Parity was already becoming a hallmark of the modern NBA, and the league's new collective bargaining agreement will continue that trend. The talent pool is deep, and it's spread pretty well throughout all 30 teams. Several have multiple bona fide stars.
There are a dozen or so organizations that could emerge from this campaign as the champions without causing much of a surprise. Here, we're going to stretch that idea even further by looking at some wild-card contenders, which we'll define as teams outside the top 10 in FanDuel's latest title odds . Some things would have to break right.
Some players would have to break out. But in the right set of circumstances, the 10 teams below could crash the contenders' tier. After half a decade of perennially high expectations, everyone is off the Los Angeles Clippers.
And it's not hard to see why. They lost Paul George to the Philadelphia 76ers. Since they were over the salary cap with or without him, there weren't really options for a meaningful replacement.
Instead, L.A. had to cobble together a supporting cast for Kawhi Leonard and James Harden with incumbents, minimum salaries and cap exceptions.
And it's certainly tougher to buy the new roster as a title contender. But Kawhi is still around. When he's healthy, he can bring the impact of a top 5-10 player.
Harden, in the absence of George, might be able to reignite some of the offensive explosiveness that once accompanied him to the Houston Rockets, Brooklyn Nets and 76ers. He was .