NBA Open Thread - Week 10

John Hammond always pays his debts. Always.

Knowing this truth, it should come as no surprise to anyone that the Milwaukee Bucks have the Orlando Magic of all teams to thank for granting us (for the moment) top dog status in the Eastern Conference. In a home-and-home series you’d have sworn the Celtics would be capable of dispatching the Magic at least once, and you’d be wrong as Boston dropped a pair 117-109 and 95-92 losses to Orlando. Boston is now losers of four of their last five thanks in large part to a collective smashing back into the core of the Earth of their outside shooting making just 28.6% of their 44.0 or so 3PA a game in that stretch. That compares to a flat 40.0% in the 26 games prior.

Whether it be a temporary dip or the start of Boston coming a bit back down to an average, if respectable, scoring output remains to be seen. There is undoubtedly plenty of cohesive firepower already on the roster, and it’ll remain that way even as they work to reintegrate a non-spacer like Robert Williams into the lineup. They still own the best offense in the league and a top-10 defense to boot, but Milwaukee’s strong start to the year has us beyond mere striking distance and still ahead where it counts in Ws and Ls. Should be a fun duel for the rest of the season between these two teams.

Elsewhere this week we have Nuggets-Grizzlies on Tuesday night in a fun Western Conference matchup, Clippers-76ers could be interesting on Friday if anyone suits up for LA, as would be the Suns-Grizzlies later that night. And, of course, the all-day slate of Christmas Day games for your delight:

• Sixers-Knicks
• Lakers-Mavericks
• Bucks-Celtics
• Grizzlies-Warriors
• Suns-Nuggets

Enjoy the week ahead and use the comments to follow along with the general goings-on of the rest of the NBA!