Crystal ball

Fearless predictions for the coming season

By John Hollinger, SI.com

Brazilian Leandrinho Barbosa has averaged 9.6 points a game in preseason while making 11-of-23 3-pointers. AP 12.2 Rebounds per game by Cleveland's Carlos Boozer in the preseason, the best mark in the NBA. "Like most American or foreign players, he understands about half of what I say." -- Jeff Van Gundy on Yao Ming. Five headlines you won't see this year: 1. Camby breaks consecutive games record. 2. Riley admits Heat need to start over. 3. Richardson, Rose named to All-Defense team. 4. Sellout crowd cheers Hawks past Bucks. 5. Blazers' charm offensive wins over fans.

The season starts on Tuesday, and since everyone's chiming in with their prognostications, I thought I'd join in the fun. I'll get to the nitty-gritty, but on the way let's look at some of the offbeat awards that will be given out this year:

Worst uniform change: Orlando Magic. Talk about plain. The home uniforms look like school-issue gym clothes.

Worst logo change: Houston Rockets. Rumor has it the producers of Buffy the Vampire Slayer are suing for copyright infringement.

Best draft: Phoenix. Based on preseason results, Zarko Cabarkapa and Leandrinho Barbosa are as hard to guard as they are to pronounce, and neither of them were even lottery picks. Once Zarko returns from a hernia and they both get some experience, the duo could help the Suns challenge the West's elite.

Best new coach: Jeff Van Gundy. The Rockets may take a step back in the early season, but by April this will be a real team instead five guys taking turns going one-on-one.

Surprise team: Chicago. If Jamal Crawford and Eddy Curry play like they did last April, these guys will be a handful. With the Celtics essentially punting on the season and the Raptors one injury away from 24-58, Chicago has to be considered a playoff team.

Disappointing team: Minnesota. They'll still make the playoffs, but the heady talk of a 60-win season isn't supported by the talent on the roster. And that's if everyone's healthy, which at the moment they're not.

This year's Golden State: L.A. Clippers. Like the Warriors a year ago, they'll have a sudden flirtation with respectability -- and playoff contention -- thanks to the maturation of several of their talented, young players.

Twice as many wins: Denver and Cleveland. LeBron and Carmelo will rival each other for Rookie of the Year honors all season, and each team has made other improvements to help them out of the doldrums and into the seemingly massive jumble of 35-47 teams.

Half as many wins: Utah. From John Stockton to Carlos Arroyo. Ouch.

To The Next Level: Peja Stojakovic. He's been good for years, but this year he'll be great. The Kings forward shot just 40 percent until January last year because he was bothered by a foot injury, but blew up in the second half (21.3 points, 51.2 percent from the floor, 41.4 percent on 3s after Jan. 9). With Chris Webber out to start the year, the Kings are his team, and he'll put up those kind of numbers all season.

Rookie of the Year: Carmelo Anthony. Two things attract voters: points and wins. Anthony might be Denver's leading scorer this year, and he may receive undue credit for what I expect to be a much-improved Denver team.

Sixth Man Award: Bobby Jackson. He'll be hurt by the fact that he won it last year, but I can't come up with anybody better. Teammate Brad Miller might be his biggest competition, although Derek Anderson of Portland also has a good shot at it.

Defensive Player of the Year: Tim Duncan. I'm not betting on two-time champ Ben Wallace, because he's going to have to guard more perimeter guys this year with Clifford Robinson gone, and he gets faked out too easily when he's outside the lane. As a result, Duncan finally will get his due.

Most Improved Player: Zach Randolph. Let's face it, "Most Improved" has really been "Guy they finally noticed" the past few years (Gilbert Arenas, Jermaine O'Neal), and this season should be no exception. Randolph is good for 20 and 10 as soon as he gets the minutes, and this year it looks like he'll get them.

Scoring champ: Paul Pierce. Pierce averaged 25.9 a game last year with Antoine Walker gunning away alongside him. Imagine how many shots he'll get this year. He might only shoot 40 percent, but Pierce will have the ball so much it won't matter.

MVP: Tracy McGrady. I know he's looked awful in the preseason, but I won't put too much stock into it unless he struggles when the real games start. McGrady was the best player in the league last year. If he just keeps doing what he's been doing, eventually people will realize it.

Eastern playoff teams: New Jersey, Detroit, Indiana, Orlando, New Orleans, Chicago, Philadelphia and Toronto.

Western playoff teams: L.A. Lakers, Sacramento, Dallas, San Antonio, Minnesota, Houston, Phoenix and Portland.

Western Conference Finals: L.A. Lakers over Dallas in five. Shaq and Dirk Nowitzki average 70 points a game while attempting to guard each other, but the Lakers prevail 167-163 in the clinching Game 5. In the semis, L.A. exacted revenge on San Antonio after Robert Horry went 0-for-the-series on 3-pointers, while Dallas took advantage of a Webber injury to knock off Sacramento.

Eastern Conference Finals: Detroit over New Jersey in seven. With Alonzo Mourning sidelined, the game Nets have trouble containing Detroit's post players, but finally are beaten by a late Chauncey Billups 3-pointer.

So-called "Finals": L.A. Lakers over Detroit in four. Someday, we will have an interesting Finals. This is why the NBA put LeBron in the East.

• I still wouldn't have traded Walker and Tony Delk for him, but I have to acknowledge the possibility that Raef LaFrentz could be reborn in Boston. He's been forced to play out of position at center his whole career, but with Tony Battie and Vin Baker he could move to power forward in Boston and make an impact. Think of how he did at Kansas when he had Scot Pollard to play the middle.

• The Knicks are looking to trade one of their 16 guaranteed contracts by Tuesday, and wouldn't mind getting rid of a second one so they can keep rookie guard Matt Carroll, who's had a decent preseason. But there's not a lot of demand for their guys, so they may end up having to bribe somebody with a second-round pick just to take Othella Harrington off their hands.

• Officials are said to be emphasizing freedom of movement this year -- i.e., no bumping cutters. If they're true to their word, that will benefit guys such as Reggie Miller and Richard Hamilton who move well without the ball. 

I'm disappointed you did not even mention the contribution of Gregg Popovich to the Spurs' success. How come? -- John Rominger

John,

No offense intended. I have about a thousand words to talk about a team's strengths and weaknesses, and inevitably I end up focusing on a few key players or issues. Popovich did a great job last year and I have no doubt he can patch things up with Tony Parker and get the most out of this team again.

By the time the season starts, Dikembe Mutombo will have had very little time to learn Don Chaney's system or to get adjusted to other players on the Knicks. Will this cause the Knicks to underperform in the first part of the season, and how long will it take before Mutombo is fully in sync with the rest of the team? -- Gregg P. Frasco, Saint Augustine, Fla.

Gregg,

The Knicks won't underperform because of Mutombo. They will underperform for completely different reasons. New York doesn't have a big-time superstar, and their closest thing to one (Allan Houston) is coming off knee surgery and may not be ready for the start of the season. I don't think Mutombo is good enough to start anymore, but he's played long enough that the adjustment period should be fairly short regardless of his role.

While you should have concerns over the Mavs' defensive abilities, using points allowed isn't a good barometer. When you score as much as the Mavs do with their uptempo game, the other team will score more because they have so many more chances. Look at shooting percentages as an indicator of their defense. It wasn't bad during the year, but it dropped off during the playoffs. Another big problem in the playoffs was a lack of rebounding. Dallas DID address that issue when they got Danny Fortson, who looks like the dominant rebounder of old. If we can get more rebounds, the shooting percentages will look better against us. -- Ron Nevelow, Dallas

Ron,

I got many letters protesting my description of the Mavs. I think the Walker trade will help and their offense will be unbelievable, but I greatly doubt they can win a title just by outscoring people.

You are correct that using possessions is the more accurate barometer of measuring defense. A detailed explanation is beyond the scope of his mailbag, but the Mavs got consistently worse after their 14-0 start and especially bad in the posteason. In fact, while Dallas' pace was faster than average, they weren't at the top of the league or anything -- seven teams used more possessions per game than the Mavs.

Overall, they gave up 1.08 points per possession in the playoffs, which is terrible, and they did it against two teams that were missing key players (Scottie Pippen from Portland, Chris Webber from Sacramento). The playoff standings for last year's final eight are in the chart; as you can see, the Mavs didn't rate too highly.

Don't you think the Spurs may have made a mistake when they traded their first- round draft pick to the Suns for money? Barbosa seems to be able to become a decent backup point guard. At that position, the Spurs are prety thin. Plus the success of their team today (on the floor and in the cap) is partly based on drafting promising international player late in the draft (Parker late first round, Ginobili late second round). Don't you think the Spurs are now denying a strategy that used to make them succesful? -- Mathieu Breuzon, France

Mathieu,

Bonjour from Atlanta. If you run into a small patisserie near Notre Dame, tell them they overcharged me for a baguette two years ago and I'm still pissed about it.

As for the Spurs, they made the move so they could clear as much salary-cap room as possible. That helped enable them to bring in guys like Hedo Turkoglu and Rasho Nesterovic, and will give them enough room next year to re-sign Manu Ginobili. But they'll miss having Barbosa, because he can play, and I have a feeling backup point guard will be a sore spot all year for this team.

John Hollinger covers basketball for SI.com and is the author of Pro Basketball Prospectus. Click here to send him a question or comment.