Who will follow the Phoenix Suns as the NBA's next breakout team?
Aging legend Chris Paul and his young Phoenix Suns charges were the story of the 2020-21 NBA season, until Milwaukee Bucks superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo stole every headline, punctuating the Milwaukee Bucks' first championship in 50 years with arguably the greatest close-out performance in league history.
Only, Antetokounmpo's ascent is far harder to replicate than how the Suns constructed their contender.
Even if the 2019-20 campaign ultimately ended in another lottery appearance, first-year Phoenix coach Monty Williams untapped the winning potential of Devin Booker, DeAndre Ayton and Mikal Bridges, the young foundation of a 19-win roster one year earlier. Suns general manager James Jones upgraded the veterans around them, from Ricky Rubio and Kelly Oubre Jr. to Paul and Jae Crowder, and collectively they transformed the Suns from scrappy underdog to Western Conference No. 2 seed and bona fide contender.
Can the Suns remain in the championship hunt? Or will another team's turnaround steal their thunder?
It is rare to leap from the lottery to the Finals, and the Suns did benefit from some playoff injury luck, but they are hardly the first example of a team reversing its fortunes on the strength of rising stars, veteran leadership and quality coaching. Look no further than the 2019-20 Miami Heat, who stamped Jimmy Butler, Andre Iguodala and Crowder as stewards of a roster featuring Bam Adebayo, Duncan Robinson and Tyler Herro. None of those three young talents were as established as Booker or highly regarded as Ayton (the No. 1 overall pick in 2018), which should provide even more hope for teams aspiring to similar take-offs.
Crowder was also on the 2016-17 Celtics, who added Al Horford to a promising roster that lost in the first round a year earlier and rode Isaiah Thomas' rising star to a No. 1 seed and the Eastern Conference finals.
Beyond simply signing Crowder, what lessons can aspiring teams take from these turnarounds? All three rosters boasted quality players on rookie contracts and at least one ascendent star, all of whom were willing to embrace an influx of veteran talent and a coach whose credentials carried cache across all generations.
Last season marked the third for Ayton and Bridges on the Suns. Booker was a 24-year-old returning All-Star on the second year of his maximum rookie contract extension. Crowder brought playoff experience on the wing, and Paul trusted them all enough to believe he could lift them to at least a level of legitimacy.
It was not at all unlike the 2001-02 New Jersey Nets. They swapped Stephon Marbury for Jason Kidd, returned veteran wing Kerry Kittles from injury and added 21-year-old rookie Richard Jefferson to a 26-win team that featured productive recent top-two picks Keith Van Horn and Kenyon Martin. In his second season as coach, Byron Scott helped Kidd guide the Nets to the first of consecutive Finals appearances.
Any number of teams this season could fit a similar bill.
Teams with expectations too high to significantly exceed
The Heat and Celtics have retooled their rosters, but they are only a year removed from meeting in the conference finals. Likewise, the Atlanta Hawks were Suns lite last year, riding Trae Young, a roster full of potential and veteran help to the third round. None of those teams would be coming out of nowhere.
The Chicago Bulls' moves have been more bludgeoning than the subtlety of incorporating Paul and Crowder into an established young roster. Lofty expectations come with surrounding 26-year-old All-Star Zach LaVine with Nikola Vucevic, DeMar DeRozan and Lonzo Ball, and they are not so easily met in Year 1.
With Luka Doncic coming off a top-five MVP campaign and a brilliant performance at the Tokyo Olympics, the Dallas Mavericks are more closely following the blueprint Milwaukee penciled for Antetokounmpo. No one will be shocked to see Doncic carry a contender, with or without Kristaps Porzingis' return to form.
After overachieving under coach Tom Thibodeau last season, the New York Knicks added Kemba Walker and Evan Fournier to the roster, but a step back seems just as plausible as another massive step forward.
Teams with expectations so low a leap still falls short
The Sacramento Kings, Orlando Magic, Minnesota Timberwolves and Detroit Pistons have been dormant so long, any semblance of improvement will be welcomed, but all four rosters could use an influx of veteran leadership beyond Tristan Thompson, Robin Lopez, Taurean Prince and Kelly Olynyk. The promise of playoff success for their talented young cores still feels at least a season and several more pieces away.
The San Antonio Spurs just lack the star power and pedigree it takes to make such dramatic improvement.
It would be cool if the arrival of Rubio helped revitalize Kevin Love's career, and together they willingly led a cast of recent lottery picks in restoring glory to the Cleveland Cavaliers, but they feel just as likely to fold.
A handful of teams feel more qualified to make a leap ...
Indiana Pacers
The Pacers were staples of the Eastern Conference's first round until first-year coach Nate Bjorkgren rode them into the ground last season. He has since been replaced with Rick Carlisle, a veteran coach with title experience. A return to prominence might be more of a bounce-back season than a Suns-like turnaround, but Indiana does have the talent to catch the league by surprise. Domantas Sabonis is a 25-year-old two-time All-Star. Malcolm Brogdon, Caris LeVert, Myles Turner and T.J. Warren are proven players around him.
It is just not clear whether rookie Chris Duarte and third-year projects Oshae Brissett and Goga Bitadze hold enough potential to raise the Pacers' ceiling higher than the frisky first-round out they recently were.
Charlotte Hornets
The Hornets were an extremely watered-down version of the Suns or Hawks last season. Rookie of the Year LaMelo Ball was their young gun. Terry Rozier played like a borderline All-Star at 26 years old. Miles Bridges and P.J. Washington were productive players on rookie deals. A max-contracted Gordon Hayward injected some veteran life into the roster, and they were firmly in the playoff hunt for much of the season.
If injuries had not torn them asunder, they might have had a chance to make some noise in the postseason. The free-agent losses of Devonte' Graham and Malik Monk will hurt a roster in need of more help, but Ball's upside is such that the Hornets might be closer to breaking out than most of their perennial lottery brethren.
Memphis Grizzlies
Ja Morant and the Grizzlies gave the top-seeded Utah Jazz all they could handle in the first round of the playoffs. Morant is a 22-year-old rising superstar in command of a roster loaded with developing young talent. Steven Adams is not a star-level veteran addition, but he warrants respect. The Grizzlies are far from their considerable ceiling as a collective, but leaps from Morant and Jaren Jackson Jr. will get them closer.
Still, it was not until Year 5 of the partnership between Marc Gasol and Mike Conley Jr. that Memphis last leapt from first-round fodder to 2013 Western Conference finalist. That team also had more veteran help.
Washington Wizards
Bradley Beal is the real deal, better than Booker, and while he may not have a second or third star as talented as Paul and Ayton, the Wizards rebuilt the entire roster around their 28-year-old All-NBA guard. Spencer Dinwiddie, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Montrezl Harrell, Kyle Kuzma and Aaron Holiday are all capable rotational players. They should bump last year's sub-.500 record above the play-in line, and breakout seasons from recent No. 9 overall picks Rui Hachimura and Deni Avdija could lift them to greater heights. There may come a point when the Wizards become buyers and quiet the noise around selling Beal.
New Orleans Pelicans
Like Phoenix last year, New Orleans will feature a 24-year-old All-Star (Brandon Ingram) and a burgeoning recent No. 1 overall pick (Zion Williamson). Hard-nosed center Jonas Valanciunas and beloved teammate Garrett Temple are the incoming veterans. The Pelicans tried like hell to make 35-year-old Kyle Lowry their Chris Paul, but he chose the Heat, so they signed-and-traded Graham away from the Hornets instead.
If Ingram and Williamson make strides, and one or more of the Pelicans still on rookie contracts — Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Jaxson Hayes and Kira Lewis — leap along with them, they could be a frightening force. It does not hurt that New Orleans tabbed Phoenix assistant Willie Green as the team's new head coach.
Given how rare it is for a surprise team to take a direct flight from the lottery to the Finals, it is hard to imagine it happening for a third year in a row. We are not talking about the Celtics adding Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen in 2007 or the Los Angeles Lakers teaming Anthony Davis with a healthy LeBron James in 2019.
The rise of the Suns and Heat the past two years depended as much on the collective development of their young stars as it did on the leadership of Paul and Butler, neither of whom was a model of playoff success. This is the hope every fan base of a losing team has entering each season, and hope is a wonderful thing.
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Ben Rohrbach is a staff writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at rohrbach_ben@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @brohrbach
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