Golden State and Ranking the Eight Dwarfs

I made a point of watching all Eight Dwarfs this week-end, plus the Golden State Warriors so I could come to some conclusion on if anybody could hang with the Warriors. My conclusion is no and in reality I see no real separation of all that much within these eight teams who are the cream of the crop to challenge Golden State.

Each of the eight have a star with the possible exception of Denver unless you feel Paul Milsap can lead a team to an NBA championship. Toronto has Kawhi and Kyle Lowery…. the Sixers have Butler, Embiid, and Simmons…. the Celtics have Kyrie, Tatum, and Al Horford…and the Bucks have the Greek Freak.

In the West after the Warriors the star pecking order goes Houston with Harden, Chris Paul, and Clint Capela… the OKC Thunder with Paul George, Russell Westbrook, and Steven Adams… the Jazz with Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert… and the Denver Nuggets with Paul Milsap and Nikola Jokic.

Based on what I saw this week at this juncture of the season with the exception of LeBron, Chris Paul, and Capela being hurt the Thunder have on paper as good of an argument as any of the eight. But with the Thunder it will be all about Westbrook and can he corral his overall game when we hit March and April. NFL teams don’t advance with their QB throwing picks and NBA teams don’t advance with up and down point guard play.

But if you held a gun to my head today and made me rank the Eight Dwarfs…I’d go:

1 Houston

2 Boston

3 Toronto

4 Oklahoma City

5 Milwaukee

6 Philadelphia

7 Utah Jazz

8 Denver Nuggets

* I can’t rank the Lakers until I see proof LeBron will be ready to go when the games start meaning something. We’ll circle that for the time being and see if LeBron is a hundred per cent for the long haul.

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