Grading bold preseason predictions for all 30 NBA ...

playShams: Bucks 'fully open for business' on trade offers for Giannis (2:00) Before this NBA season began, I made 30 bold but realistic predictions, one for each team. In retrospect, some of them made me look prescient and smart. Others ... less so. So as the 2025-26 season winds down and the offseason approaches, it's a good time to reflect on those scattered prognoses. I'm grading each of my predictions, looking back, as well as spinning it forward to forecast how these 2025-26 outcomes might influence the 2026-27 season to come. (Hat tip to David Schoenfield, who does this exercise for ESPN's MLB coverage.) Teams are organized from best to worst grades below: Jump to a team: ATL | BOS | BKN | CHA | CHI CLE | DAL | DEN | DET | GS HOU | IND | LAC | LAL | MEM MIA | MIL | MIN | NO | NYK OKC | ORL | PHI | PHX | POR SAC | SA | TOR | UTAH | WAS The prediction: The Knicks finish third in the East in the regular season ... but still reach the Finals. Nailed it! New York landed the 3-seed because it struggled through some growing pains and inconsistency under new coach Mike Brown, but it turned into the most statistically dominant team in NBA playoff history and reached the Finals on an 11-game winning streak. Looking ahead to 2026-27: First things first: The Knicks are on the precipice of their first championship since 1973. Considering this prediction as it relates to next season, however, it's likely they will fare better in the regular season than they did in 2025-26, now that they've fully jelled and flourished under Brown. And regardless of how these Finals finish, the Knicks will likely enter next season as the favorites to emerge from the East once again. The prediction: Jalen Johnson makes the All-NBA third team. Johnson was one of the breakout stars of the season. The do-it-all forward averaged career highs across the board (22.5 points, 10.3 rebounds and 7.9 assists per game) and took over for Trae Young as Atlanta's best player. He comfortably slotted into the All-NBA third team. Looking ahead to 2026-27: Johnson wasn't able to replicate those highs in the playoffs (19.5 points, 7.7 rebounds and 5.2 assists per game), but the 24-year-old's emergence gives Atlanta a new direction after trading Young. The Hawks should remain a fringe contender next season, with Johnson leading the way. The prediction: Two Nuggets make the All-Star team. Nikola Jokic was a shoo-in. But he famously had never been teammates with an All-Star before this season, and Jamal Murray was widely regarded as the best active player never to make an All-Star team. I thought that would change, and Murray proved me right: He started strong and turned in the best regular season of his career, averaging 25.4 PPG and ranking fifth in 3-point makes. He not only received his first All-Star nod, but his first All-NBA honor, as well. Looking ahead to 2026-27: A better regular-season performance didn't continue into the playoffs, where Murray shot just 36% from the field in a surprising first-round loss to Minnesota. Now, the Nuggets are considering drastic changes to their rotation around Jokic, as ESPN's Shams Charania reported last month that they are "expected to take calls" about every other player on the roster. The goal is to surround Jokic with as much talent as possible, after three consecutive postseasons falling short of the conference finals. The prediction: Toronto earns a top-six seed. Here's what I wrote about the Raptors in October: "Although their ceiling looks low, their floor is a lot higher than those of the other injury-decimated rosters in the East." And indeed, they fell in the first round of the playoffs, but not before finishing with their first winning record in four years and landing the 5-seed. Looking ahead to 2026-27: With a high floor secured, Toronto now must figure out how to raise its ceiling -- though the team could reasonably argue it would have already advanced in the playoffs with a healthy Brandon Ingram and Immanuel Quickley. The prediction: Ryan Rollins is the Bucks' best guard. Only two Bucks ended the season in contention for the title of the team's best guard: Rollins averaged 17.3 points and 5.6 assists across 74 games with 58% true shooting, while Kevin Porter Jr. averaged 17.4 points and 7.4 assists in 38 games with 57% true shooting. Given Rollins' big advantage in availability, it's reasonable to rate him as No. 1, just a year after he was a two-way player for Milwaukee. Looking ahead to 2026-27: If the Bucks retain Giannis Antetokounmpo, then Rollins will be a key player for a team trying to contend. But if the Bucks trade their MVP, they'll have to consider whether to keep the 23-year-old Rollins as a long-term building block or deal him, too. With a cap hit of just $4 million next year, he would be a very valuable player for a team trying to win. The prediction: P.J. Washington starts at least half of Dallas' games. Dallas brought Washington off the bench for its first t

Grading bold preseason predictions for all 30 NBA ...

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