OKC Thunder: Wild races for seeding in final week of regular season
East’s middle group:
The trio of the Heat, Pacers, and 76ers are yet to define who’ll finish in the fourth, fifth, and sixth seeds. Depending on how serious Joel Embiid’s ankle tweak is that injury could result in the 76ers finishing sixth and more importantly if he has to miss any games in the first round, suddenly the ownership they held over the Celtics isn’t a given. As it is the loss of Ben Simmons puts major pressure on Embiid.
Their matches aren’t of the easy variety either with the Suns, Raptors, and Rockets on tap. The only thing working in their favor is Toronto won’t extend their core’s playing time and the Rockets may have already locked in their seed by the final game.
Ironically, the Pacers and Heat will play each other twice this week with Indy also playing the Rockets and Miami also playing the OKC Thunder.
Adding intrigue to these two teams specifically is the war of words on and off the court between T.J. Warren and Jimmy Butler.
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In their last meeting on January 8th, Warren and Butler got into an on court altercation which resulted in TJ being ejected. Afterward, Butler threw shade at Warren calling him soft, saying he couldn’t guard him and cited the team’s next match in March.
Little did Jimmy Buckets know TJ Warren would end up being the hottest shooter of the bubble. Butler missed the last three games due to a sore foot which could affect whether he plays or how well he plays. Miami who had a chance to move up to third (and defeated the Celtics to help that cause) have lost two in a row and now could finish fourth, fifth or sixth depending on what happens in these final games by this trio.