This is how the Western Conference regular season will play out in 2024-25 from 1 to 15 ... according to The Stein Line 100

The results are in from our recent community survey seeking a top-to-bottom forecast of the West's regular season standings

In our last Tuesday Newsletter Extravaganza, we shared the results of our triple-digit-strong community vote laying out how we think that the Eastern Conference will play out from 1 to 15 this coming season.

On this Newsletter Tuesday: The West!

One hundred respondents were surveyed — including the author's forecast — and a whopping 74 picked the Oklahoma City Thunder to record the West's best regular-season mark in 2024-25 ahead of Minnesota after Alex Caruso and Isaiah Hartenstein were added to one of the league's strongest rosters.

From there Dallas narrowly edged Denver for the predicted third seed after its unexpected run to the NBA Finals last season ... with Phoenix landing at No. 5. And then: An almighty jumble from No. 6 down to No. 13 that wasn't terribly kind to the California teams.

As a reminder, I set 100 respondents as the goal for each conference to create a deep, strong panel for each 1-to-15 ladder that would be unveiled as The Stein Line's official preseason forecasts for East and West. Our trusty tabulator Deven P. then did the truly hard work by going through every submission to set me up to assemble the respective ladders.

Teams were awarded 15 points for each first-place vote, 14 points for each second-place vote and so on ... all the way down to one point for every 15th-place vote.

So ...

Oklahoma City's 74 first-place votes were worth 1,110 points in this system. Minnesota's 45 second-place votes were worth 630 points. And Portland's whopping 85 15th-place votes — more than any other team in the league was specifically projected to finish anywhere — racked up only 85 points.

As training camps leaguewide slowly dribble closer, here is how we as a collective project the West's 1-to-15 regular season to play out:

1. Thunder (1,470 points)

2. Timberwolves (1,349)

3. Mavericks (1,284)

4. Nuggets (1,206)

5. Suns (1,006)

6. Grizzlies (891)

7. Kings (803)

8. Pelicans (774)

9. Warriors (687)

10. Lakers (669)

11. Rockets (612)

12. Clippers (512)

13. Spurs (421)

14. Jazz (200)

15. Trail Blazers (116)

Some process notes and reflections:

🏀 The Thunder fell just four votes shy of Boston's total of 78 first-place votes in the East. So we've got heavy favorites in both conferences as the season nears tipoff.

🏀 The Stein Line community surprised me with its faith in a bounce-back season for Memphis. The Grizzlies are projected to finish a solid sixth in the West after a hellacious slew of injuries in 2023-24 dropped them all the way to 13th last season at 27-55. I had the Grizz way down in 12th in my preseason forecast, which apparently was way too low.

🏀 I was likewise surprised to see the Clippers way down at No. 12 after all the ballots were counted … one slot below No. 11 Houston. Is Paul George's departure going to weaken the Clippers to that degree? George might have been the only current All-Star to switch teams this off-season, but the Clippers' roster depth should prevent them from cratering completely.

This was my personal 1-to-15 West ladder in the original story published on Aug. 26 that urged you to join in with your votes:

1. Thunder

2. Timberwolves

3. Mavericks

4. Suns

5. Nuggets

6. Warriors

7. Kings

8. Lakers

9. Pelicans

10. Clippers

11. Spurs

12. Grizzlies

13. Rockets

14. Trail Blazers

15. Jazz

The Committee (of One) will naturally be back very soon with its own 1-to-30 ladder to ring in the start of a new season in true Power Rankings fashion … but I'm glad we went the community survey route for the East and West for starters to get a good feel for what expectations are for every team in a broader sense.

And thanks one more time, Deven P., for your dogged tallying. You carried this project.

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As a reminder: Tuesday editions, on this and every Newsletter Tuesday, go out free to anyone who signs up, just as my Tuesday pieces did in their New York Times incarnation.

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One full quarter-century later …

As I mentioned in Monday's post that took the place of This Week In Basketball, I'm on one of my usual soccer-heavy excursions that are a mid-September tradition for me.

How traditional? I've enclosed a picture from 25 years ago (to the month) that was recently brought (back) to my attention. It was a professionally taken photo by the Manchester Evening News in the Maine Road press box before a 2-1 home win over Crystal Palace in September 1999 with the intent of spotlighting the crazy Yank who bizarrely liked vacationing in England’s rainy northwest … just a few months removed from Manchester City's dramatic promotion from the third tier of English football via a miracle comeback at Wembley against Gillingham.

Just for fun: I've also enclosed the Stein-taken very unprofessional selfie attempt to replicate the original from the Etihad press box Saturday before a ridiculously entertaining 2-1 home win over Brentford. What a wonderfully watchable circus of a game it was; could have easily been 5-3.

City were so close to getting stuck in that third tier of the English game in 1999. It would have been impossible then, especially given how strong The Red Half of Town was at that time, to imagine the standing in world football that City holds now.

And yes, BTW, if you insist on asking: I definitely do wish I still weighed what I weighed there. Man ...

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Numbers Game

🏀 44

The Lakers have announced that they will wear a tribute patch on their uniforms this season featuring Jerry West's No. 44. West will also be honored by the Lakers at a formal ceremony as part of their season opener on TNT against Minnesota on Oct. 22 .... just days after West is inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass., for the third time.

🏀 74

The NBA last week released its full preseason schedule spanning 74 games between Oct. 4 and Oct. 18.

🏀 3

Interestingly there are two other preseason games that will be contested stateside on Oct. 4 after Boston and Denver meet earlier in the day in Abu Dhabi in the first preseason game on the 2024 NBA schedule. Also on Oct. 4: Utah plays host to the New Zealand Breakers from Australia's NBL and the Lakers will play host to Minnesota in Palm Desert, Calif.

🏀 2

The Breakers will play exhibition games against both the Jazz and the Oklahoma City Thunder on their US tour. It'll be the sixth time in eight years that an NBL team plays NBA opposition in the preseason.

🏀 2022

It was only two years ago, remember, that the NBL's Adelaide 36ers won an October exhibition game against the Phoenix Suns.

🏀 36

Former Finland national team guard Petteri Koponen, whose NBA draft rights were held by the Dallas Mavericks for more than a decade after Dallas acquired Koponen in 2011, was recently named as the Breakers' new head coach. The 36-year-old was actually included in a recent trade between the Mavericks and the Knicks that enabled Dallas to obtain the draft rights to Melvin Ajinça (selected No. 51 overall in June).

🏀 30

Koponen never played in the NBA despite being selected with the 30th overall pick by Philadelphia in 2007.

🏀 9

Nine NBL "Next Stars" — highly rated draft prospects who commit to playing professionally in Australia rather than playing collegiately for a season until becoming draft-eligible — have been drafted by NBA teams, including LaMelo Ball (No. 3 by Charlotte in 2020), Josh Giddey (No. 6 by Oklahoma City in 2021) and Alex Sarr (No. 2 by Washington in June).

🏀 4

Four of those nine NBL Next Stars drafted directly into the NBA were selected in June: Sarr, AJ Johnson (No. 23 by Milwaukee), Bobi Klintman (No. 37 by Milwaukee and dealt to Detroit) and Ariel Hukporti (No. 58 by Dallas and dealt to New York in the aforementioned trade featuring Ajinça and Koponen). 

🏀 5

The exhibition schedule includes four games that will be televised nationally by ESPN (Milwaukee at Detroit on Oct. 6, Golden State at Sacramento on Oct. 9, Minnesota at New York and Phoenix at Denver on Oct. 13) and a fifth on ESPN2 (Lakers at Golden State on Oct. 18).

🏀 2

TNT is scheduled to televise two preseason games to launch its final season of NBA coverage: It's a doubleheader on Oct. 17 featuring Milwaukee at Dallas and the Lakers at Phoenix.

🏀 120

Thanks to Alex Drude and Andrew Sidebottom for writing in last week to correct my faulty baseball math: The Mets' 40-120 record in 1962 (not Detroit's 43-119 mark in 2003) is the standard for single-season futility in Major League Baseball ... even though the Mets’ expansion season was not quite 162 games long thanks to two rainouts (as reader Matt Wagner reminds).

🏀 36-115

The White Sox, who recently lost 16 consecutive home games, are 36-115 entering Tuesday's play and need a 5-6 finish to avoid supplanting the Mets as modern baseball's Worst Team Ever percentage-wise. I still haven't seen a single inning of White Sox baseball this season ... and I'm still not loving their chances even after their stunning recent three-game winning streak.