Wild playoffs seen for West; Sixers step up in weak East
AUBURN HILLS, Mich. -- With about five weeks until the regular season ends, the NBA playoff watch shows a couple of huge gambles reaping poor dividends, with one team actually breaking from the pack of bumbling Eastern Conference contenders.
First of all, in the West, early returns on Phoenix's acquisition of Shaquille O'Neal were pitiful. Until beating the Spurs on Sunday afternoon, the Suns had gone 3-6 with Shaq in the lineup, while allowing more than 110 points in six of the nine games.
Beating San Antonio might give Phoenix some hope that it will be better equipped in games where the pace slows to a crawl. But it's hard to imagine the Suns making a long postseason run with O'Neal (36), Grant Hill (35) and Steve Nash (34) all playing heavy minutes.
Meanwhile, trading for Jason Kidd probably didn't make Dallas any worse, but it hasn't made them much better, either. The Mavericks have gone 5-5 since dealing for Kidd, and they gave up a key piece for the future in 25-year-old guard Devin Harris.
With the West so evenly bunched, playoff seeds and homecourt advantage could make a significant difference.
As of Sunday, Phoenix and Dallas held the No. 6 and 7 seeds, respectively, and weren't all that far ahead of No. 9 Denver. So missing the playoffs isn't far-fetched for either of those teams.
Right now, the final four teams in the West should come from the five-team group of San Antonio, the Lakers, Utah, New Orleans and Houston.
A heartbreaking 4 vs. 5 battle appears to be in store for a couple of those teams.
At this point, the Rockets might be the favorite, considering they've piled up 18 straight wins. Yao Ming's season-ending foot injury hasn't even made much of a difference because Tracy McGrady is playing out of his mind and Houston's had a reliable group of role players in Rafer Alston, Shane Battier, Carl Landry, Luis Scola and Luther Head.
In the East, the Bulls are not the team breaking from the sub-.500 playoff pack and probably never will be, but you knew that already.
Philadelphia became the first of the bottom-feeders to pull away by going 12-3 since Feb. 5. The Sixers hit a favorable stretch of schedule, which helped explain their surge, but don't count on them sliding back to the pack anytime soon.
Philadelphia is getting contributions from rookie forward Thaddeus Young (11.4 points since Feb. 1), and combined with Andre Iguodala, the Sixers have sort of an Atlanta-esque long, athletic lineup. Unlike the Hawks, the Sixers have an actual point guard (Andre Miller) and center (Sam Dalembert), plus some veteran muscle to help on the boards (Reggie Evans).
Unless the Bulls have more room to improve than they've shown to this point, the No. 7 playoff seed may be out of reach.
But the Bulls will determine their own fate beginning Friday, when they begin a nine-game stretch featuring six home dates and seven matchups against their playoff competition.
Before March ends, the Bulls will play Philadelphia twice and Atlanta twice, along with home games against New Jersey, Indiana and Milwaukee. If the Bulls are capable of stringing together more than a few quarters of solid play, this would be the time to do it.