West No. 4 | West No. 6 | Full List
No. 5: Oklahoma City Thunder
Last Season: 45-37
9th place in West; Missed playoffs
The 2014-15 Oklahoma City Thunder season was marred by injury almost before it began. A Jones fracture in Kevin Durant's right foot that ultimately limited him to 27 games, all but one of them before the All-Star break, was only the start of Oklahoma City's woes. Nobody was hit harder by absences than the Thunder, who still weren't eliminated from the playoff race until the final night of the regular season.
Now, Oklahoma City begins another season with legitimate championship aspirations but a different mix around its core of Durant, Russell Westbrook and Serge Ibaka. The Thunder replaced Scott Brooks, who grew up alongside his young stars, with veteran college coach Billy Donovan. Oklahoma City is also counting on last season's midseason additions, Enes Kanter and Dion Waiters, to help get back to the NBA Finals -- all with Durant's looming free agency in the background.
Durant was diagnosed with a Jones fracture midway through training camp. The Thunder figured Westbrook would carry the team in Durant's absence, only to lose him to a fractured bone in his right hand two games into the regular season. The two stars weren't alone on the sidelines. At one point early in the season, Oklahoma City was without eight players because of injury, thrusting 15th man Lance Thomas into a starting role. The depleted roster limped to a 3-12 start.
Durant and Westbrook returned in late November, and the Thunder climbed back to .500 by Jan. 2. Even when Durant was sidelined again by discomfort in his foot that eventually required season-ending surgery, a playoff berth appeared inevitable. As originally expected, Westbrook became Oklahoma City's go-to guy on offense, leading the league in usage and posting 11 triple-doubles. The Thunder peaked at 41-30 on March 24, giving them a three-game lead for the eighth seed in the West.
Then Oklahoma City collapsed behind a leaky defense that ranked 27th in defensive rating (107.0 points allowed per 100 possessions) after the All-Star break, per NBA.com/stats. The Thunder lost seven of their next nine games, and wins in their last two weren't enough. The New Orleans Pelicans claimed the final playoff spot via the head-to-head tie-breaker secured by a winning 3-pointer from Anthony Davis at the buzzer at Oklahoma City on Feb. 6.
Most of the Thunder's roster changes were made during the 2014-15 season. In January, Oklahoma City sent Thomas and a protected first-round pick to the Cleveland Cavaliers for Waiters as part of a three-team deal. The next month at the deadline, the Thunder used Kendrick Perkins' expiring contract and backup point guard Reggie Jackson to add a four-player package headlined by Kanter. (Oklahoma City also got D.J. Augustin, Steve Novak and Kyle Singler in the deal.)
The Thunder re-signed Singler to a five-year contract worth nearly $25 million as a restricted free agent, then matched an offer sheet to Kanter from the Portland Trail Blazers worth the maximum $70 million over the next four years. The two new contracts pushed Oklahoma City deep into the luxury tax, which the organization paid for the first time last season. The Thunder trimmed the bill by dealing disappointing former first-round picks Perry Jones and Jeremy Lamb, also clearing room on the roster for 2014 first-rounder Josh Huestis and this year's first-round pick, Murray State point guard Cameron Payne.
While the roster should look similar to -- if much healthier than -- the one that finished last season, the coach will be different. Brooks, who had coached all but the first 13 games the franchise played in Oklahoma City after moving from Seattle, was fired days after the season ended. Sam Presti, executive vice president and general manager, replaced Brooks with longtime Florida coach Billy Donovan, a two-time NCAA champion who nearly jumped to the NBA with the Orlando Magic in 2007 before changing his mind and returning to college.
There will be ample storylines and narratives hovering over the Thunder's 2015-16 season, but one trumps all -- Durant's future. Potentially, the Thunder have one season left with their transformative superstar, and that has cranked the urgency and attention on this campaign. All their chips are on the table as they enter the most pivotal moment in franchise history, and with Durant already sensing the oncoming distraction, he's done his best to get in front of it.
"Along with [Thunder PR director Matt Tumbleson], I've got two people that I trust with my life, my agent and my manager, who's my best friend as well," Durant told reporters in Las Vegas in August. "I trust them with my life. So if you hear sources or anything, don't believe it if it didn't come from them. I tell them everything. We bounce ideas off each other. We collaborate on a lot of different things. They give me advice. So throughout this year, if you hear sources from anybody, it's not true, unless you hear it from Charlie Bell, Rich Kleiman or Kevin Durant." -- Royce Young
Projected Real Plus-Minus for starters
Russell Westbrook, PG: +6.8
Andre Roberson, SG: +2.2
Kevin Durant, SF: +6.7
Serge Ibaka, PF: +3.7
Steven Adams, C: -1.5
Scouting reports on every player on the Thunder
Using shot data from 2014-15 and projected starters, Grantland's Kirk Goldsberry ranks each team's offensive efficiency based on square footage.
Ibaka is one the NBA's best from the left side, shooting 50 percent from the baseline and 60 percent from the corner 3 last season.
One of the NBA's best interior threats? Westbrook: 11.3 points per game in the paint, the only guard in the top 10.
All About The Space: 23rd (384 sq. ft. of above-average offense)
To identify players who stretch offenses the most, ESPN Stats & Information created the Kyle Korver effect -- a metric on a 1-100 scale, factoring in 3PT%, 3-point attempt rate (percentage of total shots that come from 3-point range) and influence on teammate FG%.
Korver effect: Anthony Morrow (73.7) is their best outside threat (42.4 percent), but his lack of minutes limits his impact.
Until Durant gets through a full season, there will be some concern about his foot after undergoing three procedures in six months, the last of them a bone graft at the end of March. But Durant is healthy now, and that puts the Thunder in the Western Conference mix. The question is whether Oklahoma City can still be considered a leading contender with other teams loading up.
The poor track record of Kanter and Waiters in ESPN's real plus-minus (RPM) suggests that, talented as the former lottery picks are, they might not make this an upgrade on previous Thunder supporting casts, hence Oklahoma City's ranking fifth in RPM-based projections, as well as in ESPN's Summer Forecast. At the same time, the separation between first and fifth in the West is minimal, and the tactical upgrade on the sidelines to Donovan might make the difference.
As with the rest of the West's top teams, there's heavy uncertainty about how far the Thunder will advance in the postseason. The difference is how much Oklahoma City has riding on this season with Durant heading into free agency. This time a year from now, the Thunder might finally have translated potential into a championship -- but a darker timeline ends with Durant elsewhere.
West No. 4 | West No. 6 | Full List
