Predicting where Sacramento Kings will finish in Western Conference next season

The Sacramento Kings finished last season with a 46-36 record, which was good for ninth in the talent-laden Western Conference. Fortunately, they are in the middle of a rockstar offseason – one that saw their team improve a great deal.

Unfortunately, the West is still a juggernaut. So, it is hard to say how much their offseason growth will help them in the standings. In this post, we attempt to estimate where the Kings will land in the standings next season.

What People Are Saying

In early August, NBA.com's John Schuhmann posted his most recent edition of his Western Conference Power Rankings. In that edition, he placed the Kings at eighth in the conference. Here are his full Western Conference rankings.

While there are plenty of other power rankings out there, we are going to use Schumann's as our reference point, as I think his rankings do a good job of capturing the general consensus on the Kings.

What I Think

Let's do some elimination first. Unless things go terribly wrong, I feel pretty confident in saying that the Kings will be better than the Portland Trail Blazers, Utah Jazz, and San Antonio Spurs. On the flip side, barring a miracle, I have a hard time seeing the Kings jumping the Oklahoma City Thunder, Dallas Mavericks, Minnesota Timberwolves, or Denver Nuggets in the standings. By that logic, our range is somewhere between fifth and 12th in the conference.

Now, for the teams Schumann has behind them, I think the Kings are better (on paper) than the Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Clippers, and Houston Rockets. We'll talk about the Grizzlies in just a second.

As for the teams he has ahead of them, I think that with their improvements, the Kings are actually better than the Phoenix Suns, New Orleans Pelicans, and Golden State Warriors. In my mind, none of those teams made positive moves that were as significant as what the Kings did this summer. And in the case of the Pelicans, I think they had a pretty rough offseason.

The only team in that five to 12 group that I've been discussing that I think I would rank over the Kings is the Grizzlies. To me, if they can stay healthy, the Grizzlies are a serious threat in the Western Conference (to know why, check out this article).

So, by that logic, I think the Kings range is between the fifth and 12th seed. But if I had to pick an exact spot, it would be the sixth seed (which would help us avoid the Play-In Tournament).