NBA: 5 most surprising teams 15 games into the 2022-23 season

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Miami Heat Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo (Sam Navarro-USA TODAY Sports) /

Fifteen games into the 2022-23 NBA season, we look at the five most surprising teams.

We’re just 15 games into the NBA season, and we’ve already seen some interesting surprising movement in the Eastern and Western Conference standings. Let’s break down our top five most surprising NBA teams this season, and analyze if these can keep up their dominant or poor performance.

5. Miami Heat (7-10)

After having the best Eastern Conference regular season record, the Miami Heat was just one shot away from the NBA finals in 2021. After losing PJ Tucker to Philly this offseason, Miami finds themselves with an eight-man deep roster, with Caleb Martin and Max Strus playing a consistent 30+ minutes a game.

It’s quite obvious that this Miami team lacks speed and struggles to beat teams off the dribble. To make up for their defensive weaknesses, Miami has been playing a strange zone for a large portion of the season, which proves they are unable to defensively match up one on one against other teams. Head coach Erik Spoelstra is being tested this year…can he craft an elite defensive game plan (among other things) that can help this team get back to the top of the Eastern Conference?

Why they will turn it around: Spoelstra is a terrific regular season coach; his teams have an awesome regular season track record. Let’s remember reinforcements are coming. Tyler Herro will return soon from an ankle injury, and Victor Oladipo will return sometime this year. These two will be able to provide some scoring, but more importantly, can stretch the incredibly shallow Miami bench. Even though this team started slow, they’re back to around .500 and may be figuring things out. Oh, and they do have Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo.

Why it will continue: This is a roster that has numerous holes. They lack scoring, speed, and refuse to match up man-to-man on defense. Spoelstra might be able to secure a play-in tournament spot for this team but can he do much more with an old roster that’s so sparsely talented?

Yes, Oladipo and Herro are returning, but as we saw in the 2021 playoffs these two were both unplayable because of their defense. This season, we may just end up appreciating how meaningful PJ Tucker was to this roster. His ability to play multiple positions, spectacular defense, and veteran leadership were very important to this Miami roster.