In the Rotation: NBA Week 1

The first week of the NBA season, basically the first half of the season, needs to be taken with a grain of salt. It's entertaining, competitive, and a good time to evaluate what's what around the league, but nothing that happens is going to be earth-shattering. Good teams will start slow (San Antonio), bad teams will start fast (too early to tell who just yet), and everyone will settle into their roles heading into the stretch.

At least a half a dozen or more teams will be drastically changed throughout the course of the season, meaning what you see now isn't always what you get come playoff time.

Nonetheless, today and every Monday throughout the season we'll put together an NBA team worth of top stories from around the league.

Starting Five

1. Los Angeles Lakers

There's good news and bad news in Lakerland right now. The good news: the Lakers are 3-0 with an average margin of victory of 21.6 points per game. The bad news: all those M-V-P chants will be going to waste because it looks like Kobe only needs to play about two and a half quarters per game on this team. It'll be good for 60+ wins, but it's not the recipe for back-to-back MVP awards.

Other than that, you couldn't ask for a better start for the Lakers. Kobe has been Kobe. Andrew Bynum has played well in his return from a knee injury. Pau Gasol has thrived back at power forward, where his game is best suited. And Trevor Ariza is the one player who I can guarantee you'll watch this year and think, "Wow, I didn't know he was that good."

Sure, being the best team in the league at this point of the season translates to a title about as often as "You may already be a winner!" translates to early retirement, but you only get one chance to make a first impression. The Lakers didn't just make a first impression, they made an opening statement: They're ready to play.

2. Chris Paul and the Hornets

Notice that it wasn't "Kobe and the Lakers" earlier, but it's "Chris Paul and the Hornets" this time around. That's because the Lakers are the deepest team in the league right now, and the Hornets are only going to go as far as Paul can take them. And that isn't a slight in any way.

Paul was nothing short of spectacular in the Hornets three wins this week, going over 20-10 in points and assists in each of the Hornets' first three games. If the Hornets are in fact going as far as Paul takes them, they should be prepared for a long season. He could be entering "all-time great" status already, with his 50% field goal percentage nearly as impressive as his league leading 12 assists per game, with his teammates, coaches, and fans reaping the benefits.

3. Detroit Pistons

I'll never understand why some people still underestimate this team. You wouldn't have to look far to find some preseason predictions that have teams like Cleveland, Orlando, Toronto, or even Philly picked ahead of Detroit in the East.

Those teams are all young, inexperienced, unfamiliar with each other, or some combination of the three, and still trying to find their groove. The Pistons, meanwhile, just quietly take care of business racking up 50 win seasons, division titles, and conference championship appearances like they are going out of style.

Who cares if it's practically the same team year after year, they're really good. They won 59 games last year and returned basically the same exact team. The idea behind that is brilliant in its simplicity. You don't have to like the way they play, but you have to give them credit where credit is due.

Teams like Dallas and Phoenix are busy overhauling their rosters every two years like a college program, despite the fact that they have good teams to begin with, and have little to no success in the long run to show for it. Meanwhile, teams like San Antonio and Detroit keep their "boring" (or "great", depending on your level of basic basketball comprehension) core of players together and have exponentially more success to their credit.

This 2-0 start for the Pistons is nothing but business as usual in Detroit, and a sign of things to come for this team.

4. Houston Rockets

Everything is going to plan in Houston so far. Ron Artest has played well, Yao and Tracy McGrady have shared the load well, and the Rockets have gotten off to a hot start.

It's easy to like this team; they have more talent on their roster than any other team except possibly Boston and L.A. They are supposed to win games, and as long as they stay healthy they will.

Now's not the time to bring up the inevitable injury woes this team will face, but to enjoy watching every Rockets game you can with the big three playing and healthy. Three games played at a high level isn't enough to convince me that the Rockets are for real, but it's enough to admit that if everything works out well this team is a legitimate threat out West.

5. Derrick Rose

I have to admit, I thought Michael Beasley was going to be the best player in this draft class. He still might be, after all we're three games into a head to head comparison that will last for about a decade, but after watching both of their debuts I'll say that Rose is head and shoulders better than Beasley (or any other rookie for that matter) right now.

He's lightning quick with the ball, yet never gets out of control. He can finish around the rim, which is a major bonus because it allows him to score even though he doesn't look confident in his jump shot at all. His assist numbers will come once he gains more familiarity with his teammates, giving him the potential to be the first stud rookie point guard drafted since Chris Paul and Deron Williams in 2005.

In the Rotation

Atlanta Hawks

If they can develop any sort of consistency, the Hawks certainly look like they have a real chance to make some noise in the Eastern Conference. Already this year, they have blown a 20-point lead and overcome a 20-point deficit. Either way, both games have been victories and they remain one of only seven unbeaten teams in the league.

They may not have the depth (at least not yet) that good playoff teams have, but their starting five is as solid as just about any team in the league. Joe Johnson and Josh Smith have evolved into borderline superstars, and Mike Bibby is playing for one last big contract, which never hurts.

They'll be tested this week with tough matchups against other unbeatens New Orleans and Toronto, but look for the Hawks to come out fighting as they try to prove that they belong in the discussion of top Eastern Conference Teams.

Guys With Goofy Hair

Teams are absolutely missing the boat if they don't have a bench player on their roster with a wild hairdo. It's practically guaranteed that this player will be the most popular among the fans and will whip the crowd into a frenzy with a couple of hustle plays off the bench. Keeping home court advantage alive while the starters rest could be good for as many as two or three victories a year, and yet some teams allow this resource to go untapped.

Chris Wilcox is probably twice the player that Ben Wallace is (funny how leaving a team of all-stars will reveal a player's warts), but Big Ben was a folk hero in Detroit while Wilcox toils in obscurity all because Wallace rocked the afro for a few years.

When I'm given control of an NBA team, I'm going to make it a rule that my eighth man has to have a perm, and reap the benefits of a few extra home wins because of it.

Buried on the Bench

Portland Trail Blazers, Philadelphia 76ers

Both of these teams had lofty expectations coming into this season, and neither has impressed so far. Portland has a team that finished .500 last season, and was only supposed to improve with the addition of baby-faced rookie Greg Oden. Instead, the Blazers have lost Oden, most likely for the first month of the season, face a brutal stretch of games to start out, and seem like they are completely out of sync as a team despite not losing anything from their core a year ago.

Likewise, Philly has high hopes coming into this season after making the biggest splash in free agency by adding Elton Brand, only to find out what they should have learned from his time with the Clippers: he's not good enough to be the best player on a good team. Brand can either be the best player on a bad team or he can be a big contributor to a good team, but it's going to become more evident as the season goes on that he can't be both.

Both of these teams were big disappointments in week one, and look like the early favorites to be the teams most overvalued in the preseason.

Inactive List

Andrew Bynum

It usually takes terrible play or an injury to be made inactive in the NBA. Here, it just takes poor decision-making.

I'm going to go out on a limb and call this a poor decision.

Honestly, I can't decide whether I want this to be the first or last time I get to link to a seven-footer throwing wads money off a balcony. Luckily, it's a long season, and I'll have plenty of time to decide.

Either way, congratulations to Andrew Bynum for being the first of many players to make the "inactive list" for his stellar off-the-court performance.

Be sure to check back at Sports Central every Monday to see who cracks Scott Shepherd's rotation as he breaks down what is going on around the NBA.