NBA Eastern Conference preview

No offense to the Hawks, but you know the Eastern Conference is officially the wasteland of the NBA when even its Atlanta entry has a chance to do nice things this season.

Only the Cleveland Cavaliers are DOA in the conference before the first dribble. Everybody else ranks in the same average vicinity.

Whatever that means.

Let's just say that the NBA's Eastern Conference resembles the NFL overall, and that isn't necessarily good. What you have in both cases is mediocrity disguised as parity. As for the NBA, you can shake up every Eastern Conference team in a bag the size of one of Shaquille O'Neal's sneakers, and nearly any combination falling out would produce the same results in the playoffs. Give or take a Tracy McGrady here or an Allen Iverson there, the Pistons are the Wizards, and the Hawks are the Knicks, and the Nets are the Pacers, and the Hornets are the Raptors, and the East is a mess. That's in contrast to the West, where you have the Lakers as the NBA's three-time defending champs.

Sacramento joins the Lakers among the league's elite, along with Portland, San Antonio and Dallas. Minnesota is a giant, because the Timberwolves have one in Kevin Garnett. Plus, Karl Malone and John Stockton will make Utah potent again since this likely is their last dance as a Hall of Fame pair.

In case you haven't noticed, all of those teams are from the West, and the West is now what the East once was: The better conference.

This definitely isn't the East of Bird, Barkley, Dominique, Dr. J. and Isiah. That's part of the problem here. When those stars among stars retired within the last decade or so, they took the conference's mystique with them. Gone is Boston's monster frontcourt. The Bad Boys are more associated with a movie than the Pistons. Nobody hears "Knicks" anymore and thinks of Patrick Ewing and then everybody else. Mostly, Chicago hasn't Jordan I or Jordan II.

Maybe you've heard the ugly news for those wishing for their legends to depart before evolving into ordinary or less. Jordan III is playing for the Washington Wizards these days, and he doesn't fly anymore. In fact, the guy formerly known as His Airness is now His Floorness as a role player in his second season out of his third retirement. We're talking about Michael Jeffrey Jordan, of course, and nobody ever will compare his current team with his Bulls team that included Scottie Pippen, Dennis Rodman and enough of everything else for six world championships.

Before Chicago ruled the league from the East during the 1990s, you had Isiah's Pistons doing the same with their smash-mouth basketball. Before that, Bird's Celtics challenged Magic's Lakers for NBA supremacy. In addition, Dr. J's Sixers joined Dominique's Hawks and Sidney Moncrief's Bucks to make the East lethal beyond Boston.

Then came those retirements. That, along with something else to lower the East's profile entering the new millennium. While the Bulls evolved into Clark Kents after losing their Superman, the Lakers got theirs. O'Neal even wears a tattoo of the man of steel for inspiration. He took his considerable skills from Orlando to Los Angeles as a free agent, and a few days later, the Lakers weakened the East even more. They acquired the extraordinary Kobe Bryant from Charlotte in exchange for the ordinary Vlade Divac. Not the best thing for Charlotte or for the East. Neither was San Antonio receiving a double dose of blessings with lottery picks that became David Robinson and Tim Duncan.

Here's another thing: Most of today's NBA players prefer the West, because they are from the hip-hop generation. Their lives fluctuate between fast and quick.

Just like the West. That's opposed to the traditionally plodding East.