During this past Thanksgiving week, the NBA surpassed the quarter mark of the 2021-22 season.
There are some real important things that can happen once we get to this point in the season. The 20-25 games mark for the season is typically regarded as the necessary number of games to know what teams are. Maybe the record won’t reflect it completely, but their net rating often becomes a good indicator of what to expect moving forward. That can change due to injuries or guys getting healthy or major trades, so it isn’t a concrete rule across the board. But we usually know where a team is headed based on that.
The other thing that can happen? We revisit some of the unnecessary, random predictions I made right before the season. That’s right. For this week’s Power Rankings, we’re still placing all 30 teams exactly where they need to be with zero pushback from the audience. But we’re also grading their for the first quarter this season, and checking in on the predictions made. Do they look like they are on track? Do they look unlikely? Are they already dead? We update it this week.
Just a reminder, the Power Rankings this season don’t just rank the 30 teams. We’ve divided these teams up into tiers, which any of the teams can move in and out of all season long. Here are the six tiers that teams can fall into this season.
Rebuilding franchise – Self-explanatory
Tired of rebuilding franchise – They’re not trying to keep rebuilding but they’re just not good enough to avoid it.
Play-In Tournament gives them life – Normally, this team would be headed toward Tank-a-palooza, but the Play-In Tournament is keeping them alive.
