NBA Northwest Divison: Season Preview Roundtable

Another NBA season is almost underway. The Oklahoma City Thunder are were part of the the most competitive division in the 2018-19 season. The Northwest Division is set to once again produce multiple playoff teams and have some of the best individual talent in the NBA. This division includes the Oklahoma City Thunder, Denver Nuggets, Portland Trail Blazers, Utah Jazz, and Minnesota Timberwolves.

For the second straight NBA season, the Northwest Division had four playoff teams in the Western Conference last season. Among these, all four of the representatives were top six seeds, taking up over half of the Western Conference playoff spots.

Among the five teams in the division, the Minnesota Timberwolves were the only team who did not make the NBA Playoffs last season. A combined record of 242-168 was produced by the five teams in the Northwest Division last season, which was by far the best overall record by any division.

To get ready for the Northwest Division race for the Oklahoma City Thunder, I had a roundtable with several Forbes contributors who cover the teams in the division.

We answered two simple questions:

I have three Northwest teams in the postseason this year - Denver, Utah and Portland. I'm perhaps a little higher than some on Minnesota, but still have them narrowly missing out. And while OKC is one of the most confusing teams to evaluate based on their intentions with Chris Paul and their season-long health, I think the most likely outcome still remains them on the outside looking in.

I would consider three teams to be locks for the playoffs: Utah, Portland and Denver. The Blazers and Jazz made more changes to their rosters, but all three of these teams are ostensibly deeper following offseason moves, and bring back their most important core players (Lillard and McCollum, Mitchell and Gobert, Jokic and Murray) to provide the stability and continuity that should keep them in contention among the top five or six seeds in the West. Both the Thunder and Timberwolves certainly have enough talent that making the postseason cut wouldn't be too surprising, but many more questions surround both teams. The possibility - especially if either team struggles early - that Oklahoma could trade Chris Paul, or that Minnesota could try to land D'Angelo Russell by dealing Robert Covington to the Warriors, at the very least sets their potential floors much lower.

Denver, Utah, and Portland. Expectations are sky-high for those teams and it would be shocking to see any one of them not make the playoffs and probably injury-driven. Everything would have to go perfect for the Wolves or Thunder to make it and that seems highly unlikely. They won't be among the league's worst teams by any means, but the West is too powerful for them to sneak into the 8th spot.

Denver, Portland and Utah.

I think every team in this division, when healthy, has a legitimate shot at making the playoffs. I by no means think all five will make it, but they all are at least competitive enough to have a shot. Realistically, I think three teams make it, including Denver, Utah, and Portland. I think Oklahoma City has a chance if they stay healthy and build chemistry early, but there is always a chance they make massive roster changes over the course of the season. Minnesota certainly has the talent between Andrew Wiggins and Karl Anthony-Towns, but will they both make that next step and be consistent all season? Being in a division this tough, along with being in the Western Conference won't make it easy for any of these five teams.

Oh man, that's a great question. Can I cheat and put Nikola Jokic at power forward to make sure both him and Rudy Gobert make the first team? If so I'd say 1st team is Lillard, McCollum, Donovan Mitchell (cheating a little more), Jokic and Gobert; 2nd team is Paul, Murray, Ingles? (NW is weak on SFs honestly), Millsap, Towns. Feels unfortunate to leave Steven Adams out of this entirely, but the division is pretty stacked when it comes to big men.

One really tough thing about this exercise in the Northwest is the positional overlap of some of the best players in the division. There's a strong case to be made that three of its best five or six players are centers Nikola Jokic, Karl-Anthony Towns and Rudy Gobert. As a completely unbiased Nuggets writer I have to keep Jokic, but since there has in the past been at least some experimentation with Towns at power forward I'm also sneaking him in at the four (with apologies to Rudy, who sadly gets yet another snub). With Paul on the waning side of his career (though at this point probably underrated), Lillard at point guard is a no-brainer. And I'll round out the lineup so it includes a player from every team in the division, with Donovan Mitchell at shooting guard and Danilo Gallinari at small forward, for a team that would destroy worlds offensively, even if its defense might be suspect.

John:

Without adhering to a traditional starting lineup, I'll go with this group: Mike Conley, Damian Lillard, Karl-Anthony Towns, Nikola Jokic, and Rudy Gobert. A little bit of everything on the court.

Nikola Jokic, Damian Lillard, Karl-Anthony Towns, Donovan Mitchell, CJ McCollum

This is extremely tough. There are so many excellent centers in this division. I will go with Nikola Jokic at center alongside Karl-Anthony Towns at power forward. Since the team would now have so much size, I would be comfortable playing small to fill out the roster with Damian Lillard, CJ McCollum, and Donovan Mitchell. There is so much talent in this division.

Overall, there were quite a few trends with the answers in this roundtable. All five of us had the exact same three teams making the playoffs, leaving out Oklahoma City and Minnesota. On the topic of the best lineup from the Northwest Division, Lillard and Jokic both made the cut for everyone. This isn't surprising considering they are both MVP candidates and on teams that have expectations to be among the best in the NBA next season. As far as members of the Oklahoma City Thunder go, it seems Chris Paul, Steven Adams, Danilo Gallinari would be solid picks for the Northwest Division Second Team, but aren't quite good enough to make the top lineup.

Among the players in the division currently, three made the NBA All-Star Team last season in Towns, Lillard, and Jokic. How many will be represented this season? With Paul George and Russell Westbrook gone, it is time for new faces in this division to make a name for themselves. The Northwest Division will be a fight to the end in the 2019-20 season.