1 Prediction for Every NBA Team This Season

Prediction: Jalen Johnson will be the team’s second-leading scorer.

Dejounte Murray’s exit gives the Atlanta Hawks usage to spare. Those opportunities will be filled by committee. Bogdan Bogdanović and rookie Zaccharie Risacher as well as Dyson Daniels and Kobe Bufkin all stand to benefit.

Nobody should receive more of a scoring bump than Jalen Johnson, one of last year’s primary Most Improved Player candidates before the appearances benchmark got in the way. He finished fourth on the team in points per game and will have a real crack at the runner-up spot behind Trae Young.

This isn’t meant to double as a prediction that Bogdanović is due for decline. Nor should we expect Johnson to start suddenly initiating a boatload of pick-and-rolls and running possessions from dead stops. This is more like a vote of confidence in comprehensive improvement.

Johnson polished off just about every part of his offensive game last season: the shooting, the floor-running, the catch-and-go decision-making, etc. He should see more overall volume this year, and with Bogdanović likely taking on more table-setting reps, it opens the door for the 22-year-old to go from 16 points per game to somewhere north of 20.

Prediction: Jayson Tatum comfortably averages a career high in assists.

Jayson Tatum’s playmaking has been on the ascent for a while, culminating in what was some ridiculous high-stakes table-setting during last year’s title run. He averaged seven assists over the Boston Celtics’ final 10 games, showcasing pretty much every ounce of growth he’s cobbled together.

This trend will continue in a big way through 2024-25. Hitting his career high in assists can feel like a given. Five dimes per game gets him there, and he doesn’t play beside floor generals who have to monopolize the ball.

My gut tells me he’ll comfortably clear the career-high benchmark. I am also a coward, so I can’t get to the seven-assists prediction bouncing around my brain.

It says a lot that this doesn’t feel outside the realm of possibility. Tatum has improved so much at passing out of double-teams and exploiting live-dribble rotations, and with Kristaps Porziņģis on the shelf until at least 2025, we shouldn’t rule out seeing more of Boston’s superstar working out of the post.

Prediction: The Brooklyn Nets finish with the league’s worst record.

Bottoming out is the Nets’ endgame for the next two years after reacquiring control of their 2025 and 2026 first-rounders from the Houston Rockets. But that doesn’t mean finishing with the NBA’s lowest winning percentage is a given.

Other teams are firmly entrenched in the pursuit of Cooper Flagg (and Ace Bailey). Some of them are just as equipped, if not more so, to lose out of the gate and gain valuable ground in the race to the bottom.

The Utah Jazz have shifted all the way into developmental mode. Rival lottery-odds obsessive cannot bank on head coach Will Hardy chaperoning his crew toward too many wins and not enough losses forever.

Another Western Conference team should find itself in full-on descent. The smart money’s on the Portland Trail Blazers. They have a deep well of talent across every rotation spot, but zero immediate star power, and it’s not quite clear whether the front office is attempting to accelerate its timeline or get ready to have the fire sale many expected last season—and then again this past summer.

Oh, and the Washington Wizards exist. Plus, history and/or common sense suggests one or more of the Charlotte Hornets, Chicago Bulls and Detroit Pistons will suck.

Have faith in the Nets anyway. General manager Sean Marks understands the mission. He is the one who laid it out. If the Nets are too good, dramatic measures will be taken, via both trades and lineup decisions. And while select In The Pooper For Cooper peers will have logistical pivots up their sleeves, most of them have one or two or more players capable of propping up or breaking out in a way that anchors watchable and somewhat effective offenses. Brooklyn does not. Which, for its own purposes, is a good thing.

Prediction: Tidjane Salaun earns a rotation spot earlier than expected.

Finding regular minutes out of the gate for rookie Tidjane Salaun will be tough in the Charlotte Hornets’ frontcourt. Miles Bridges, Brandon Miller, Mark Williams (when healthy), Grant Williams and Nick Richards are all in front of him. And this isn’t a team that seems itching to bottom out or make trades earlier than anyone else. (Counterpoint: Maybe they are that team.)

And yet, it’s going to happen anyway.

Salaun looked the dials-all-go-to-11 part during preseason. He hustled up and down the court and uncorked threes with zero hesitation. There will be a defensive learning curve, but confidence to let it fly from distance and relentless floor-running are difference-making complements for a squad built around LaMelo and Miller.

A more typical order of events will see Salaun get substantial run after the trade deadline. It will happen before then. Maybe injuries up front will allow it—demand it. Or perhaps head coach Charles Lee regularly goes 11 deep. Whatever the reason, and despite being billed as a project, Salaun’s energy will prove infectious enough, undeniable enough, that he becomes a mainstay outside garbage time sooner rather than later.

Prediction: The front office gets more than one first-round pick for Zach LaVine.

Perception of Zach LaVine has officially—and long ago—veered too far into pessimistic waters.

The three years and $138 million left on his contract is a lot. And his health bill is miles from clean. But he has spent the past half-year or so being viewed through an alarmist’s lens, as if he’s someone for whom the Bulls would be lucky to flip for expiring money, let alone actually draft and prospect equity.

That stance severely understates LaVine’s utility as an on-ball creator who scales to an away-from-the-ball spacer. And if preseason is any indication, he is ready to resume his place among the league’s most dangerous off-the-dribble shot-makers.

Somebody, somewhere, will recognize the translatability of LaVine’s skill set, and how he might look as a third or interchangeable second option as opposed to a central focus. And once they do, the Bulls will move him for actual value—if not two first-round picks, then at least one attached to an intriguing prospect.

Prediction: Evan Mobley will more than double his three-point attempts per game.

Hiring Kenny Atkinson to replace J.B. Bickerstaff suggests the Cleveland Cavaliers are searching for a more inventive offensive structure. And if Atkinson’s early years with the Brooklyn Nets are any indication, any innovation will include advancing the team’s three-point volume even further than it went last season.

Evan Mobley will be invited to that party—and attendance is mandatory.

More than boubling his three-point attempts per game is a steep ask. It helps that he’s working off a low baseline. Mobley finished last year averaging 1.2 looks from deep—low volume that’s right in line with his career mark (1.2).

From February on, though, he attempted 1.8 per game (while draining them at a 41.7 percent clip). That’s not a far cry from the 2.5 he must reach for this to hit.

Mobley’s preseason stylings also bode well for this prediction. He put up 2.3 threes per game while averaging under 26 minutes. His volume should climb past the threshold once he’s handling games-that-matter reps.

Prediction: Both the offense and defense rank in the top seven of points per possession.

Take the Dallas Mavericks’ 17th-place defense from last year at face value, and this prediction seems inane. View it through their post-trade-deadline performance, during which they ranked seventh in points allowed per possession, and this proclamation is nondescript as hell.

Factor in the departure of Derrick Jones Jr. and the addition of Klay Thompson and the significant minutes he’s slated to play, and we wind up back inside inane territory.

Sounds like the right type of prediction to me.

There is nothing to discuss on offense. Dallas has Luka Dončić and Kyrie Irving and added Thompson—who, despite what certain corners of the internet would have you believe, has not devolved into a minimum-contract contributor just because he doesn’t guard at an All-Defense level.

The less glamorous end of the floor is nevertheless the primary concern. Can the Mavs turn in a quality defense with Luka, Kyrie and Klay logging ample time together? And do they have enough contingent levers to pull when they start to stagger them?

My answer is a resounding “yes”—on both counts.

Lineups with Luka, Kyrie and Klay will always have two of Dereck Lively II, Daniel Gafford, P.J. Washington and Naji Marshall behind them. That is huge—literally and figuratively. Staggered combinations can have up to three of those guys as well as Quentin Grimes, who spent his first two seasons in the league drilling threes and tackling some of the toughest individual perimeter assignments at a high level.

This is all going to work. Dallas may not match the season-long returns expected from Boston, Minnesota, Oklahoma City, Orlando and even Cleveland. But it has the personnel to hover closer to the top five or six than outside the top 10.

Prediction: Nikola Jokić wins his fourth MVP award.

There, I said it. Well, actually, I already said it. Twice. But I’m saying it again, under my own byline, to hold myself accountable.

Winning four MVP awards is damn near impossible. Only five players have done it: Wilt Chamberlain (four), LeBron James (four), Michael Jordan (five), Bill Russell (five) and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (six). I’m picking Nikola Jokić to become the sixth.

Voter fatigue is of course a factor. Jokić has won three of the last four. The field of direct competitors is teeming with alternatives. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Luka Dončić and Giannis Antetokounmpo all have no-brainer preseason cases, and the same can be said for stars like Jalen Brunson, Anthony Edwards and Jayson Tatum.

Jokić’s appeal endures anyway. We know he’s going to have the numbers. He will average something like 27 points, 12 rebounds and nine assists, if not an outright triple-double, on ultra-efficient scoring inside the arc while notching one of the league’s largest net-rating swings.

Now is around the time his anecdotal case should suffer. But consensus hasn’t been this low on the Denver Nuggets in some time. That works in Jokić’s favor.

If they win enough to hover near the top of the Western Conference while carving out (much) larger roles for youngsters like Christian Braun, Peyton Watson and Julian Strawther and navigating the Russell Westbrook experience, perhaps even optimizing it, who will be deemed primarily responsible? Spoiler alert: It won’t be general manager Calvin Booth or head coach Michael Malone. If the preseason (and Olympics) are any indication, it will not be Jamal Murray, either.

It’ll be Jokić, the generational superstar who will have ferried a team relying on youthful question marks and divisive supporting cast members to contender status, all without the help, in all likelihood, of a fellow All-Star.

Prediction: Cade Cunningham makes the All-Star team.

Early-season impressions of Cade Cunningham took hold last year and never really released their grip. To many, he was an inefficient scorer with a knack for giving away possessions from start to finish—even though the latter is decidedly inaccurate.

Cunningham averaged 22.5 points and 7.8 assists after Christmas while banging in 38 percent of his triples and lowering his turnover rate from 15.8 to 12.6 amid an increase in usage. Should we really expect him to be any worse? When he’s once again healthy? And when the Detroit Pistons have given him even more floor-spacers to play alongside?

If anything, the extra breathing room should serve to elevate his inside the arc game.

Take all preseason returns with a metric ton of salt, but almost 34 percent of his looks came inside eight feet, where he shot 66.7 percent (12-of-18). That volume presents a downtick from 2023-24, but Cunningham converted just 50 percent of his attempts within eight feet. Boosting that number juices his overall efficiency and scoring output while maybe, just maybe, rendering him a more frequent visitor to the charity stripe.

Basically, Cunningham finished last year on an All-Star trajectory. He will pick up where he left off this season—and perhaps even exceed those expectations.

Prediction: Jonathan Kuminga gets up more than five threes per game.

If preseason is any indication, this prediction is more cowardly than fearless. Jonathan Kuminga put up seven threes per 36 minutes, keeping in theme with the Golden State Warriors’ approach to let ‘er fly.

That volume is a stark departure from seasons past. We have seen pockets in which Kuminga can fire away four or five threes. But he’s so conditioned to drive and attack that outside volume is seldom his default.

This isn’t necessarily going to change. He is still most lethal going downhill. But he’s launching triples without an ounce of hesitation. And while that’s easier to do when they’re falling at a 44 percent clip, Kuminga will need to sustain real downtown volume so long as the Warriors plan to play him with Draymond Green and another big—and, potentially, Andrew Wiggins.