NBA Draft 2015: Jerian Grant, Delon Wright To Work Out For Washington Wizards by Ben Mehic

It’s the off-season and #KD2DC updates are beginning to resurface. I feel like I stole Jack Whitacre’s job writing this…

So, the Oklahoma City Thunder missed the NBA Playoffs this year because of an injury riddled season. Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant both missed a substantial amount of games which was enough to keep the Thunder out of the playoffs in arguably the toughest conference in all of sports.

Let’s face it: It’s really, really tough to make the playoffs in the West.

During the playoffs, it seemed like every series had the potential of a conference finals. I mean, Los Angeles Clippers vs. San Antonio Spurs was a first round match up. On the other hand, we got to see the 38-44 Brooklyn Nets take on the Atlanta Hawks in the first round in the East.

Given the disparity in competition, there’s been some speculation that players will eventually opt to join teams in the East, hoping for an easier route to the playoffs.

An anonymous player recently revealed to the Basketball Insiders that he believes Kevin Durant will join the Washington Wizards:

“It wouldn’t be a bad idea [to join an East team],” added another NBA player. “I’m pretty sure Kevin Durant is going to start it off and go home to [the Washington Wizards in] D.C.”

The Thunder missed the playoffs despite winning 45 games this season. Again, the Nets made the playoffs despite finishing with a below .500 record.

Another solution to this problem would be to get rid of conferences altogether — having the top 16 teams match up. This would obviously take some time to implement and not all would agree to the change.

Jumping to the Eastern Conference is another legitimate option for stars wanting to compete for a championship ring.

Is Kevin Durant going to set the precedent?

Well, we’ll just have to wait and see.

With a healthy roster, the Thunder are arguably the most talented team in the league.

Still, their route to the Finals would be a lot tougher than, say, the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Besides the Cavaliers, there really isn’t a team in the East that should be “feared”. Some would even argue that Cleveland shouldn’t be feared, given how they’d stack up against other teams in the West. Regardless, with LeBron James in the East, the Cavaliers are going to be considered the favorite for quite some time.

However, that could change if stars decide to join the East.

For now, we’ll just have to imagine a Kevin Durant-John Wall led Washington Wizards squad versus a LeBron James-Kyrie Irving led Cleveland Cavaliers squad in the Eastern Conference Finals.

I hope you’re right, anonymous player. It would certainly be cool to see Kevin Durant play for his hometown.