Photo by Andrew D. Bernstein/Getty Images.

Barring the landscape changing with significant trades or injuries, the top 7 in the West this season is pretty much set with the Lakers, Spurs, Blazers, Nuggets, Mavericks, Jazz, and Hornets. A few interesting teams will be fighting for the chance to lose for the Lakers and I’m going to discuss them. First up, the Los Angeles Clippers.

I’m terrified to make a prediction about the L.A. Clippers. They’re a mystery. On paper they’re the eighth-best team in the conference, but I’m not the least bit confident saying that they’ll make the playoffs. In fact, if you were to tell me that you thought they would, I’d pester you to make a bet with me about it, even if it’s late-November and they’re becoming a trendy pick due to their soft early-season schedule.

There’s enough talent here for this team to win a lot of games and be one of the more interesting teams in the league to watch. Their three best players should be the sometimes-electrifying, bearded point guard Baron Davis; the freakishly talented, athletic power forward Blake Griffin; and the sophomore stud Eric Gordon. Davis, as a Warrior, did things like this which made him a hero to a long-suffering fanbase. Griffin, who still isn’t old enough to hit the clubs after games unless he’s playing the Raptors, can already put “meanest pre-season dunk in NBA history” on his resume. Gordon has one of the sweetest-looking jump shots in the league, right up there with Ray Allen and Anthony Morrow, and his jumper is far from his only weapon. Unlike last season, there’s a decent supporting cast here too. Still, I’m worried about them, mostly because of their coach.

Sports memorabilia enthusiast Bill Simmons called Mike Dunleavy a big dummy last season. If I hadn’t actually watched the Clippers last year, I might point out that Dunleavy had to deal with a coach’s nightmare: chemistry-killer Zach Randolph, the out-of-shape version of Baron Davis, and significant injuries to almost all of his key players. Seeing as I watched more Clippers games last season than any reasonable person should, though, I know better than to let him off the hook. This team underachieved last season even with all those things taken into consideration, and I’m not just talking about their atrocious record (19-63). They were the least entertaining team in the league, even worse than the fucking Kings. Save for Eric Gordon’s jump shot and a morbid interest in seeing how truly indifferent professional basketball players can look whilst playing the sport they’re paid millions of dollars to play, I could offer no compelling reasons to tune into a Clippers game last season. As Simmons pointed out, you’d think the coach would relinquish some control and have his team play uptempo, with Baron Davis running the show. You’d think, once injuries hit, that he’d be able to get at least some effort and hustle out of the bench guys who rarely get the opportunity play big minutes. Didn’t happen. Instead, Clippers fans were treated to the kind of boring, uninspired basketball that would fool a person subjected to it into believing that idiotic “college basketball is more entertaining” bullshit. The Clippers were going to be bad last season, but it didn’t have to be no fun.

Now, some things have changed. This roster is deeper, seemingly healthy, and they now have a guy who’s such a lock to win rookie of the year that betting types are saying to stay away because the odds are so low it isn’t worth your time. With Beardo in shape and Zach Randolph banished to Memphis on a team that might manage to play even less aesthetically-pleasing ball than last year’s Clips, things could drastically improve. As long as Dunleavy doesn’t fuck it up. One bad sign already: he’s talked about bringing Blake Griffin off the bench. This is obviously insane.

When you draft a guy as talented as Blake Griffin, you throw him right in there. Let him go up against the best. Have him turn the ball over, have him get picked on a bit on the defensive end, whatever. He’s such a beast of a scorer that it doesn’t matter. He needs touches, lots of them. He needs to learn what works and doesn’t work in the NBA. It won’t take long for him. For the short-term and long-term benefit of this franchise, making him a featured part of their starting unit is the right thing to do. Marcus Camby and Chris Kaman both know that Griffin is the future of this team. Baron Davis knows that if Griffin has a great season, he’ll look good too. The single biggest mistake Dunleavy could make this year is to make this kid and the crazy-efficient Eric Gordon (.593 TS%!) into role-players. Give ‘em the damn ball.

Aside from the Griffin/Gordon thing and a general fear of over-coaching, there’s one more thing I’m worried about in Clipperland: the small forward position. Al Thornton started there and played 37.4 minutes a game last season, but there’s no way in hell this should happen again. You know the ridiculously overblown Kevin Durant/Wayne Winston thing? Here’s all you need to know: KD is a mind-blowingly good scorer, but, at 21 years of age, he is pretty bad at almost everything else. This manifests in a negative score in a stat called adjusted +/-, meaning his team and individual teammates have been better when he’s on the bench. The same was true about Carmelo Anthony and Al Jefferson in their first few years, and it’s in no way a cause for concern because, again, the kid is 21 years old and scores more effortlessly than anybody else in the league. Anyway, Al Thornton also has a terrible adjusted +/-. He lacks superhuman scoring ability, however. His TS% of .503 in his first two years in the league is crap. He’s not particularly good at anything besides accumulating field goal attempts and, for the Clippers to be good next season, they need that bit to change. With their talent, there is no reason for Thornton to take a lot of shots. What they need at the 3 is someone who will play solid defense and hit open jump shots off of drive-and-kicks from Davis and passes out of the post from Griffin. Luckily, this is exactly what free agent acquisition Rasual Butler can do. Let’s hope the coach realizes this and puts him on the floor.

Unfortunately, I have no confidence in this happening because I don’t trust Mike Dunleavy. I can see the Clippers stumbling out of the gate, even against sub-par competition in November. I can see Dunleavy losing the team again and Bill Simmons linking back to this article. I can see Baron Davis and Eric Gordon being stifled. Hell, I can almost even see Tyreke Evans winning Rookie of the Year as I yell at the TV that Griffin should have been given the damn ball more. I don’t want any of this. I want a Clippers team that’s fun. I want Baron to look like this instead of this, Blake Griffin and Eric Gordon to make their fantasy owners happy, and Al Thornton to play a role that he’s suited for. If Dunleavy does this right and the team stays healthy, not only will these guys be watchable, they have a damn good chance of getting that 8th spot. This is one of the most intriguing teams in the NBA; for everyone’s sake, let’s hope the on-court product bears no resemblance to last year’s loathsome mess.