By: Opinionated MJ

Well well, how the mighty have stumbled. Both the Warriors and Cavs came out of the gate stumbling over their own feet. We just seen LeBron have to drop 57 in a performance that exhibited his paint domination, especially when you don’t have a rim protector. You need that to beat LeBron. We’ve seen the Warriors lose to teams that are truly suiting up to take their best shot at them. They didn’t get it together until they played the Spurs this week. We’re about 4 weeks in.

The surprises of the first month to me are the Clippers, Magic, Celtics, Pistons, and Grizzlies. They’ve all come out and have tried to set a tone for the beginning of the season that they can only build upon. No one expected the Grizzlies to be putting on such a strong start. Especially out west. The Pistons sat atop the east for a second, so did the Magic. Extra shocking indeed. The Clippers have shown what their new culture is since they’ve moved on past being “Lob City”. They seem to be more about ball movement and defense all while playing through Blake Griffin. Lastly, who would’ve thought that the Celtics would’ve endured the loss they suffered in the first game to Gordon Hayward? They’ve run off on a win streak, including a huge comeback against the OKC Thunder. Their youth along with Kyrie Irving and a surprising start from Al Horford have carried them along.

My early picks for MVP are Giannis Antetokounmpo and Russell Westbrook. Giannis is leading by far with me giving the other nod to Russell because of his willingness to incorporate his teammates while still very closely averaging a triple-double, again! Giannis came out the gate like a man on a mission. Maybe Kobe challenging him to become MVP has given him a straight path in the focus department. It also doesn’t hurt that he’s in the east and because of it he can surely attain this feat if he continues this trend. He’s got to land his team in the top 2 seeds out east and top 5 in the NBA and he’ll receive my vote.

My early vote for Rookie of the Year is Ben Simmons with Jayson Tatum following behind him in second. I’ve got Kyle Kuzma as my sleeper. He’s sneaky good and even reminds me of Kobe sometimes. Guess it just cause he’s a Laker. It’ll be interesting to see what November will bring us. October was a bad month. Numerous injuries, bad starts to strong teams, and slow beginnings to some big name rookies.

My pick for Most Improved Player is clearly Kristaps Porzingis. No argument at this time.

I’ll provide more insight on these topics and more in the next podcast. Be on the lookout for that.

Hello November! Don’t forget to set your clocks back!