DeMarcus Cousins and Anthony Davis will form one of the NBA's best big man combinations in recent memory and could do so for the next decade. The Pelicans will be big man dominant in a small ball era, yet both Cousins and Davis are capable of spreading the floor as the most enticing bigs of this generation do. Read more »

The Cavaliers lost money last season and LeBron James has questioned their commitment to repeat. There's no way to discount how special it is to have LeBron on your team and there will be no regret for trying to win by all means necessary. Read more »

The Warriors and Cavaliers remain atop our year-end rankings but there's considerable change behind them, most notably the Raptors, Bucks and 76ers. Read more »

The NBA has accorded a new financial bar to its best players and that meritocracy was certainly needed. It will also restrict their mobility to benefit owners but there will be unintended consequences. Read more »

The new collective bargaining agreement will contain a few fixes to help the players, but Donatas Motiejunas is testing the limits of the current system as its final restricted free agent. Read more »

Russell Westbrook is a top-10 talent who plays his heart, soul and body out every night of the season, but the Thunder can't shake the ostensible reality they have one of the NBA's least talented and incompatible supporting casts around him. Read more »

While Russell Westbrook may be stubbornly extending his time with the Thunder, the short-term prudence of the Thunder may set them back by not timing the start of their rebuild with the 2017 draft. Read more »

Russell Westbrook playing as the unequivocal alpha and omega with a finely crafted set of elite role players is perhaps the ultimate fulfillment of his basketball destiny. Perhaps it is also the ultimate fulfillment of this asset-rich Celtics' era. Read more »

Tim Duncan isn't the greatest player in NBA history and certainly not the most entertaining or culturally relevant, but no team has extracted more value from a player and for longer than the Spurs did with him since Bill Russell and the Celtics. Read more »

Festus Ezeli is one of the best rebounders in the game and also keeps getting better as a rim protector, which was quite clearly one of Portland's biggest needs entering the offseason. Read more »

Without the development of friendships as teammates and the on-court test drive of playing with each other as part of Team USA, the 2010 Heat and 2016 Warriors probably never happen. Read more »

Players will always be interested in Miami with its advantages of weather, culture and no state income tax, but the reality of even Dwyane Wade being unable to trust his 13-year relationship with Pat Riley has caused irrevocable damage. Read more »

Harrison Barnes is not the transcendent talent many expected him to be as a hyped high school kid in Iowa, but he's figured out how to be productive and valuable as a prototypical combo forward. Read more »

The Warriors' center rotation of Zaza Pachulia and Damian Jones won't be as effective as Andrew Bogut and Festus Ezeli, but it will come at a fraction of the cost. Read more »

The Spurs could have instead pursued a younger, more athletic big with upside to emerge to another level within their system, but they went with the safe plug and play option of Pau Gasol. Read more »

Signing Kevin Durant with an existing team so young and talented that just won a record-breaking 73 regular season games is an NBA miracle. Durant's legacy will now be playing within the greatest offense in the history of basketball and however many titles they win. Read more »

The Bulls didn't need a ball dominant, high profile point guard who more than likely still can't shoot and has become disinterested in defense but at least the risk in years and dollars is minimal. Read more »

Marvin Williams was always destined for this combo forward role as soon as he worked on his perimeter shot and the NBA evolved to match his physical gifts. Read more »

Courtney Lee has always seemed like an ideal complementary shooting guard with his stable all-around game, yet he's been traded five times in his career and has never last more than two seasons with any single team. Read more »

Houston is loading up on shooters in Ryan Anderson and Eric Gordon to surround James Harden within Mike D'Antoni's system and must be assuming the defensive side of the floor will be a layup line regardless. Read more »