 What's the word y'all? NBA playoffs are just around the corner and I decided that I wanted to get controversial. But I don't mean in a traditional sense, I'm not talking like when you turn on the TV and they say something controversial just because they want you to react to it, they want you to talk about it on Twitter or make videos about it. I don't mean that way. I would never in my lifetime say something that I don't truly believe just to get more engaged. I won't do that. But I will be talking about all the playoff teams or majority of the playoff teams and I'm gonna give my opinion. Some of them I'm lower on than others. I might be wrong. As long as you remember that I'm just a dude with a microphone that watches the basketball, everything is gonna be okay, man. It's all for entertainment purposes. You can clip these takes and send them back to me if I say your team won't win the championship and they do, sure, do all of that. But just remember, we are just entertaining. I do have a huge announcement coming up in the next couple of days. I don't like to be a dude that say, hey, tune in two days from now. But I'm being serious, tune in like two days from now because something big is coming. And I've been working on it. We've been working on it for a few months now and I'm just telling you, keep your heads up, whether it be on socials or on this channel I will be talking about it. But I'm ranking the NBA playoff teams based on how much of a contender I think they actually are. Now, as you know, if you've been a fan of basketball for some time, there are a lot of different factors that go into winning the championship. It's not just ex-to-nose. It's not just who has the best players. There's a ton of luck and a ton of things that go into it. I like the posts where people go through our history and try to add an asterisk to every single season because there has to be something. There always is something that puts a team over the top. That is luck-based. You have to be extremely good at basketball and also get at least a little bit lucky. So I might say something about a team today and it might be completely false in a few weeks, whatever. All right, so I divvied things up. We have five different slots here. They're the favorite slot. These are gonna be the two teams that I believe are the favorites to win their respective conferences. There's one under that that I say contenders. These are the teams that even though I have the teams above them as favorite, I would not be surprised if this team came in and won a championship. Then we have the teams that things have to be perfect. They have to have a couple injuries. They have to have some crazy games from the eighth man on their rotation. Some things have to go perfectly for them to win the championship. We have a tier that's just happy to be here. These are teams that might not have made the playoffs in the last X amount of years and they're like, we know we're not contenders. We gonna put up a good fight, but we just happy that we made some noise and make the playoffs. And then this is the no chance. These are teams that have already been eliminated or basically don't have a chance to either make the playoffs or even if they do make the playoffs last play in, I don't think they have a legitimate chance to win a championship. I guess the most controversial thing there is probably the Lakers. I know some people that still believe that the Lakers are a team that can make a run. I have not seen it. I guess the argument for it is that Anthony Davis will be back eventually playoff time and playoff Anthony Davis is the monster and I acknowledge that. But I just think outside of the top two and a half because Russell Westbrook has been good recently. I'm not giving them a full three. Outside of the top two and a half, there's not another player on that team that I trust. And even like their championship team in a bubble, you had good role players that came in and did their job or any LeBron team in history that actually won a championship. Yes, you have LeBron doing a thing and yes, you have secondary star doing a thing or a test your worry, third star doing a thing, but you also have the other people around them playing their roles. You needed a JR Smith to do a thing. You needed a RJ, Richard Jefferson to turn back the clock a little bit in the finals. So there are a lot of different factors and I don't see that Lakers roster having that. They have two and a half really good players that can do their thing, but the playoffs are so much more. Star Power definitely matters, but the role players matter as well. And their role players have not impressed me whatsoever this season. There's a reason why they're at the 10th seed right now as I'm recording this video and they have one of the toughest schedules left of the season and the pals are looking solid. The Spurs have a relatively easy schedule left. There's a real world where the Lakers don't even make the plan, which would be wild. The Pelicans, I mean if the Pelicans make the playoffs they're not happy to be here tier, but I'm just gonna say no chance for right now. They're obviously waiting until Zion comes back next season and we'll see what Zion, CJ and Brandon Ingram looks like. I think it's gonna look solid. The Clippers have been, you know, being an eye all season long, eight seed currently, Paul George is back working. I can potentially see them making the plan and getting one of those guaranteed spots and make up some noise as far as first rounds go, but as a championship, and that's what this video is about, it's about contending. I just don't see they have a chance this season without Kawhi Leonard coming back, but once Kawhi Leonard comes back, man the team is gonna be nasty. Atlanta Hawks went on a crazy run last season. This team is just different. Trey Young is still, I think he's leading the league in points and he's leading the league in assists, I guess before LeBron just had his game tonight. Either way, he's a crazy player in himself, but the rest of the roster I do not trust whatsoever. Cool, let's get to my favorites. I've set this for the last couple months and I have not wavered one way or another. My absolute favorite to win the Eastern Conference is the Milwaukee Bucks. Yann is still playing in the MVP caliber level. I still trust Chris Middleton and Drew Holiday once playoff time comes around. Brooke Lopez is starting to look better and better I just don't know how much to trust him once playoff time comes around after missing what seems like 70 games of the season, 65 games of the season, but I know they've done it before and I know that Yannis has the ability to turn it up from MVP level to like goat type level if needed be. And they're really, really good and I haven't seen anybody that impressed me even more than that in the Western Conference or in the Eastern Conference. Out West, we made two videos about them in the last week or so. It's the Phoenix Suns. They are the by far best team in the entire NBA and it's not even close. I think they have a 10 game lead on the second best record in the entire NBA. They're killing the game. They're undefeated when leading and going into the fourth quarter. They have a crazy good record even when they're down going into the fourth quarter. They're as perfectly constructed of a team I've seen in some while without having like a super duper, duper start the LeBrons or the Kevin DeRenz or the, you know what I'm saying? So those are my two favorites. Next, let's get to my contender. You know what, let's go backwards from here. I want to keep y'all, y'all toes on this. Let's go backwards from here. They're happy to be here tier. Like I said, these are teams that don't have a lot of chances to win the championship. There, they might be a first round team that gives somebody some hell or they might even be a second round team but I just don't see them making it further than that. Starting off with my Chicago Bulls, I'm biased here. I'm happy to be there. I know that the season has been way up and then way down but ask any Bulls fan out there after missing the playoffs for half a decade just being a playoff team, at least right now. You know what I'm saying? We're at a five seed with like a half a game or a game beneath us. Again, anything can happen. Like I said, with the Lakers, we might be a playing team at the end of it. I am happy as a fan that we are in the playoffs right now. Talk to me next year with the expectations changed. My expectations for the Bulls season this year make the playoffs. My expectations for next season might be better or higher because now we got an extra year under our belts and maybe the team or the people up top make some more trades and some signage, whatever. Right now I am happy to be in the playoffs and I'm sure Zach Levine will say the same thing. Of course, the player is one of one championships. I'm sure Zach Levine is like, I'm just happy to be here. But I'm just saying as a guy, is really good of a player he is. He has not made the playoffs just yet and this is his first season. So that is my first happy to be here team. Oh, I should probably put the Spurs in there too, right? Yeah, I'm gonna put the Spurs in there, no chance. Shout out to the Spurs though. Shout out to the Spurs for show, for show. Next happy to be here team, I think it's the Cleveland Cavaliers, man. They have not made the playoffs without LeBron James on their team since LeBron was drafted in 2003 and considering all the injuries that they've been through, all the turmoil and no, turmoil is the wrong word because that makes it seem like the front office is like bad. Front office has been amazing. There's no nothing going on in there. And all the injuries and the inconsistencies with their rotations and their lineups and stuff, I would say Cleveland Cavaliers fans should be happy to be there, especially considering you're gonna get another year of Darius Garland who's gonna probably get better. Jared Allen who's an all-star again is gonna probably get better. Evan Mobley is one of the rookie of your candidates. He's probably gonna get better. Next year might be the year where we're like, we're past happy to be here and now we like, let's go and make some real noise, you know? So set out to them. The next team is the Minnesota Timberwolves, man. Only made the playoffs one time since KG left and that was when the Jimmy Butler year and even then they got eliminated in the first round. But that was a big moment for them. That was a big season for them. But Jimmy Butler has been gone and they've missed the playoffs since then and now they've put together a roster that is good enough to make the playoffs and I'm sure they're super happy about that. But even saying that, I don't see them getting further than the first round, maybe second round if things go perfect. I think the Charlotte Hornets fall on that tier as well. Another team that had been towards the bottom for the last couple of seasons. They made some moves. They drafted Lamello Ball, who's in all started season. Miles Bridges has blossomed. Terry Rogier seemed like a good pickup. He has been a good pickup. And they've been missing Gordon Hayward who had been one of the glue guys for their team and they've been able to stay put. They went on a five game win streak. They're winning games. They just beat the Brooklyn Nets today. I would say they're probably happy to be here. I don't see a world even if things are perfect where they're able to win a championship. And now I got to figure out, is there any more people on that tier? I think that the Denver Nuggets are probably on that tier, man. Considering they said Jamal Murray is not even close. So they didn't say that he's not coming back, but they said he's not close and the playoffs is close. I think that this is a happy to be here a year for the Denver Nuggets, man. I think it might be a happy to be here a year. Could they make some noise and eliminate somebody in the first round? Hell yeah, they got an MVP candidate, Nikola Yokochun, they did. You feel me? But going deeper than that, I think it's gonna take more than Yokoch. It's gonna take Jamal coming back again, these far away. It's gonna take a Michael Porter Jr. getting healthy next season or whatever. Like I said last year, before the Jamal Murray injury, they were my team to win the Western Conference before Jamal Murray tours ACL. So I still believe that there's a lot of potential left on his roster, but this season, I think they're happy to be here a team. And as I look, I think the next team that might make this tier is the Toronto Raptors, man. Everybody else is probably a tier above, so I will go Toronto Raptors. They're probably closer to here. This is not ordered. This tier is not in order. I need people to realize this because people messes me all the time when I do a tier ranking video. How can you have your Lando Magic higher than the Portland Trier? That's not how tiers work. That's not how tiers work. If you are on the same tier, I look at you pretty similarly. The Toronto Raptors being here doesn't mean I think they're worse than the Bulls or them being right here don't mean I think they're better than the Bulls. That's not how tiers work. What are we doing? They're on the same tier. I think they're happy to be here. They still have Scotty Barnes who's going to develop. Freve and Vlee was all stuff for the first time. And Pascal Siak can be at his groove back after a down season last year. This is a happy to be here a year. And I think they're gonna make some changes in this off season to get a more complete roster because they're still missing some things to get them back to the Toronto Raptors of old. That was like, oh, they might be a second round conference finders, maybe a championship team. They still missing some things. And part of that is developing OG more and developing Scotty more, but also getting the damn center. Press out to precious. Precious has been good for the last couple of months. I'm not this valuing or devaluing you precious, but they're just need some more. You just need some more. So I think that's my happy to be here tier. I think that's my happy to be here tier. Next, I gotta figure out my has to be perfect tier. These are the teams that in order for me to consider them a contender, they have to get Kevin O'Ram big old shoe being on the line, plus six, three other injuries or every team they go against in the round. They got somebody that goes down. They have a player that gets extremely popular like they have to have the perfect seating matchups because a lot of this is matchup base. I should have said that early in the video, but whatever, if you got to this point, you're a real one. A lot of this is matchup base. Cause for example, the Boston Celtics are the one seat as of right now as I'm recording this video, they might match up against the Brooklyn Nets and they might change the perspective of the of the Boston Celtics because they're going against a good competition team in the first round. So all of this is matchup base 100 feet. But I'm looking at the, I'm just looking at the rosters right now. Okay. So my has to be perfect teams. I think the first one has to be the, ah, this is tough. Dallas Mavericks has to be perfect. As good of a player that Luca is, he is one of the best in the league right now. He's a playoff performer too. He's got some huge shots in his short playoff career, but two through 15 are questionable for me. I trust Luca wholeheartedly. I even trust like Spencer Denwitte now. I trust Jaylen Bronson, but they're still like a little iffy. I still think that the Dallas Mavericks are secondary star away from me really taking them super seriously once we get to the playoffs. Like I said, they have not made the second round in some time. I don't know, I'm not saying this is not a year that they can do that, but as far as championship contenders, I think that they need more than Luca and really good role players. I want to see Luca star, another star and really good role players. They're just missing that, that star and maybe it comes next year. Maybe it comes a year after that. I don't really know. Luca is in the league of his own, but even with that, I still think it has to be perfect for them to be a championship contender. Next team is going to be the Utah Jazz, man. This core of my colleague Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert have made some noise playoff time. They've made it to the second round a few times, but deeper than that has always been a question for them. I still think they're lackluster on the defensive side of the ball outside of Rudy Gobert. They still need some good perimeter defenders. And even Rudy Gobert is talking about the offense. It's like it's very stagnant. It's Donovan Mitchell, Donovan Mitchell, Donovan Mitchell. And somebody actually leaked me an article last time we talked about them saying that they had to convince Donovan Mitchell to shoot more because he wanted to be more passive. But that just tells me that they don't trust, they don't even trust nobody else on the roster, right? It's like we trust Donovan on offense. We trust Rudy Gobert on defense. We trust Mike Connolly on both sides. But after that, Jordan Clarkson can potentially heat up and give you 30 every once in a while, but everybody else in the roster is kind of in. And that means I'm talking about on both sides of the ball. And Bojan has it been there for some time. I don't know what to really expect about Bojan. So I'm going to say everything for them has to be perfect. And if it ain't perfect, they're probably going to have to hit, I'm not telling them to rebuild, but they're going to probably have to make some moves this off season. Next one, it might be controversial, Memphis. I swear to God, I love you. I absolutely love you. But I still believe everything has to be perfect for the Memphis Grizzlies to win a championship this season. I'm a firm believer in development of your players and they've been doing a great job of that. But I still think that they're still a little bit too young. And that might be dumb for me to say it. They might make me eat my words in a month's time, but I still believe they're too young. I just don't know how much to read into their success. Right now, they're one of the best teams of all time when Jon Maren isn't playing and they're still very, very good when Jon Maren is playing. They have a great defense, a superstar player up top, and really good role players. But I still believe that everything has to be perfect for them to go on and go on a little run to win a championship. This season, if they even get to the second round, that's a W over season. No matter what your seeding is, once you get into it, is a team that wasn't expected to make the playoffs two years ago. They were very close. And then last year, they made it. They stole a spot in the play-in, made it. One game one against the number one seed. And this year, I could see them making a second round appearance. But for me, I think everything has to be perfect for them to go further than that and eventually win a championship. Shout out to them though. Again, development has been big for them. Next year might be the year where they change up on this list. But right now in 2022, I think it has to be perfect. And now we have five other teams that I'm looking at that I have not ranked. And I'm trying to figure out if there's anybody else that I want to put on this has to be perfect here. And there's one team I'm specifically looking at here. And it's the Brooklyn Nets. And that might be a surprise. You might've thought I was going Miami because they're slumping right now. You might even thought I was going Warriors or Barton. Has to be perfect Brooklyn Nets is a real possibility for me. And I know that's about weird as it gets because Kevin Aran is one of the best players in the league right now. He might be number one, depending on who you ask. And Cary Irvin is one of the most skilled players of all time and he is an absolute bucket. And I'm not questioning them on the offensive side of the ball because those two dudes can combine to give you 95 points if you need them to. It's the other side that I struggle with. It's the other side that they struggle with. And I'm trying to think about their last year. They were a really good defensive team once playoff time comes around. But then I think about their matchups and they were going against a relatively weak team in the first couple round or the first round or so. So maybe those defensive stats that I looked at last playoff so they're a bit skewed because they were just objectively a way better team than the teams they went against. I don't really know what to think about their defense. And though again, they can give you 95 total that roster might give up all of those points. We're seeing that right now. I'm guessing Memphis Grizzlies last week. They literally, I think they literally gave you like 45 points. I think KD had like 40 and Cary had like 40. They gave you 80, oh, I guess that's 80. They gave you about 80 together and they still lost that game because Desmond Bain was getting so many open shots. DeAnthony Melton was getting so many open shots. And even today against the Charlotte Hornets, the defense hasn't been there. And I guess a lot of it has to depend on whether or not Ben Simmons is gonna ever play because he is this, last year he was graded the second best defensive player in the entire NBA. He can change things dramatically. He can change things dramatically where I'm not even worried about if they should be on this tier, this tier. But right now as they currently constructed, I might put them in that has to be perfect. Is that me being crazy? Maybe, again, in a month, two months time, I might look crazy as they're raising to Larry O'Brien. But right now I just don't trust them on the defensive side of the ball. They got some of the legit, some of the best playoff performance of all time on their roster and I acknowledge that. But I think it takes two sides. Do I expect Kyrie to lock in for a seven game series as much as he locked in on James Harden in that first game and when he gets each other? I honestly do not know. I'm gonna say as of right now and today, without having been Simmons as in, you know, working, I think it has to be perfect. I think it has to be perfect. And I don't know what that means because right now they're going to have to go against one of the best teams in the conference to start off with. It might be a Boston, it might be a Miami, it might be a Philly, it might be a Milwaukee. One through four right now in the Easter Conference is wild, it's changing every single day. They're gonna have a tough match up in the first round. And then I go get to the second round and guess what? They're gonna probably have to go against another one of these four teams. And then they'll get to the conference finals and they might have to go against another one of these four teams. And then get to the finals and go against whoever comes out West. I think it has to be perfect. There it is, I just convinced myself as of right now it has to be perfect. And it leaves me with the last four. It leaves me with the last four. Yep, and I'm thinking things through, I'm trying to figure out if there's somebody else that needs to be moved. I'll start off with the Boston Celtics. The Boston Celtics start off the season 22 and 23 and right now, right now as I'm recording this video, midnight, March or close to midnight, March 27th. They are the one seed, which is a crazy story in itself. Robert Williams is getting an MRI and everything on his ankle and neck. That dramatically changes my opinion on this team, by the way. If Robert Williams is going to miss significant time, they drop. I don't know how important Robert Williams is defensively, like legitimately, he's a guy that I'm considering putting on my all defensive team. He is that nasty on the defensive side of the ball. If he's not playing, there has to be perfect team. If he is playing and he is healthy, 100% healthy, they are contender to me. They do have their little holes though, things that I'm definitely thinking about. I worry about their half court offense once playoff time comes around. I worry about their half court three point shooting once playoff time comes around. But I still believe that what they're showcasing to us is the real deal. The only problem is they might go against Brooklyn in the first round and things, you know what I'm saying? It changes a little bit. Again, matchups change things a little bit. But their defense is real. The offense is still a bit iffy for me, but they've been making it work. They've been blowing teams out. They haven't really been in many clutch games to showcase to you if they're a good clutch team or not. And that scares me just a little bit, but I will still go out on the limb and say they are a contender. Next team is the Philadelphia 76ers. No team here is perfect. That's why their contenders are not favorite and Philly is there too. Their bench depth is terrible this season. It's just bad. You watch James and you watch Joel go out there and give you good performances or give you good statistics, draw the fouls, do whatever they do to keep the team afloat. And then one of them goes out the game and then the other one has to show to the rest because the other four players on the roster, you don't really trust. Other teams aren't trusting them. They're leaving Matisse-Type a wide open. They're leaving this player wide open. They're leaving Shayk Melton wide open. Four-card Corkmiles rarely even plays anymore because he went from a 40% three-point shooter to a 29% three-point shooter in a year's time. They don't have the role-players. Like I said earlier when I was talking about the Lakers, you need the role-players to be close to perfect to win that championship. And they haven't been that, but I trust their role-players more than Lakers. So they're a contender right now. They're definitely not my favorite. They are a contender. The Miami Heat, I think a lot of people have turned on the Miami Heat this week because they've had three back-to-back-to-back really tough losses. And if they lose tomorrow, I don't know. I think they go against the Kings tomorrow, a team that the Kings aren't trying to lose for show. I mean, they are trying to lose, but they're not at the same time. You know what I'm saying? It's not like they're rustic superstar players, but they're not a good team right now. And Garen Fox is still injured. If they lose that game, things might change a little bit. And people are already turning. Like Jimmy Butler had a triple single game the other day where he didn't hit 10 points, 10 rebounds or a 10 assist. And people are turning on heat culture and turning on the Miami Heat as a team. I'm still not going that far. I can't look at the first 85% of the season of them being one of the best teams in the league and look at this one week of games to be like, oh, now I can start reacting to the things that they're doing. And I was even reading things about the Miami Heat and the scuffle that happened between Jimmy Butler and UD and Spostra. And people are saying that type of stuff happens all the time in the Miami Heat locker rooms and stuff. You just don't see it, you know, national TV, which means that this is not as big of a deal as some people may to be on Twitter or people may to be online and stuff. This is a bunch of alpha dog type dudes and I hate using that word, but that's part of heat culture. You got these super strong, super tough-minded people and sometimes you clash. But what happened in the next game? They shook it out, you know what I'm saying? They shook a pregame warm-up handshake. They lost that game, but there was no harm done. You know, there was no harm done. I still believe them to be contenders right now. And I'm just not going to let this three game lose a streak deter that, especially with Tyler Hero not playing in these games and he's their best player sometimes. Next, we got the Golden State Warriors. Another team that's slumping right now but Steph Curry is injured. All of this depends on whether or not Steph Curry is coming back from his injury and how he is. But if I'm assuming that he's going to be 90% of Steph Curry, I still see them as contenders this season. I guess I can say the same thing about Jha. They say he's going to be reevaluating in a few weeks. I still see the Golden State Warriors as contenders this season, even though Clay Thompson might not look the same. You know, he had a heel of 30 pcs the night. I saw you Clay, even though you lost. I saw you Clay out there turning it up. Jha, my green is back. He's been looking decent since his return but I still consider them contenders. The offense could be really deadly when you've got all of their pieces clicking. And I think this is my list. Let me know what you think. Again, if you just take it at face value, it's just entertainment and talking about NBA teams. We could be homies, but if you one of those super weirdos that's going to take it too seriously, I don't know what to say to you. I don't know what to say to you. But I think this is my list. My two favorites and then the contenders that has to be perfect team. The happy to be here team and the no chance inhale. I should have put inhale but YouTube monetization might not have worked. Again, just to do with the microphone. So let me know in the comment section, a team that you are higher on than I am or a team that you are lower on than I am. And I'll be down there reading. If you enjoyed it, leave it a like and I'll see you all tomorrow. Peace. I normally don't do outros for this channel. I just ruined it. I ruined it. I got to delete it.