The Western Conference has dominated the NBA for the better part of three decades. When Michael Jordan retired for the second time, he seemingly took Eastern Conference dominance with him. Even during the peak of LeBron James, there was always a sense that he was warming up on the junior varsity side of the bracket before his postseasons began in the Finals against whoever emerged out of the Western Conference bloodbath.
On paper, the two best rosters in the NBA are still in the West. Once you get past the Spurs and Thunder, though? The East looks more imposing than ever. That obviously starts with the reigning champion Knicks, but virtually every East contender figures to be better in some way, shape or form. The Pacers get Tyrese Haliburton back. The Celtics will have a full year of Jayson Tatum. The Pistons were one of the youngest teams in the NBA last year and still won 60 games. The Heat just added Giannis Antetokounmpo.
The East has never gone into a season with a deeper group of contenders. At least five teams fancy themselves genuine Finals contenders, and that number could get bigger in the weeks to come. So, with the beginning of free agency looming, what is the biggest question each Eastern Conference team needs to answer this offseason?
Pistons: Where are they finding offense?
The Pistons rode their No. 2 defense to a 60-win season and a No. 1 seed, but their complete inability to generate half-court offense nearly got them knocked out in the first round by a No. 8 seed. Cade Cunningham is the only reliable shot creator here. There’s not nearly enough 3-point shooting, especially given the reality that their second- and third-best players, Jalen Duren and Ausar Thompson, are both non-shooters. Somehow, the Pistons have to get more offense in the door if they want to score enough to meaningfully compete next season.
Detroit certainly seems to be planning something on that front. By trading Isaiah Stewart to Memphis, the Pistons created around $33 million in possible cap space if they wanted. ESPN’s Brian Windhorst says they’re going “big-game hunting” and even mentioned Kawhi Leonard and LeBron James as possible targets. Norman Powell and Tyler Herro feel a bit more realistic, but either way, Detroit seems very aware of the problem and is taking active steps to address it.
Celtics: Where is Jaylen Brown going?
The Celtics made a real push to turn Jaylen Brown into Giannis Antetokounmpo. They came up short, but all of the reporting to this point suggests they’re still scouring the trade market. As spectacular as the Jaylen Brown-Jayson Tatum duo has been, it may no longer be financially viable. Both are on 35% supermax contracts. Employing two such players when neither is an MVP candidate is probably untenable in the apron era. That just doesn’t leave enough room for depth unless the team in question is also generating surplus value through high draft picks. The Celtics have simply been too good for that.
So if a trade is likely, who’s making it? Atlanta, Portland, Houston and New Orleans have all been linked to Brown at some point this offseason. San Antonio was last summer. Denver is a frequently speculated trade partner, but the cap mechanics of a Jamal Murray swap would be a major challenge. There will be no shortage of interest here. All-NBA wings are highly coveted. The question for now is just what sort of team the Celtics want to reshape themselves into in a post-Brown world.
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Knicks: Are they really dead set on ducking the second apron?
The Knicks don’t necessarily need to duck the second apron. They are not hard-capped. They’re not even paying the repeater tax yet. They just won a championship and they play in New York City. If ever there were a justification for going into the second apron, it would be breaking a 53-year championship drought. But by all accounts, the Knicks are dead set against going into the second apron. They even traded out of the first round of the draft on Tuesday in an apparent money-saving effort.
Even after doing so, there’s no immediately apparent way they can bring back key reserves Mitchell Robinson and Landry Shamet without crossing that line. Perhaps they could keep one of them, and even that might involve some creative maneuvering at the deadline. But if the Knicks refuse to be a second-apron team, their bench is going to look different next season. That’s just unavoidable.
Cavaliers: How can they improve without breaking up the core?
Few conference finals teams feel as far away from genuine contention as the Cavaliers now do. They stood no chance whatsoever against the Knicks, yet they’ve seemingly resisted calls for major changes thus far this offseason. They didn’t dangle Evan Mobley for Antetokounmpo. By all accounts, they plan to extend Donovan Mitchell rather than considering a trade. James Harden is probably coming back. Jarrett Allen hasn’t factored meaningfully into the rumor mill yet.
So… is there a way for the Cavaliers to improve without touching their core? Let’s assume Harden declines his player option and signs a new deal that takes the Cavaliers back below the second apron. At that point, they could try to aggregate some of their mid-sized salaries and dangle their minimal remaining draft capital (2031 unprotected first-rounder, first-round swaps in 2030 and 2032) for a wing. Is Herbert Jones gettable at that price? If not, the Cavaliers will probably have to get creative here, because, as currently constructed, this is not a championship-caliber team.
Raptors: Can they trade their bad contracts?
Toronto has seemingly been active on the trade market since the deadline, when they were linked to players like Domantas Sabonis and Anthony Davis. They’ve since swung and missed on LaMelo Ball, and even now they’re being linked to Kawhi Leonard as the Clippers navigate his future. After their competitive first-round series against Cleveland, it’s probably worth trying to take a step forward and compete with Scottie Barnes, now a clear-cut star in his prime.
The only problem here? All of Toronto’s big contracts are bad. Brandon Ingram was terrible in the playoffs and is owed almost $82 million for the next two seasons. Immanuel Quickley is probably a high-end backup making good starter money. Jakob Poeltl is on one of the NBA’s worst contracts. Making the money work on any big trade is a challenge in the modern NBA. Doing so with bad contracts is that much harder. The Raptors control all of their own first-round picks. They have the assets to grease the wheels here. But how much are they willing to pay to trade these deals?
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Hawks: What’s their backup center plan?
Atlanta addressed its needs at point guard and wing by drafting Kingston Flemings and trading for Aaron Wiggins. The question now is at the center spot. Onyeka Okongwu’s shooting is very valuable next to Dyson Daniels, who is deficient on that front, but he’s undersized for a center, so Atlanta probably needs a bit more heft in its backup slot. Jock Landale was solid for them down the stretch before an injury ended his season.
The Hawks could bring him back, but they have the means to get a bit more ambitious if they want to. They can create nearly the whole non-taxpayer mid-level exception by waiving and stretching Buddy Hield’s partially guaranteed deal, or they could trade mid-tier salaries like Corey Kispert or Jonathan Kuminga for someone better. Former No. 1 pick Zaccharie Risacher had a down second season, but he’d figure to have some trade value to teams with lesser short-term ambitions who’d like to take a flier on him. Atlanta can take this in whatever direction it wants to.
76ers: Are they willing to pay the tax?
We do this dance basically every year. The 76ers start the season above the luxury tax line, and then they duck back below it before the trade deadline. Last year’s Jared McCain trade was the most controversial example, but this has been an ongoing phenomenon. If they duck the tax again, next year’s roster is probably meaningfully worse.
As of right now, the Sixers have around $14.3 million in luxury tax room with three empty roster spots. That might be enough to keep Quentin Grimes or Kelly Oubre Jr., but certainly not both, and considering the fifth-highest paid player on their roster is No. 22 overall pick LaBaron Philon, there really aren’t going to be the same cost-cutting avenues available to them in-season as there have been in the past. If they’re going to retain any depth, they’re either going to have to pay the tax or dump Paul George or Joel Embiid.
Magic: What’s their plan for their impending second apron crunch?
With only 12 players under contract at this point, the Magic are only around $3.4 million below the second apron. They can save money pretty easily, most notably with Jonathan Isaac’s partially guaranteed deal, but the real questions start next summer. Anthony Black is eligible for a rookie extension, and he’s going to cost enough to make avoiding the second apron unavoidable.
There are teams for whom paying the second apron makes sense. A Play-In team is not one of them. Maybe new coach Sean Sweeney will unlock the contender we all assumed this team could be last season. They did push the Pistons to seven games, after all. But this upcoming year is going to be put up or shut up time in Orlando. If they don’t make serious progress, this roster is going to be broken up in some way, shape or form. They are not good enough to be this expensive.
Hornets: What’s the post-LaMelo Ball plan?
The basic idea of selling high on LaMelo Ball made sense for the Hornets. He is coming off of his healthiest season in years, and it was the closest he’s ever come to proving that he can function on a real, winning team. Whether because of durability, defense, maturity or other factors, the Hornets simply decided that they did not want to move forward with Ball as their franchise player. They are young, asset-rich and flexible. This is all reasonable.
But trading Ball showed us what the plan isn’t. Now we need to know what it is. The Hornets re-signed Coby White, who will likely replace Ball in the starting lineup. No. 18 pick Christian Anderson will get a shot as the backup. The Hornets have a massive trove of draft picks and a $40 million trade exception burning a hole in their pocket. Are they going to try to add talent and compete this season? Will they use their newfound financial flexibility to add more draft capital by taking on bad money? Or are they just going to slow-play this thing, be opportunistic and move forward with what they have? They’ve given themselves a ton of optionality, but now they have to actually use it.
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Heat: Can they add offense around Giannis?
Defense shouldn’t be much of a question for the Heat. The Bam Adebayo-Giannis Antetokounmpo pairing gives Miami one of the most schematically versatile front-courts in the NBA, and with Davion Mitchell and probably Andrew Wiggins (who has a player option) guarding the ball, the Heat should be set on that end of the floor. The questions are on offense. There is very little shooting and ball handling here.
The Heat have around $18 million in room beneath their first-apron hard cap, but have only 10 players under contract. It seems for now as if they’re going to get outbid on Norman Powell. Can they sign one of the other offensively inclined guards available, like Anfernee Simons or Collin Sexton? Can they dump a contract like Nikola Jović to clear out more money? Or could they do something truly wild like, say, pursue an out-of-nowhere reunion with LeBron James through a double sign-and-trade involving Wiggins? Miami is aggressive and creative. The Heat are not close to having a finished roster.
Bucks: How available are their veterans?
When the Bucks decided to trade Antetokounmpo to Miami instead of Boston, they tacitly chose a rebuild over attempting to remain competitive. The question here is how far down that path they are willing to go. Tyler Herro reportedly drew interest from Detroit earlier in the offseason. Is that something the Bucks would revisit? Centers who can shoot 3s are such a rarity that even after a weak season, Myles Turner would probably draw a fair bit of open-market interest.
How many first-round picks could the Bucks acquire if they really put their mind to it? Do they even care about winning regular-season games over the next few years? You could argue that they shouldn’t. Remember, they don’t control their own first-round pick again until 2031. In the past, the optics of handing a high pick to another team might have compelled a team to try. Now… the opposite is almost true. The existence of the relegation zone in the new lottery rules makes it less likely that a truly terrible team hands over a top pick. The Bucks have no reason to actively try to lose games, but they also have no immediate incentive to win without the fear of their own picks getting affected. If they want to liquidate their veterans, they could do so.
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Bulls: Where is the shooting coming from?
The Bulls are building around No. 4 pick Caleb Wilson now, and they have the outline of a fun, up-tempo offense designed to maximize his athleticism and skill in transition. Josh Giddey is one of the best transition playmakers in the NBA, and fellow cornerstone Matas Buzelis fits that concept like a glove. The question here is 3-point shooting. How are they going to space the floor for Wilson as they attempt to help him develop as a half-court scorer?
The Bulls took plenty of 3s under Billy Donovan, but were only so-so at actually making them. Many of the best shooters they started last season with, like Coby White, Ayo Dosunmu, Kevin Huerter and Nikola Vučević, were traded at the deadline, and the best shooters who replaced them, like Collin Sexton and Anfernee Simons, are free agents who should draw interest around the league. The defense will take several years to build. Young teams are rarely particularly good on that end of the floor anyway. But spacing is an immediate must if they want to help their top youngsters grow into stars.
Nets: What’s the big-picture vision here?
Whether the Nets have been in a strong or a weak position under Sean Marks, we’ve always known what the big-picture plan was. When he arrived and they had no picks, it was to make themselves desirable as a free-agent destination. When they got Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, they were all in for a championship. Over the past two years, after getting their 2025 and 2026 first-round picks back from the Rockets, the Nets went into an all-out tank to maximize those selections and hopefully land a homegrown franchise player.
Well, they didn’t get that homegrown franchise player. Two tanks produced no top-five picks. The Nets don’t control their own 2027 pick, and even if they did, lottery reform has taken tanking off the board as a strategy. So… where do the Nets go from here? They took on Julius Randle’s contract, but that could mean anything. Are they buyers or sellers? Is there pressure to win now after the two-year tank, or can Marks afford to be patient? Charting a course for the Nets would be impossible without knowing what exactly they’re trying to accomplish, and right now, there’s just no clear answer.
Pacers: Rick Carlisle hinted at a win-now move; what is it?
The Pacers entered the offseason with two possible paths. In a perfect world, they would retain their top-four protected first-round pick. That, obviously, didn’t happen. But as coach Rick Carlisle noted before the offseason, Indiana was prepared for that possibility. “If it doesn’t happen, there’s a contingency plan to build the team up, too,” he said.
So what sort of win-now move might that be? The Pacers still owe the Clippers their 2029 first-round pick, but have the rest of their draft assets at their disposal. They’re pressed right up against the luxury tax as it is, so they’d have to give up meaningful salary if they wanted to add talent and still avoid it. They’ve been linked to Trey Murphy, but given the bidding war he’ll inevitably generate, Herbert Jones is perhaps the more attainable New Orleans wing. Will they need a bit more shot creation as Tyrese Haliburton recovers from his torn Achilles and key players from the 2025 Finals run like Pascal Siakam and T.J. McConnell age? It remains to be seen, but the Pacers plan to jump right back into the Finals race next season, so if there is a win-now move to be made, they’ll try to make it.
Wizards: They’re not extending Anthony Davis… are they?
Anthony Davis has two supermax years left on a deal he originally signed with the Los Angeles Lakers. He was not an All-Star-caliber player in the scant minutes he played last season. He’s played 29 games since getting traded to Dallas and obviously has an extensive history of injuries. He’s going into his age-33 season. Maybe he bounces back. At the moment, he’s probably a negative-value contract.
But the Wizards just handed Trae Young a four-year max deal that has largely been lambasted, so this isn’t exactly a team known for contractual caution lately. When Wizards GM Will Dawkins was interviewed during the draft, he said that Davis and the Wizards will “have that conversation in the middle of August when we can officially have that.” There were reports that Davis wanted an extension when he got moved at the deadline last year, but it didn’t seem as though there was much league-wide interest. Giving him an even longer deal, given his age and injuries, seems reckless in the apron era. We’ll know for sure on Aug. 6, when Davis becomes eligible for that extension.