The NBA season started much later than usual, but you can already see a little bit of the brightest teams. Learn more about NBA favorites.
The main favorites to win the NBA championship
Although the NBA season started quite recently and on a rather unusual date, the teams have already played more than 10 games and little by little you can see the emerging favorites and players who should draw the most attention to themselves this season. Of course, there is a lot of talk about the Lakers team, who became the NBA champions last season, but defending the championship title will not be easy, as other teams seem to be ready to fight. Although the Eastern Conference is often referred to as the weakest in the NBA, this season it has no less favorites to win the NBA than the teams in the West. According to the odds compiled by the betting companies, you can see who they think are the NBA favorites, and you can read more about the odds here: the best betting companies in Lithuania.
First of all, let's start looking at the situation in the Eastern Conference - last year, the Heat team, which reached the NBA Finals, showed a rather unexpected result. This year, it will be extremely difficult to repeat such a result, since the team has not changed much, and the main competitors have made some changes in their composition, thus increasing their chances of playing in the NBA finals. The Pacers are playing great right now and could be a dark horse come the playoffs. The team currently has one of the best records in the Eastern Conference, although they are without two very important players, TJ Warren and Jeremy Lamb. Also, C. Levert joined the team after the exchange, which should give more benefits than the team received from V. Oladipo recently. D. Sabonis is showing an amazing game and is one of the best players in the Eastern Conference, so the Pacers team can really surprise a lot of people.
The Bucks and Nets are considered the main favorites in the Eastern Conference. The Bucks team can stand out right now as a team that is more competitive and has more experience. In the summer, J. Holiday came to the team, replacing E. Bledsoe. However, several key bench players have left the team and this season it seems the team lacks the help of players coming off the bench, which is what has distinguished this team in recent seasons. However, league MVP G. Antetokounmpo's contract extension with the Bucks team shows that he is ready to improve his game in the most important battles of the season and with this team he wants to become NBA champions. Meanwhile, looking at the Nets team, one wonders if it is too early to label this team as one of the favorites to win the NBA. Yes, the team has three bright stars of the league - J. Harden, K. Durant and K. Irving, but we have seen more than one example when the stars gathered in the team do not win immediately and if they do not win, then they needed time to play with each other.
In the West, the clear favorites are the Lakers and the Clippers. There seems to be a bigger gap between these teams and the other teams in the west this season. The Warriors are still struggling to get going after major changes and injuries, the Rockets will have to fight for a playoff spot, the Mavericks lack reinforcements for key players, while the Nuggets have weakened over the summer and it's showing early this season. The Jazz look very solid, but it's hard to believe that this team can beat the Lakers or Clippers in a 4 game series. Therefore, there is a high probability that in the finals of the Western Conference we will see the duel between L. James and K. Leonard, which everyone was waiting for last season, but the team unexpectedly lost the series against the "Nuggets" basketball players. Meanwhile, the Lakers have looked very solid this season and have the longest road winning streak in the entire league.
At the moment, the team led by L. James and A. Davis are considered the biggest favorites, but they will have to do a lot to defend the title won last season. Although the team added solid players over the summer, the departures of J.McGee and D.Howard have made it seem at times that the team lacks athleticism under the basket this season and the defense is not as good as it could be. Still, the Lakers are one of the best defensive teams in the league, and defense is what makes them win the most important matchups. One could compare one of the league's best offenses - the Nets and one of the league's best defenses - the Lakers, so in this matchup the Lakers would have more chances to win the NBA.
