93% of GMs Picked OKC or San Antonio. The East Has Other Ideas.

NEW YORK

Every October, the NBA asks the people who build the rosters who built the best one. This year, the answer was not close, and it was not balanced.

In the NBA's 25th annual GM Survey, released Thursday, October 15, 93% of the title votes went to just two Western Conference teams. The San Antonio Spurs received 50%. The Oklahoma City Thunder received 43%. The defending-champion New York Knicks got one vote. The Philadelphia 76ers got one vote. That was the entire case for the Eastern Conference.

Opening night on Tuesday will test that verdict immediately. Philadelphia plays at New York at 4:00 p.m. PT. Oklahoma City plays at San Antonio at 6:30 p.m. PT. The four teams mentioned for the title all play each other on the first night. We will not have to wait long to see whether the survey was prescient or premature.

The West Duopoly

San Antonio is not a sentimental pick. Last spring the Spurs beat Oklahoma City 4-3 in the Western Conference finals before losing the Finals to the Knicks. They came within a series of the championship with a core the same survey voted most promising in the league by an overwhelming margin — 87%.

The ages explain why executives think the window is just opening. Victor Wembanyama is 22. Stephon Castle is 21. Dylan Harper is 20. Harper was also voted the breakout favorite, another sign decision-makers expect this group to get better, not just stay good.

Wembanyama sits at the center of it. He was voted MVP favorite with 77%, best defensive player with 97%, and the player GMs would pick first to build a franchise around with 93% — survey records for dominance on single questions. When one player is viewed that clearly as the league's best defender, its likely MVP, and its most valuable building block, his team starts every title conversation.

Oklahoma City's case is just as firm. The Thunder took San Antonio to seven games in the conference finals, and 43% of GMs picked them to win the title — more than every other team combined except the Spurs. This is not a one-team race dressed up as two. It is two young, deep teams that just played a seven-game series for the West, both expected to be right back in the same spot in May.

The East's Case

If the survey has a blind spot, New York and Philadelphia intend to find it.

Start with the champions. The Knicks are defending their first title since 1973, and they won it by beating the very Spurs team that now leads the survey. San Antonio may have the brighter future on paper, but New York has the most recent proof when the games counted most.

The GMs did not ignore New York entirely. The Knicks received 60% of the votes to finish first in the East, well clear of the field. They simply were not picked, beyond a single vote, to repeat as champions. That gap — best in the East, barely considered for the title — is the season's central argument. The East's best team has to prove the conference belongs in the same tier.

Philadelphia is trying to close that gap in one summer. The 76ers received 23% of the East first-place votes, second to New York, and ran away with best offseason at 73%. The reason is obvious. Jaylen Brown arrived from Boston. LeBron James signed with Philadelphia. Added to a team already expected to contend, those moves built a veteran, star-heavy roster designed for a short series, not a long rebuild. It is a direct challenge to New York — even if the GMs gave Philadelphia only one title vote to start the year.

Tuesday sets it up perfectly: champion against best offseason, at Madison Square Garden, on the night New York's defense begins.

The Dark Horses

A survey this top-heavy still leaves room for the teams that changed the map over the summer.

Miami made the acquisition GMs voted the biggest-impact move of the offseason: Giannis Antetokounmpo, from Milwaukee to Miami. It puts a former champion on a team coached by Erik Spoelstra, voted the league's best coach at 43%. If any team outside the top four can disrupt the bracket by spring, Miami is the clearest candidate.

Denver remains in the conversation because, in a West ruled on paper by San Antonio and Oklahoma City, the Nuggets are one of the few other teams with the experience to punish either favorite in a seven-game series. A long season tends to test that kind of certainty.

Minnesota is the other team to watch after adding LaMelo Ball, a move that gives the Timberwolves a new engine and a different ceiling. In a conference this crowded at the top, one star addition can change a matchup, a seed, and a path.

And Houston, with Kevin Durant, belongs on any list of teams that can win a series they are not favored to win. Durant changes a playoff game by himself. Houston may not open in the GMs' top tier, but no favorite will want to see them early.

What Opening Night Tells Us

Opening night will not decide the title. It will test the survey's logic under real conditions for the first time.

Boston at Detroit opens the day at 12:00 p.m. PT — an early look at an East reshuffled by Brown's departure from the Celtics. Then comes the doubleheader that frames the whole race.

At 4:00 p.m. PT, Philadelphia at the Knicks is East favorite against East challenger. The winner does not win the conference in October. The winner sets the terms everyone else will chase.

At 6:30 p.m. PT, Oklahoma City at San Antonio is a rematch of a 4-3 conference finals, restaged as the opener between the two teams that took 93% of the title votes. If the GMs are right, this is a preview of the series that decides the West — and possibly the championship — again.

The West wants to confirm the race is a private contest between the Spurs and the Thunder. The East, led by the champions and the summer's boldest rebuild, wants to prove 93% was a consensus built too early. By late Tuesday night, we will have the first real evidence either way.

How to watch Tuesday, October 20: Boston Celtics at Detroit Pistons, 12:00 p.m. PT; Philadelphia 76ers at New York Knicks, 4:00 p.m. PT; Oklahoma City Thunder at San Antonio Spurs, 6:30 p.m. PT — all on NBC and Peacock. Start with the desk's opening-night preview, and follow the season from the NBA hub.