Thunder, Favorites to Repeat the NBA Title
The annual NBA.com survey, conducted among the league’s 30 offices, has identified the Oklahoma City Thunder as the favorites to defend their championship. The team emerges as the main candidate, solidifying its position after a standout season.
As in a recent poll, the Thunder are shaping up as the undisputed favorites to win the title for the second consecutive year. An impressive 80% of NBA general managers have bet on Oklahoma City, which, if realized, would mark the first time since the Golden State Warriors repeated in 2018 that a team achieves this milestone.
The Cleveland Cavaliers and the Denver Nuggets also received some votes, while the Houston Rockets and the New York Knicks each got a selection.
The survey, which is sent to the 30 teams and prohibits teams from voting for themselves or players on their own rosters, also predicted Oklahoma City and Cleveland as the top favorites to win their respective conferences. In addition to the Thunder, who received first place on 87% of the ballots and second place on the remaining 10%, the Nuggets received 10% of the first-place votes and the Rockets received a single vote.
In the Western Conference, the teams that followed the Thunder were, in order, the Minnesota Timberwolves, Warriors, LA Clippers, Los Angeles Lakers, Dallas Mavericks, and San Antonio Spurs.
In the Eastern Conference, Cleveland and New York were unanimously selected to finish in the top three, with the Cavaliers receiving 63% of the votes for first place, 27% for second, and 7% for third. The Knicks, for their part, received 30%, 53%, and 13%, respectively.
The only other team to receive first-place votes was the Orlando Magic, with 7%. The Magic was also picked to finish third overall, followed by the Atlanta Hawks, Detroit Pistons, Milwaukee Bucks, Philadelphia 76ers, and Boston Celtics.
Nikola Jokic, Nuggets star, who has finished first or second in the last five MVP votes, was the clear choice to win this year’s top individual honor, obtaining 67% of the votes. Meanwhile, Victor Wembanyama, the Spurs phenomenon, received 83% of the votes as the player general managers would choose if they had the opportunity to select anyone to start a franchise, making him the winner in that category for the second consecutive season.
Amen Thompson, Rockets forward, received 30% of the votes in the “most likely to have a breakout season” category, which aligns with his current favorite status in the betting odds to be this season’s Most Improved Player.
There was little debate about who is the best player at each position, with Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Anthony Edwards, Luka Doncic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Jokic claiming the honor at each position. The only one of the five positions that received less than 70% of the votes for the main selection was the forward, where Doncic received 40%, followed by Jayson Tatum (20), Kevin Durant (17), LeBron James and Kawhi Leonard (7 each), with Jaylen Brown, Jimmy Butler, and Jalen Williams receiving one vote each.
In the offseason superlatives section, the Hawks (53%) were the best choice for having the best offseason, followed by the Rockets (27%) and the Nuggets (10%). The Rockets’ trade for Kevin Durant was chosen as the offseason move that will have the greatest impact, while the Magic were chosen as the most improved team this season (47%) and for having made the most underrated move by signing guard Desmond Bane, and the Thunder (83%) were chosen as the best defensive team in the league.
Cooper Flagg, Mavericks rookie, the number 1 pick in the June NBA draft, was the heavy favorite to win both Rookie of the Year and be the best rookie in this class in five years, while Kasparas Jakucionis, Miami Heat guard, was the pick to be the biggest steal in this year’s draft class.
In the individual superlatives section, Wembanyama (80%) was chosen as the best defensive player in the league; Erik Spoelstra (52%) was chosen as his best coach for the sixth consecutive season; Jokic (80%) was chosen as the NBA’s best passer and player with the highest basketball IQ, while Antetokounmpo and Wembanyama tied, with 30% of the votes each, for the honor of being the league’s most versatile player, and Stephen Curry was the winner, with 47% of the votes, for being the player you would trust with the game-winning shot.
