The NBA is officially back. The season tips off Tuesday evening with the Houston Rockets at the defending champion Oklahoma City Thunder, followed by an interstate rivalry when the Golden State Warriors take on the Lakers in Los Angeles.
And with that, we’re off. The NBA never lacks for drama, and this season figures to be no different. Here are seven pressing questions we’re focused on as the 2025-26 campaign gets going.
1. How will the Kawhi investigation shake out?
The NBA is investigating the Clippers for a possible salary cap circumvention violation after podcaster and journalist Pablo Torre dropped an unexpected anvil on the league’s head this summer. According to Torre’s reporting, Leonard signed a four-year $28 million endorsement deal with a company called Aspiration in April 2022, nine months after re-signing with the Clippers. Leonard also received a reported $20 million in Aspiration stock options. Several months earlier, in September of 2021, Clippers owner Steve Ballmer invested $50 million in Aspiration. Despite the deal, there’s no evidence that Leonard ever did any endorsement work for Aspiration, and an unnamed employee who purportedly worked for the company told Torre the arrangement was to “circumvent the salary cap.”
The Clippers have denied any wrongdoing, and Ballmer has said he was “conned” by “guys who committed fraud.” In August, Aspiration co-founder Joe Sandberg pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud.
Unsurprisingly, Leonard was asked about all this at media day and tried to shrug it off by saying he doesn’t deal with “conspiracies or clickbait analysts.” But in that same session when he was asked whether he was still owed some $7 million by Aspiration, Leonard had a surprising reply.
“I’m not sure, I gotta take a look back at the books,” Leonard said. “No, it’s more than that for sure.”
Love to wave away would-be clickbait with one hand while counting the money you’re pretty sure you’re still owed by the company you reportedly didn’t do any work for with the other.
This thing is a mess, and it will likely linger over the Clippers and the NBA as the season and the investigation continue. The league absolutely has to get this right, which brings us to…
2. How will Adam Silver handle several pressing issues?
Heavy lies the crown. In addition to the aforementioned investigation, Silver is juggling several other important matters. Domestic expansion has been a hot topic for years now, with cities like Seattle, Las Vegas and Kansas City, among others, mentioned as potential new outposts should the NBA add two more teams.
But growing the league in the states isn’t all the league has in mind. The NBA has recently made plain its desire to expand to Europe and set up a new operation to rival the EuroLeague. That could be big business, with massive amounts of money flowing to the NBA in expansion fees if they can get the new league abroad operational.
Silver said that the domestic and European expansion plans are on separate but parallel tracks. That would be a lot all by itself. Then throw in the various issues that pop up over the course of the season, not to mention the ever-changing All-Star Weekend format that has become a regular focal point for the commissioner in a never-ending attempt to fix a showcase that has been broken for some time now. And, yeah, eventually he’s gonna have to make a ruling on what the richest owner in the league did or did not do regarding Kawhi and the salary cap.
This will be Silver’s 12th full season as commissioner. It might also be his toughest.
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3. Will Giannis stay in Milwaukee?
Bucks head coach Doc Rivers is already annoyed, and the season hasn’t even started yet. After reports that the Knicks had engaged the Bucks in trade talks regarding Giannis Antetokounmpo, it’s not surprising that Rivers was asked about the drama and whether his star player had designs on relocating. It is equally unsurprising that Doc wasn’t thrilled about fielding those questions.
“What’s the old saying — you create the story and then you report on the story you created,” Rivers told the media recently. “That’s what it feels like, and it gets old for us. But at the end of the day, there’s nothing we can do about it.”
He’s right about that last part. This topic isn’t going away anytime soon. Giannis said he’s “locked into” the Bucks for this season but reserves the right to change his mind in “six, seven months.” He also had a case of selective amnesia and said he couldn’t recall a meeting with managing governor Wes Edens where Edens claimed his franchise player expressed his commitment to the Bucks.
The frustration the Bucks must feel concerning all this is understandable, but Rivers didn’t have it quite right when he blamed the media for creating the story. The only thing that has to happen for all this to go away is for Giannis to publicly pull a Nikola Jokic. At media day, Joker said he wants to be a Nugget for life. Giannis could make a similar declaration with the Bucks and poof, no more story. He hasn’t. That’s telling — and until and unless he does, this situation will be riding shotgun with the Bucks all season.
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4. Is this the end of LeBron James’ All-NBA streak?
LeBron made the All-NBA second team last season, extending his league record and marking the 21st consecutive year that he’s made the cut. The only time he didn’t make All-NBA was his rookie year.
James is entering his 23rd season, moving him past Vince Carter for the longest career in NBA history. He’ll also turn 41 in late December. He’s already the oldest player to ever make an All-NBA team, but age isn’t the only thing working against him here.
LeBron didn’t participate during training camp or the preseason due to sciatica on his right side, and he’s expected to miss several weeks to begin the regular season. When Lakers head coach JJ Redick was asked when James might return, he told the media that James is “on his own timeline.”
In order to even qualify for All-NBA honors, James has to appear in a minimum of 65 games. Last year he played in 70 games while the year before that he played in 71. But in the 2022-23 season he played in just 55 games, and the season before that he played in 56. How long he’s out to start the season could go a long way to determining whether he’s even eligible for awards and a record-extending 22nd straight All-NBA selection.
5. What will Year 3 look like for Wemby?
Victor Wembanyama’s second season got off to a brilliant start. He was named to his first All-Star team and through 46 games he averaged 24.3 points, 11 rebounds, and 3.7 assists while shooting 47.6% from the field and 83.6% from the line. There was some handwringing among some of my peers about his shot selection — he took 8.8 three-point attempts per game and shot 35.2% — but I found that less troublesome than most. Yes he’s 7-foot-4 and has a length and height advantage against any defender, but he’s only 21 years old and just now scratching the surface of what he can do on a basketball court. To me, those long 3s were like the raptors testing the electric fence for weaknesses in Jurassic Park. Once he figures out what he’s capable of, the rest of the league is cooked.
Last season Wembanyama posted the second game of his career where he went for 25+ points, 5+ rebounds, 5+ assists, 5+ steals and 5+ blocks. The only other player in NBA history to have more than one of those games was Hakeem Olajuwon. And if not for last season getting cut short when he was shut down due to deep vein thrombosis in his right shoulder, Wembanyama was on an easy path to winning Defensive Player of the Year. Despite missing 36 games, he still led the league with 176 blocks — 28 more than second-place Brook Lopez managed over 80 games — and averaged over a steal per game. If he stays healthy and clears the 65-game threshold, he could put a stranglehold on DPOY for the foreseeable future.
The talent is undeniable, but is it enough to buoy the Spurs playoff prospects in an overloaded Western Conference? The oddsmakers have them pegged as a play-in team with San Antonio listed at +115 to make the Play-In Tournament on FanDuel.
6. Who are the biggest threats to OKC in the West?
The Thunder are the betting favorites (+125) to win the Western Conference again, but they’ll have plenty of competition. Outside of the Jazz, probably every team in the conference has designs on at least being in the play-in mix. Whether that’s realistic for the Blazers, Suns and Pelicans of the world is a different question than them being convinced they have a shot. Point is, as always, the West is stacked.
The Nuggets have the second-best odds to win the West at +410. Denver took OKC to seven games in the second round of the playoffs last season — and that was before the organization addressed its glaring lack of depth this offseason by adding Bruce Brown, Tim Hardaway Jr and Jonas Valanciunas to the bench. Denver also said goodbye to Michael Porter Jr in a trade that brought back versatile wing Cam Johnson who should benefit nicely from playing alongside Nikola Jokic.
The Rockets have +1000 odds, and, after that, both L.A. teams are listed at +1100 to win the conference. The Clippers have one of the deepest rosters in the league after adding John Collins, Brook Lopez, Chris Paul and Bradley Beal to a team that won 50 games a year ago. The Lakers — who finished as the No. 3 seed last season — are much more top heavy by comparison, but that’s less concerning when the top in question is Luka Doncic and LeBron. The Wolves (+1200) and Anthony Edwards have gone to back-to-back Western Conference Finals. And the Rockets, despite losing Fred VanVleet to a season-ending ACL injury, figure to once again have one of the best defenses in the NBA. They also addressed one of their biggest issues from last season by adding one of the game’s best closing options when they acquired Kevin Durant in a trade that shipped Jalen Green and Dillon Brooks to Phoenix.
There’s more. The Golden State Warriors (+1700) will start the season with Jimmy Butler alongside Steph Curry, Draymond Green and new center Al Horford. That’s six legitimate roadblocks in OKC’s path to another parade. And we haven’t even gotten to the Dallas Mavericks, who will try to stay afloat while waiting for Kyrie Irving to recover from an ACL injury, and the Memphis Grizzlies, who were a top-four team in the West for much of last season before nosediving in the final month and firing then-head coach Taylor Jenkins shortly before the playoffs.
The Thunder are the defending champs and have the reigning MVP. But becoming the first repeat champ since the Warriors pulled it off in 2018 will be far from easy. When the question is whether to take the Thunder or the field, I’ll take the field when it’s this loaded — with the Nuggets being the team that should give OKC the most cause for concern.
7. How weak is the East?
By comparison to the West, pretty weak. Or if you think weak is too harsh, at the very least it seems fairly top heavy with a ton of uncertainty for a lot of teams.
If we’re doing the tiers thing — and who doesn’t love a good tier ranking? — the Cavs (+200 to win the East) and the Knicks (+400) would have to be at the top. The Cavs had the best offense in the NBA last season and a top-10 defense. That’s a pretty good formula for success. Yes they flamed out in the second round of the playoffs, but they ran into an underrated, white-hot Indiana Pacers team and Donovan Mitchell and especially Darius Garland weren’t fully healthy. The Cavs are loaded again — four of five starters have been All-Stars, including last year’s Defensive Player of the Year, Evan Mobley — and have an excellent shot to win the conference.
The Knicks said goodbye to Tom Thibodeau and hello to Mike Brown. Whatever you think of that decision, Brown is more likely to not run his starters into the ground during the regular season and also to use his bench, a unit the Knicks greatly improved during the offseason. A year ago, three of New York’s five starters — Mikal Bridges, Josh Hart and OG Anunoby — all finished in the top 10 for total regular season minutes, with Bridges and Hart coming in first and second. Karl-Anthony Towns finished 27th. And despite getting hurt late in the season, Jalen Brunson still came in at 40th, logging more minutes in 65 games than Cleveland’s Jarrett Allen did even though he played in all 82. Expect that to change this season. Same with actually using their beefed-up bench that now features useful offseason additions Jordan Clarkson and Guerschon Yabusele.
After that, the best odds to win the conference are the Magic (+650), Hawks (+950), Celtics (+1110) and Pistons (+1200). The Magic finished with the second-best defensive rating last season and absolutely suffocate opponents at that end of the floor. The problem for Orlando, as ever, was an anemic offense that finished in the bottom 10 for the 13th consecutive year. It didn’t help that Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Jalen Suggs all suffered injuries last season. Suggs is still working his way back from a knee injury and it’s unclear when he’ll be available, but the other two are ostensibly healthy and the Magic added Desmond Bane to offer some much-needed offensive oomph. I’m as bullish on the Magic as anyone and have them finishing third in the conference, but I still need to see that offense level up before considering them a real threat to the Cavs and Knicks.
The Hawks had an excellent offseason under new general manager Onsi Saleh, bringing in Kristaps Porziņģis, Nickeil Alexander-Walker and Luke Kennard, not to mention fleecing Joe Dumars and snagging an unprotected 2026 draft pick from the Pelicans (better of New Orleans or Milwaukee) in one of the most lopsided trades in recent memory. The Celtics are without Jayson Tatum for most or all of this season as he recovers from an Achilles injury, and they moved on from Jrue Holiday, Luke Kennard and Porziņģis among others to avoid paying around $500 million for a team that is unlikely to win anything this season. And the Pistons more than tripled their win total last season year-over-year, becoming the first team in NBA history to do so. They also have one of the best young guards in the NBA in Cade Cunningham, who made his first All-NBA team.
These are nice enough teams that should have competitive seasons, but outside of the Cavs and Knicks (and maaaaaybe the Magic), if you picked them up and plopped them into the West would any of them be better than play-in hopefuls? And as flawed teams go, we haven’t even gotten to the Bucks, Sixers, Pacers and Heat, all of which have their own well-documented issues. Which doesn’t mean the East won’t be entertaining, it just means that most of the marquee teams with legitimate championship aspirations are once again in the other conference.