How the mighty have fallen (failure of '14 Conference Finalists)

[didaksrightfoot]

This doesn't really deserve a thread of it's own, but I couldn't think of anywhere else to post it.

3 out of the 4 Conference Finalists from last season have failed to make the playoffs this year. (and the Spurs also dropped to a 6-seed).

Each team has an excuse (Losing Lebron, and all 3 being hurt by injuries), and you do often have a top team fall away because of player movement... but would this be the first time that 3 of the conference finalists fell out of the playoffs?
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(Mods feel free to move this if there is somewhere more appropriate).

Otherwise - we could make this thread about Players/Teams that fell away sooner than you expected?

 

[fidstar]

I think I mentioned it before, but I doubt it has happened before (both conference finalists from one conference missing the playoffs the next year).

But the reasons are obvious. The 3 teams that didn't make it lost their best player. Two of those players were the best two players in the league last year (comfortably) and the other guy (George) was a Top 5 guy.

SA was also only 1 game from the 2nd seed and goes into the playoffs as the 3rd favorite for the title, so I don't think they have any issues.

 

[jod23]

Yeah I think it would have been more of a story if all the teams were the same from last season. But it's mainly injuries that has made this happen, rather than teams just falling away.