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The NBA’s Eastern Conference playoff picture is a mess: How it’ll all shake out

By Ben

CHARLOTTE, NC - MARCH 06: Joel Embiid
CHARLOTTE, NC - MARCH 06: Joel Embiid /
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The NBA’s Eastern Conference playoff picture is a mess, but becoming clearer by the day

How the seeding in the Eastern Conference shakes out is anyone’s guess at this point.

Three teams (PHI, MIA, MIL) find themselves within a game of one another for the final three playoff spots in the Eastern Conference. The Indiana Pacers and Washington Wizards could flip-flop on any given night between the 4 and 5 seed, but both are only half a game back of the Cavaliers for the 3 seed.

A losing streak for any team in the East other than Toronto or Boston could send them tumbling down the standings – no one is safe in their current spot.

The question of who the playoff teams themselves will be seems fairly clear at this point, though. While only Boston and Toronto have mathematically clinched their spots, it would take a catastrophic meltdown from Milwaukee, Miami, or Philadelphia to knock them out of the top eight in the conference.

The teams on the outside looking in are riddled with too much dysfunction with too little time remaining to overcome it, and it’s unlikely that any have it in them to make a meaningful push at this point in the season.

Detroit has spectacularly self-destructed since Reggie Jackson’s December injury and then come back down to earth again after their brief Blake Griffin honeymoon phase in February. The Pistons sit five games back of the 8-seeded Bucks and are headed firmly in the wrong direction; they’re 3-7 over their last 10 games and don’t pose a serious threat to anyone in the East at this point in the year. It’s safe to write them off.

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Charlotte’s brief surge came too late in the year to save their season, and as the Hornets are currently riding a five-game losing streak, their playoff chances are all but gone. The Hornets will be gearing up to enter yet another full-blown rebuild after failing to make the postseason again; Kemba Walker was reportedly shopped at the deadline this year and will likely be moved this off-season, and the Hornets are bloated with underachieving players on bad contracts that they desperately need to be rid of.

Their attention should be turned fully towards the future rather than clawing to the 8 seed and getting their doors blown off by Toronto or Boston.

Predicting the future

Of the current playoff teams, Philadelphia currently has the easiest remaining schedule and naturally would be best poised to make a run at the 4 or 5 spot. With 18 games remaining and a spate of easy games ahead, the Sixers (35-29) have a very reasonable shot at stealing a higher spot from the Wizards (38-28) or Pacers (38-28) should either of the two slip up. Given that Indiana has the league’s toughest schedule for the rest of the year, the prospect of the Sixers and Pacers swapping spots isn’t too unrealistic.

Things don’t get easier for the rest of the teams fighting for better seeding: Miami has 18th-easiest schedule, Washington has the 23rd, and Milwaukee has the 24th. With the Bucks in a tailspin (3-7 over their last 10) and a tough set of games on the horizon, look for them to still be sitting in the eight spot when the regular season comes to a close.

The Heat have begun to right the ship, but given Milwaukee’s struggles and the success the Sixers will be poised to have over the last few weeks of the year, the 7 seed seems like a relatively secure spot for Miami to finish the season in.

Farther up the standings, the new-look Cavs aren’t entirely secure in the three seed either. With John Wall set to return sometime in the next two weeks, the Wizards could pose a threat to Cleveland whenever their star point guard is set to return to game action. The only guy they’ll have to get through is the one who’s won the East eight years in a row.

It looks like LeBron James is beginning to enter Playoff LeBron mode yet again, but this is a situation that we’ve yet to see him in – an almost entirely new team, many of whom have little-to-no experience playing in meaningful NBA games – and it’s anyone’s guess how well Cleveland will hold up as the season draws to a close. They won’t catch Boston or Toronto, but if they fall it won’t be farther than the 4 seed.

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My prediction is that when the season comes to a close, the East will look like this:

  1. Toronto
  2. Boston
  3. Washington
  4. Cleveland
  5. Philadelphia
  6. Indiana
  7. Miami
  8. Milwaukee

However things end up shaking out, though, with so many teams of similar talent levels all in the mix, we should be set for one seriously fun playoffs.