Projecting the All-NBA teams

The 2016-17 NBA season is scheduled to start in just under two weeks, and before things get underway, Yardbarker decided to take a look into the future to see which players will drive the NBA this season with their play. So we’re breaking down who might receive the honor of being placed on one of the three All-NBA teams at the season’s end. 

FIRST TEAM F: LeBron James F: Kevin Durant C: Karl-Anthony Towns G: Stephen Curry G: Russell Westbrook

Four of the five names here shouldn’t surprise anyone. LeBron James is the favorite to win the NBA’s MVP award and is still the best player in the world, despite what voters have said during award season. Kevin Durant finished behind Kawhi Leonard for the second forward spot last year, but as a member of the Warriors, expect an exceptional season to be extremely kind to this Warriors team.

For the guards, Stephen Curry and Russell Westbrook held these two slots last season, and unless James Harden can get back to his 2014 form, expect Curry’s shooting and Westbrook’s athleticism to keep them as the two best guards in the NBA. With Durant gone, Westbrook has the Thunder all to himself, and watching his season will be as fun, or more fun, than seeing what the Warriors do. 

The fifth spot will go to Karl-Anthony Towns. There isn’t anything the kid can’t do. He has phenomenal footwork in the post, can stretch defenses out to the perimeter and can pass as well as any young big man in the league. It’ll take some time for Joel Embiid to adjust to the NBA, but between those two and Anthony Davis, the battle for the best big in the NBA is going to be awfully fun to watch over the next decade — and after a rookie season in which Towns averaged 18 and 10.5, it looks like he has the early advantage over his peers.

SECOND TEAM F: Anthony Davis F: Kawhi Leonard C: DeMarcus Cousins G: Chris Paul G: James Harden

We ended the All-NBA First Team talking about Karl-Anthony Towns and his competition for big man superiority for this current era, and his biggest competition could be Anthony Davis — if he can stay healthy. Davis averaged 24 and 10 in 61 games in his fourth season, and he’s only going to get better. The other forward spot goes to Kawhi Leonard, another MVP candidate heading into the 2016-17 season. Leonard is coming off consecutive Defensive Player of the Year awards and is becoming one of the most efficient scorers in the NBA after seeing his three-point shooting jump from .349 to .443 last season.

The guard slots will fall to Chris Paul and James Harden, both guys who have had first team honors in the past, and should have fantastic seasons. Paul will have Blake Griffin back while James Harden is moving over to point guard while playing in Mike D’Antoni’s offense. Both should put up numbers worthy of first team nods, but playing in a Curry/Westbrook economy, voters just won’t be able to afford bumping these two guys up.

In the center slot is DeMarcus Cousins, another relatively young big man who is leading the way in a quiet revolution of size. The Kings are going to be a bad basketball team, but Cousins continues to mature, and he’s better able to harness the emotionality of his game to create on-court production instead of mistakes that hurt the team. One thing to watch out for this season is Cousins shooting more three-pointers. Last year, he increased his shooting volume by 15 percent and raised his shooting percentage from .250 to .333 from deep. The efficiency isn’t scorching, but if he can do enough to keep defenses honest, it’s only going to make him more dangerous when he wants to get to the rim — even though he hasn’t had an issue with this to begin with. 

THIRD TEAM F: Paul George F: Carmelo Anthony C: DeAndre Jordan G: Kyrie Irving G: Damian Lillard

There’s nothing wrong finishing All-NBA Third Team, especially considering all of the talent between the first two teams. With the forwards, we have Paul George and Carmelo Anthony. The former will find himself on one of the three teams every year for the next decade if he remains healthy, while the latter is primed to have a comeback season with a slightly improved Knicks team. If Jeff Hornacek can move away from Derrick Rose and start giving Brandon Jennings more minutes, things will open up a bit more for Anthony, who just finished winning his third gold medal with Team USA. For George, he finished last season with a career high in scoring after coming back from an injury that looked potentially career-ending, and with his talent, another statistical jump is in line for the 2016-17 season.

Kyrie Irving hit the biggest shot of the biggest game of the 2016 Finals while Damian Lillard will go into the new season with the biggest chip on his shoulder. Lillard was left out of the All-Star game, and responded by increasing his scoring average by two points with his shooting numbers going up across the board. Lillard gets buckets against just about anyone, and his rampage against the league will continue as he continues to get better. Sliding to the third team is a slight demotion, but not an indictment on how he’ll play this season, just a nod to the players above. For Irving, as he continues to grow, so will his responsibility, especially with LeBron James getting older and slated to sit a bit more this year than he has in previous seasons. One of the more underrated aspects of his game is how efficient he’s been during his young career. He saw a huge dip in three-point shooting last season, but expect those numbers to go up along with his scoring.

DeAndre Jordan has slowly become the most important Clipper of the Lob City era. Chris Paul is a future Hall of Famer and Blake Griffin is one of the most electrifying players on the planet when he’s healthy. Both guys are better than Jordan, but neither is more important. Given Jordan’s defensive timing and propensity for cleaning up the messes created by everyone on both ends of the floor, no Clipper changes the team dynamic more depending on whether he’s on or off the floor. When Jordan is on the floor, the Clippers see huge spikes in points per possession, eFG%, and TS%. Even in areas that Jordan has little control over, the Clippers see huge improvements while he’s on the floor versus when he’s sitting. Three-point shooting is five percentage points better and all shots are assisted at a much higher rate. Jordan’s presence changes the game in ways that neither Paul or Griffin can control, and if the Clippers are able to finish as the No. 2 seed like many are projecting, Jordan is going to be a huge reason why.

(Statistical information provided by NBA.com, basketball-reference.com and nbawowy.com)