After another long and dramatic offseason, the NBA is finally back for the 2017-2018 season.  There were lots of moves made around the league from team to team, including Chris Paul leaving the L.A Clippers and going to join James Harden and the Houston Rockets.  Also Dwyane Wade left his hometown, Chicago, after just one year of playing for them to go play in Cleveland with his favorite former teammate, Lebron James.

Some of the more highlighted moves around the league include “big-name” players going to “big-name” teams.  Dwight Howard has been bobbled around by a lot of teams since he left the Orlando Magic in 2012 and now he will be playing for the Charlotte Hornets, which is his fourth new team in six seasons.  Howard, entering his fourteenth season in the league is still going strong coming off one of his best rebounding and defensive seasons of his since he last won Defensive Player of the Year and led the league in rebounding in the 2010-2011 season.  He is starting off really well this season and hopes to continue to produce good numbers for Charlotte.

While everyone thought that D’Angelo Russell was the start of something fresh and new for the L.A Lakers, Magic Johnson did not think so.  Johnson is the new President of Basketball Operations for the Lakers and one of his first moves was moving Russell to the Brooklyn Nets and acquiring All-Star big man, Brook Lopez. Russell, however, is proving Magic wrong and is off to a great start in Brooklyn.  

Frustration among many players and their respective franchises can be a major cause for players to depart elsewhere.  There was frustration in Indiana with Paul George, Los Angeles with Chris Paul, Cleveland with Kyrie Irving, Chicago with Jimmy Butler, and New York with Carmelo Anthony.  All of these all-stars are now with different teams trying to chase a championship.  Paul George and Carmelo Anthony joined the triple-double king, Russell Westbrook, in Oklahoma City and now have a very high potential “Big 3”.  Chris Paul, four-time league assists leader, went to Houston to join scoring monster, James Harden to improve the Rockets’ chance in bringing the Larry O’Brien Trophy home.  Jimmy Butler joined a young, star-studded squad in the Minnesota Timberwolves hoping to win his first ring in the coming years of his new and young team.

The Boston Celtics probably shocked NBA fans the most this past offseason.  Boston beat the Cavaliers in the battle for the top seed in the Eastern Conference and made it back to the Conference Finals for the first time in 5 seasons.  They then made a variety of offseason moves and started this season with only four out of the fifteen players from last year’s playoff team.  The Celtics acquired All-Star forward, Gordon Hayward and Boston fans thought he was their ticket to the finals this season and then, slowly but surely, the playoff team they knew from last season drifted apart.  Cleveland and Boston traded superstar point guards, Isaiah Thomas and Kyrie Irving.  Irving did not want to play alongside Lebron James anymore when he stated he “wanted out of Cleveland”, so the unthinkable happened and now both guards have brand new teams and hope to fight for a championship.

The season is now back in full swing with everyone getting used to their new teams and teammates.  Gordon Hayward dislocated his ankle in the first quarter of his first game with the Celtics and now Kyrie Irving has to figure out what he is going to do to carry the Celtics to the playoffs again. In Phoenix, star point guard, Eric Bledsoe has requested out of Phoenix via Twitter and there is many teams interested, so we will have to wait and see where he ends up later on.  I can definitely say we have an interesting, but very fun season ahead of all of us.