2012-2013 preview: Washington Wizards

Eastern Conference #13: Washington Wizards (28-54)

Point Guard: John Wall, AJ Price, Shelvin Mack
Shooting Guard: Bradley Beal, Jordan Crawford, Martell Webster.
Small Forward: Trevor Ariza, Jan Vesely, Chris Singleton.
Power Forward: Emeka Okafor, Trevor Booker
Center: Nene, Kevin Seraphin.

The guy who could change it all

I'm not really sure what to think about this Wizards team. They started off last season just as bad as the Bobcats, winning just one of their first 13 games. After winning consecutive games just once during the season, they traded away Nick Young and JaVale McGee and got Nene from the Nuggets. They won eight of their last 12 games, including finishing the season with six straight wins, including two against the Heat. I'm not sure if this is because teams were slacking off at the end of the regular season to either rest player for the playoffs or tank for better draft seeds, or whether this trade genuinely signaled a turnaround for the Wizards.

2012-2013 preview: Charlotte Bobcats

Eastern Conference #14: Charlotte Bobcats (26-56)

Point Guard: Kemba Walker, Ramon Sessions.
Shooting Guard: Gerald Henderson, Ben Gordon, Reggie Williams.
Small Forward: Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Jeffery Taylor.
Power Forward: Bismack Biyombo, Tyrus Thomas.
Center: Byron Mullens, Brenden Haywood, DeSagana Diop.

          At the moment, the Bobcats don't have much. We all know that they finished last season with the worst record in NBA history. While 25-57 is still a bad record, that's a jump from .106 to .305, and I don't see them improving any more than that in a single season. There's several signs that they could potentially do better than that, but I'm going with the safe bet here. They've actually changed up their roster quite a bit and seemingly for the better. They got rid of DJ Augustin, Corey Maggette, and Boris Diaw who all didn't play well for the Bobcats. Augustin averaged 11 points and 6 assists in 29 minutes,  but shot a horrible 37% from the field. Maggette averaged 15 points and 3 rebounds in 27 minutes while also shooting 37%. Kemba Walker was also somewhat of a disappointment, averaging 12.1 points, 4.4 assists, 3.5 rebounds, and shooting 36% in 27 minutes.

2012-2013 preview: Cleveland Cavaliers.

We're just over a month away from the start of the new NBA season, and if you count preseason games (which I don't) then you're only 15 days away! So in celebration and anticipation of the new season I'm launching a project of looking at all 30 NBA teams and trying to figure out where they'll go this season. Yes, I'm joining the bandwagoning group of NBA fanatics who are predicting everything. The plan is to cover 30 teams in 30 days, while also finding time to write about what goes on during the preseason. So we'll se how this goes! I've always found predictions to be a sketchy thing, especially with teams that acquired lots of new players or lottery picks. You don't know how the chemistry will work and you don't know if that lottery pick could turn out as a bust or not. Nevertheless, I'm doing it anyway! We're starting off in the East and working our way from cellar-dweller to Conference champion and then repeating the process in the West. Most of this probably won't be a surprise, so don't be disappointed if you aren't shocked too often. So here we go...

The Dwightmare Extravaganza!

It all started about two years ago. When Lebron James went on national television and announced "The Decision" we weren't really surprised. It had been talked about for months about the potential for a new superpower to form. For months people had guessed that Lebron wouldn't stay in Cleveland. For months (and even years) ahead of that summer, teams cleared cap space to make a run at the best in the NBA. When he signed with Miami and everything was done, our interest soon dissipated and we asked "What next?"

Please give me free tickets...

I took a weeklong break from my upcoming Dwight Howard piece after hearing of a blog contest for lower level tickets to a Blazers game. I was asked to write about which Blazers ticket package was my favorite, and I felt like this was something I could write about since I bought one of those ticket packs two weeks earlier. To look at the tickets packs, you can look here. I decided that since I took a week to write and edit this 2500 word piece, I might as well share it on here! Also, I started school last week which means that I won't really have much time for writing on my blog anymore. I'm hoping that, after my Howard post, I can do a division-by-division forecast for the upcoming season over the next two months. Anyway, here's what I wrote: