league. Moussa Diabate is one of the more unknown and underrated players in the league. Coby White has been a great addition to the team, and they have a rock-solid cast of role players who do their job well. The Hornets are becoming a real team and, if they make it through the Play-In, will not be a fun first-round playoff matchup for whoever draws them.
The Raptors are the most interesting team in the conference heading into the playoffs. They lack the star power and experience to truly make noise, but they are not to be taken lightly. They are fully capable of punching up in weight-class and taking anyone out.
For as many talented youngsters as the Raptors have, they have just as many savvy veterans who have been around the block. They are long, fast, tenacious, and they will refuse to give up. Nobody is going to outwork the Raptors en route to beating them in a playoff series; they will have to find another way.
The Sixers are the wildcard of the East because nobody knows what they are going to get from them on any given night. There is still a real chance they miss the playoffs entirely. But if all goes right over the next few weeks, no other team has as good a shot to beat any of the teams above them on this list if the Sixers are at full strength.
Tyrese Maxey has been one of the best offensive players in basketball this year. Joel Embiid is still a walking bucket. Paul George, VJ Edgecombe, and Kelly Oubre can all hit shots and defend, and they have a couple of useful role players off the bench. Beating any of the teams in the top four would be the best playoff series win of the Joel Embiid era.
Something is off with the Knicks, and it is hard to put a finger on. They have the third-best offensive rating and eighth-best defensive rating in the league, per nba.com. Their offense has generally been more diverse under head coach Mike Brown, which benefits their best player, Jalen Brunson. Still, it feels like everything has to go right for this team to make the NBA Finals.
The roster has a bunch of one-way players: Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns do not play much defense, and OG Anunoby, Mikal Bridges, and Josh Hart do not consistently bring enough offense. But they have beaten all three of the teams above them on this list in the playoffs in just the last three years, and the Indiana Pacers, who have taken them down each of the last two years, will not be in the bracket at all. The Knicks have a shot.
The Cavaliers did not get off to the start they wanted this season. After being the wire-to-wire best team in the East last year in the regular season, the expectation was that they would be even better in year two under head coach Kenny Atkinson. What hindered them most was Darius Garland's inability to stay healthy for an extended period and Evan Mobley's not taking the superstar leap many expected.
They got rid of one of those issues by trading Garland to the Los Angeles Clippers in exchange for James Harden. Adding one of the game's best playmakers helps mitigate the other issue by getting Mobley into the best spots and into the advantages of his career. Donovan Mitchell is playing fringe MVP-level basketball to tie it all together. The Cavs are a mismatch problem in this year's playoff field and can surely find themselves in the playoffs in June.
What the Boston Celtics are doing this year is incredible. Jayson Tatum has not played a single minute of basketball this season, yet they still have the second-best record in the conference and the fourth-best in the entire league. For the first time in the three editions of the in-season power rankings, there is a second team in the top tier.
Jaylen Brown has earned every bit of the MVP buzz he is garnering. Joe Mazzulla is one of the league's more mysterious figures, but there is no denying that he is one of the best coaches in the league. The Celtics roster without Jayson Tatum should not be nearly as good as it is, but because of Brown and Mazzulla primarily, they have a chance to win another title if Tatum returns at any effective capacity.
The Detroit Pistons check just about every box of a championship-caliber team. They have a superstar in Cade Cunningham, who could backdoor his way into an MVP award if a couple of guys out West miss some more games. Jalen Duren is coming off his first All-Star nod and perfectly embodies the toughness of Detroit. JB Bickerstaff gets better as a coach every year. They have great individual defenders and a great team defensive construct, a surprise contributor in Daniss Jenkins, and a knockdown shooter in Duncan Robinson.
So, what are they missing? They lack shooting, and that could hamper them come playoff time. Not only would having another shooter have helped bail Cunningham out a little more on the offensive end, but it would also have opened up the floor for him and everyone involved. Playoff defenses are not going to be worried about Ausar Thompson or Tobias Harris lighting them up. They are going to further constrict the available space Cunningham has to operate, and with only one playoff series worth of experience under his belt in his career, it is going to be a tall task to ask him to overcome that every single night for four straight rounds.
No matter what happens, this year has been a massive success for the Pistons. This core has a great chance this year and beyond to win the team's first title since the Goin' To Work Pistons in 2004. Remember that nickname?
