Players with most to prove heading into NBA season

Remember when it seemed like nearly a guarantee that the Cleveland Cavaliers would trade Kevin Love to build a better roster around cornerstones LeBron James and Kyrie Irving? Among those three, Love is now the last man standing in Northeast Ohio. The new face of Cleveland pro basketball must turn the clock back and find the version of himself who starred for the Minnesota Timberwolves years ago, if the Cavs are to flirt with making the playoffs. 

Welcome to the NBA, rookie. Luka Doncic going viral and winning trophies in Europe was all fun and games, but the first-year NBA would-be star acquired by the Dallas Mavericks now has to match the hype. Some will regard his debut season as a flop if he doesn't, at the very least, compete for Rookie of the Year honors. 

As of the first week of September, rumors continue to swirl that the Miami Heat could look to move big man Hassan Whiteside ahead of the regular season. Regardless of where he calls home come Halloween, Whiteside has a lot to prove en route to hopefully putting a lackluster 2017-18 campaign behind him. Per Basketball-Reference.com, the 29-year-old shot 54 percent from the field, and he was largely a non-factor in five playoff contests. 

A healthy Gordon Hayward can be an All-Star who helps the Boston Celtics earn the top spot in the Eastern Conference. The Celtics have yet to see that version of the 29-year-old, though, as a horrific leg injury that he suffered in the first quarter of the regular season cost him his first year with the club. As A. Sherrod Blakely of NBC Sports Boston pointed out, Hayward has a history of torching opponents in the fourth quarters of games. 

Statistically speaking, point guard Eric Bledsoe enjoyed a successful season after the Phoenix Suns dealt him to the Milwaukee Bucks. Bledsoe didn't make the Bucks any more of a legitimate contender, though, and it's possible the team could trade him if presented with an offer that included a first-round pick. If he remains with the Bucks, he'll be looking to prove he can become a cornerstone for a winner before entering free agency next summer. 

It's possible we'll never know all that happened in the year leading up to the public breakup between the San Antonio Spurs and Kawhi Leonard. What's done is done. Leonard, 27 years old, is with the Toronto Raptors, and the one-time NBA Finals MVP will be expected to make last season's No. 1 seed out of the Eastern Conference even better than that team was in the spring. 

As Matt Ellentuck of SB Nation wrote, DeMar DeRozan took to Instagram to apparently react to the news he had been shipped by the Toronto Raptors to the San Antonio Spurs. As unhappy as he may have been at the time, there's no better revenge for a player who feels mistreated than winning. DeRozan has big shoes to fill with Kawhi Leonard and Manu Ginobili no longer with the Spurs. 

Twenty-year-old Markelle Fultz taking steps to fix his broken jumper in the offseason makes for a nice story in the summer. Let's see him drain some shots while wearing a Philadelphia 76ers jersey in front of a national audience. As Marcel Mutoni of Slam Online explained, Fultz's trainer claimed the player suffered from the "yips" during his rookie year. There's no easy cure for that. 

As Dan Marang of Blazers Edge explained in August, it may have been unrealistic to expect Portland Trail Blazers guard CJ McCollum to repeat his fantastic and even historic 2016-17 production. Basketball, like life, is often unfair, and those running the Trail Blazers may feel they have a difficult decision to make regarding McCollum's future if it's believed the 26-year-old is not part of a roster that can eventually climb to the top of the conference standings. 

It's easy to forget Orlando Magic forward Aaron Gordon will be only 23 years old at the start of the season. Gordon posted career highs in points per game, three-point percentage and rebounds per contest in 2017-18, and the time has come for him to help the Magic win more than roughly one-third of the time. Continuing to improve his shooting is more important for his long-term success than averaging a highlight-reel dunk a game. 

Before he officially entered the league and was drafted by the Denver Nuggets, Michael Porter Jr. compared himself to a "mix" of Giannis Antetokounmpo and Kevin Durant while speaking with Damon Amendolara ‏of CBS Sports Radio. Porter dropped in the first round because of supposed concerns about his health, but he says he's healthy following a second back surgery, per ESPN's Chris Forsberg. History tells us athletes with back problems often struggle to return to form or, in the case of a 20-year-old, fail to reach advertised ceilings. 

Plenty is being said about the youth movement making the Philadelphia 76ers must-see television heading into the season. As D.J. Foster of The Ringer wrote, don't sleep on the Utah Jazz and second-year guard Donovan Mitchell. Can Mitchell avoid the dreaded "sophomore slump" and continue to be a dominant scoring presence at the rim? Recently, Hansen James of SLC Dunk compared Mitchell to Damon Stoudamire and Allen Iverson. 

In late August, Ansar Khan of MLive.com wrote that the Detroit Pistons are expecting a "bigger impact" from Blake Griffin after Griffin failed to help the Pistons make the playoffs following the trade involving Detroit and the Los Angeles Clippers. The Pistons should start by hoping Griffin can stay healthy. The 29-year-old, who ended the season on the sidelines because of a sprained ankle, has been good for one significant physical setback every year since the 2014-15 campaign. At what point will one have to admit Griffin is more flash than substance at this stage of his career? 

Washington Wizards guard John Wall appeared in just 41 games last season because of lingering left knee issues. The Wizards are banking on the to-be 28-year-old being healthy, and the franchise gave him a proven big man in July (more on that later). Wall needs to shoot better than 42 percent from the field and also probably avoid publicly criticizing the front office moving forward. 

Per Candace Buckner of The Washington Post, the previously mentioned John Wall lamented his team's lack of an "athletic big" last spring. The Washington Wizards responded by landing Dwight Howard in July. Howard is more an old player than the player of old these days, but he should be an effective offensive weapon alongside Wall as long as the veteran doesn't mind playing Robin to Batman in this partnership. 

We don't have to wonder if Zach LaVine thinks he has something to prove after putting pen to paper on a four-year, $78 million extension with the Chicago Bulls. "I'm used to people sleeping on me, and I'm also used to waking them up as well," LaVine said during a Summer League game, per ESPN's Nick Friedell . "I'm happy that I have this contract, and I'm happy that I have a little extra motivation to go out there and prove it to some people that don't believe in me." Remember that the Bulls merely matched an offer sheet first delivered by the Sacramento Kings, meaning even Chicago has questions about what LaVine will be in the future. 

Grayson Allen won't be the next Donovan Mitchell or probably even a starter with the Utah Jazz. Allen can be a key contributor off the bench as long as his shots fall and he keeps the nonsense — the tripping, for example — to a minimum. He'll attempt to avoid being yet another Duke product who underwhelms in the Association. 

Grayson Allen won't be the next Donovan Mitchell or probably even a starter with the Utah Jazz. Allen can be a key contributor off the bench as long as his shots fall and he keeps the nonsense  the tripping, for example — to a minimum. He'll attempt to avoid being yet another Duke product who underwhelms in the Association. 

The Minnesota Timberwolves were expecting Andrew Wiggins to take the next figurative step of his career as of the start of the 2017-18 season. Wiggins' name is now routinely mentioned in trade rumors following a down campaign. If Minnesota intends on keeping Jimmy Butler into the start of next decade, moving Wiggins to a team willing to unload tasty assets may be a necessary course of action — one that should, theoretically, light a fire under the 23-year-old.

That fatigued sigh you heard from around the Oklahoma City area in July came from Thunder fans upon learning Carmelo Anthony had been traded to the Atlanta Hawks in a cost-cutting move after Anthony didn't help OKC complete a meaningful journey in the playoffs. Anthony eventually signed with the Houston Rockets, joining Chris Paul and James Harden in a lineup that won't be happy merely playing in the postseason. "Melo, like a lot of the guys on the team, always play like we have something to prove," Paul told Alykhan Bijani of the Athletic in August. 

The Cleveland Cavaliers (cough LeBron James cough) deemed the Isaiah Thomas experiment such a disaster that the team traded him to the Los Angeles Lakers less than four months into the 2017-18 season. The diminutive guard signed with the Denver Nuggets in the summer, meaning he'll share conferences with James. He could be a steal for Denver if his hip remains healthy and he can reclaim the magic he had during his final two seasons with the Boston Celtics. Those are big "ifs," though. 

The perception is that DeMarcus Cousins is going to sit on the sidelines and watch as the Golden State Warriors continue to dominate the NBA while he works to return from a torn Achilles before the team needs him for postseason play. By being the best offensive big man on the court once he is healthy, Cousins can make every franchise with a hole at the position and some available cash to spend regret not picking up the phone.  Don't forget that Cousins will be playing for his next contract in the spring of 2019. 

The New York Knicks have no reason to rush Kristaps Porzingis back to the court from a torn ACL that downed him in February. After all, the Knicks aren't winning the title with or without him next June. With that said, fingers will be crossed among the New York faithful that Porzingis will be his unicorn-esque self and that his knee will remain 100 percent once he's back in the lineup. 

Kyrie Irving is an enigma, and not just because of his opinions on the shape of the planet. Will his knee survive an entire grueling season? How dedicated is he to the Boston Celtics if he is already plotting his next move? Will this be the year the one-time NBA champion who orchestrated a move from the Cleveland Cavaliers so he could be the focal point of a lineup takes the Eastern Conference throne now that LeBron James is out west? 

LeBron James will enjoy many nights of champagne basketball with the Los Angeles Lakers, but the realities that he's not catching Michael Jordan in championship rings and he is no longer on a team capable of moonwalking into the NBA Finals are staring him in the face in the early days of fall. James' Hall of Fame legacy is secure, and nothing about his stint with the Lakers will change that. His roles as a mentor and on-the-court coach are just as important to the Lakers as his production.