San Antonio Spurs #10 in ESPN Future Power Rankings

Every so often for the last year or so, Chad Ford and John Hollinger have gotten together to predict the future success of the thirty respective NBA teams, the system is an attempt to project what is going to happen over the next three seasons. 

In their latest version the Spurs come in tenth in the rating system based on a matrix composed of scores given to: players, management, monetary situation, market size, and draft prospects.  Join me on the other side for more.

In the first three versions of the rating system, the Spurs came in 8^th, 7^th, and 12^th in that order, so it’s clear they are considered by the writers to be a good team with a decent enough future.  What I don’t fully understand is the five spot drop between December 15^th, 2009 and March 2^nd, 2010; two things that I think contributed to that were an over-valuation of the Mavs/ Wiz trade and of the Nuggets (now in tatters) Management Team.

When we look at the current rankings a bit more order is restored to the order of teams as the Mavs are now below the Spurs as they always should be, the Nuggets have dropped a few slots (to 9), and the Cavs have been obliterated.  I still have my quibbles though.  Call me crazy, but I think a team that just lost its two main Front Office people should never, ever be above what the authors consider the best FO in the league.  On top of that, their franchise player is an un-known at this point as he may not even be around for the duration of time this system is trying to project.  In my mind, the Spurs should easily be ranked #9, but I guess top 10 is still pretty darn good.

What do you think?