THE 4TH QUARTER

1. Tim Duncan (San Antonio Spurs) – It seems like only once every decade can a player be considered the best player in the history of his position while he’s still playing. That’s the case with Tim Duncan as it seems like in the past few years he and his four championship rings have been made the consensus “greatest power forward ever”. While its true that he’s getting up there in age and years played, Tim Duncan is still among the league’s best current power forwards, and when fully healthy, its hard to consider anyone in the league ahead of him. If the Spurs can remain healthy this season, expect them to make a run at the Lakers for the Western Conference title with Tim Duncan manning the ship. The addition of Richard Jefferson gives the spurs the fresh blood they’ve often lacked in years past and should be motivation enough for Tim Duncan and the rest of the Spurs to compete at a consistently high level for the duration of the season barring injury.

2. Pau Gasol (Los Angeles Lakers) – Pau Gasol finally managed to shed the “soft” label that had been dogging him for some time when he became a champion with the Lakers in June. Gasol has been a busy man as he spent much of his offseason competing with his native Spain national team after leading them to the gold medal games in Beijing last summer. Normally this much activity would have me thinking about fatigue, but Pau won’t be affected as much as the average player would. Although Pau has learned to bang down low with the best of them, the fact of the matter is much of his game is grace and not brute. Pau won’t have to worry about fatigue much when he’s at the top of the key hitting wide open jumpers after his man left him to double up on a slashing Kobe Bryant. With the Lakers adding Ron Artest and Andrew Bynum looking at a breakout year, look for Pau’s numbers to dip slightly, but don’t expect his impact to diminish at all.

3. Kevin Garnett (Boston Celtics) – Kevin Garnett is coming off of an injury year that saw him out of the entire playoffs with a bum knee. KG is said to be close to 100% and if he can reach that point early in the season expect for him to have a monster year as his hunger will be at an all time high since he didn’t get a chance to properly defend his first NBA title. There are doubters that are saying that KG is done and you can bet that he hears them and is out to prove them wrong.

4. Dirk Nowitzki (Dallas Mavericks) – Although he has a less then impressive history of playoff exits which lead many to label him a choker, what you can’t deny is that Dirk is still one of the truly unique talents in the league. Who wouldn’t want a seven footer who can run and shoot from outside so well that you would mistake him for a guard. With Jason Kidd still running the point and the additions of Shawn Marion and Drew Gooden to lessen the pressure on Dirk, expect him to be comfortable and put up big numbers all year long.

5. Chris Bosh (Toronto Raptors) – After Lebron and D-Wade, Chris Bosh will be the most sought after free agent at the end of the season. And not to say that Bosh’s play is at all influenced by monetary incentives, but we all know that players have a little extra motivation in a contract year. Another thing to consider is that newly acquired Hedo Turkoglu is a player with excellent court vision and will no doubt be looking to feed Bosh in the post. Add that with the fact that Toronto isn’t necessarily the most loaded team in the league and what you have is a recipe for Bosh to put up some huge numbers this year.

Honorable Mentions: Amare Stoudemire (Phoenix Suns), Carlos Boozer (Utah Jazz), Elton Brand (Philadelphia 76ers), Rasheed Wallace (Boston Celtics), Lamar Odom (Los Angeles Lakers), David Lee (New York Knicks)