Long considered the NBA's glamour division, the Pacific should be able to live up to its image in 2005-06 -- even with a Lakers team in flux. Each of the five teams believes it has a chance at the playoffs, and in looking at these rosters, it's hard to blame them ...

Golden State Warriors

Losses: None, unless you think they'll miss the 12 games Nikoloz Tskitishvili played for them.

Gains: Ike Diogu (draft), Monta Ellis (draft), Chris Taft (draft).

Offseason goals: Try to encourage the NBA to move up the start of the regular season to sometime in mid-July; see if the entire roster is eligible to participate in Pete Newell's Big Man Camp.

What really happened: Thankfully, GM Chris Mullin kept to himself for most of the summer. The relative silence was refreshing after a first year filled with an array of sometimes questionable moves -- from throwing some $80 million at Mssrs. Folye and Fisher to turning an expiring contract and Speedy Claxton into Baron Davis before last February's trade deadline (a move that spurred the Warriors to win 18 of final 28 games while raising their scoring average by 10 points). Mullin followed up over the offseason with his second stellar draft in a row, securing three potential rotation players, although Diogu (a long Etan Thomas-type), Ellis (Nick Van Exel without that University of Cincinnati "education") and Taft (hopefully closer to Gilbert Arenas than to Chris Porter) may take two or three years to come around.

But this team also has enough young talent to keep things interesting right away. We would have liked to have seen Mullin hang onto the still-unsigned Rodney White, a slasher whose numbers suggest he could be a major contributor if afforded more than garbage-time minutes. The frontcourt is, at once, deep and unreliable. Assuming Diogu and Taft can't contribute right away, it falls on Troy Murphy to start defending, and Adonal Foyle to continue to do the dirty work underneath. Coach Mike Montgomery might want to start second-year big man Andris Biedrins (who should be a top-five center at some point) ahead of Foyle. The 19-year-old won't make it past the first quarter without picking up three fouls each night, but he can sop up minutes while allowing Foyle to do his damage off the bench.

Outlook: The Warriors have sustained that Flavor of the Month feeling for more than seven months now, and it appears they have done enough to make the playoffs more than a mirage. Still, the Lakers, Jazz and Timberwolves consider a postseason berth their birthright, and the Grizzlies won't go down without a fight, so the Warriors will have their work cut out for them.

Los Angeles Clippers

Losses: Rick Brunson (SuperSonics), Lionel Chalmers (Timberwolves), Marko Jaric (Timberwolves), Mikki Moore (SuperSonics), Bobby Simmons (Bucks).

Gains: Sam Cassell (Timberwolves), Daniel Ewing (free agent), Cuttino Mobley (free agent), Yaroslav Korolev (draft), Yuta Tabuse (free agent).

Offseason goals: Add some veteran help to the intriguing and youthful core, retain the free agents. (I've cut-and-pasted that line for six years running.)

What really happened: The usual. The Clips made moves with enough potential to finally secure their first playoff appearance since 1997, but fraught with enough peril to send them spiraling right back to Secaucus next May. I can't think of a transaction that was met with a more resounding "ick" than GM Elgin Baylor's decision to hand Cuttino Mobley a five-year, $42-million deal. Seemingly bidding against himself, Baylor gave the green light to a player who only puts up nice numbers when he's allowed to play big minutes and take dumb shots.

The Cassell trade could be a master stroke, and even if Sam I Am continues to pack the petulance in his overnight bag, he'll only be around for a year. Best-case scenario? He recaptures some of the magic of his brilliant '03-04 season, plays hard for a new contract, and teaches 20-year-old future All-Star Shawn Livingston a thing or two.