Outlets are publishing their standings, MVP and championship picks ahead of the season, with last year's Knicks-Spurs Finals serving as a reminder that these guesses rarely age well.
The NBA season is underway again, and with it comes the annual ritual of experts guessing who will actually be standing at the end. Predictions pieces are covering everything from full standings to Finals matchups to futures bets on who takes home the championship.
Part of the fun this year is looking back at how wrong everyone was last time. A year ago, the Knicks were considered just the fourth-most likely team to win it all according to Vegas odds, and the Spurs sat way down at 17th. Instead, both teams ended up meeting in the Finals, a result almost nobody called. Even staff writers who cover the league for a living missed it, with at least one senior NBA writer having picked the Thunder to beat the Cavs in his own preseason guess.
This time around, outlets are widening the range of their guesses and opening predictions up to more staff voices, covering the MVP race, Rookie of the Year, and who emerges from a crowded Western Conference. Betting storylines are also getting attention, with superteams and long shots both in the conversation for 2026-27. Nobody is promising to get it right this time either.