The NBA's season of parity is living up to the hype

As the NBA season tipped off, there was reason to believe that a league traditionally comprised of clearly defined haves and have-nots was finally set for an unprecedented season of parity. Preseason betting odds and projection systems indicated that 2022-23 could see the most wide-open title race in NBA history. But it's one thing to echo such conjecture before any games have been played and another to actually watch it play out on the court.

With half the season now complete, we can say that the campaign is living up to its preseason hype, and we've never seen anything quite like it.

The Association is as balanced as it's ever been, with a narrowing gap between the league's best and worst teams and a genuine brand of unpredictability from night to night that's foreign to NBA fans.

Only six games separate third place from 13th in the Western Conference, where No. 11 Portland simultaneously sits outside the play-in and within four games of a top-four seed that would bring home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs.

On a league-wide level, no victory can be taken for granted. In the last 10 days, we've seen the Celtics enter Oklahoma City as 11.5-point favorites and proceed to lose by 33 to the Thunder without Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the Bucks lose by 29 at home to the East-worst Hornets despite being favored by 10.5 points, the Warriors lose by 12 to the depleted Suns in a game they trailed by 27 points despite being favored by 12.5, and the full-strength Sixers get drilled by 19 points at home by the Thunder in a game they were favored to win by 9.5 points. I'll let you catch your breath.

Upsets happen over the course of an 82-game season, but these aren't run-of-the-mill surprises; heavy favorites are routinely getting throttled. The notion that any team can beat another on any given night - a mantra drilled into front-running teams' heads by obsessive, neurotic coaches - has never been truer.

Teams facing an opponent with a losing record won 59% of those matchups over the previous 19 seasons compared to only 52% through Jan. 3 of this season, according to Action Network's Matt Moore. In addition, Moore notes home underdogs have won 48% of their games this season compared to only 34% of games between the 2003-04 and 2021-22 seasons.

Perhaps when a league is more balanced, there's generally less to separate teams, and margins between winning and losing are, therefore, thinner, home court can make the difference. That would help explain why after years of decline, home-court advantage has made a comeback this season. For the majority of NBA history until about 10 years ago, home teams won more than 60% of games. Through half of this season, 2022-23 is on pace to be the first campaign in a decade where home teams once again crack the 60% threshold.

Only four teams enter the weekend with winning road records. Over the last 30 years, an average of eight teams per season finished with winning records on the road, and over the last five years, that number has ranged from nine to 14. This season is also on pace to be only the third this century without a 60-win team (or a team playing at a 60-win pace in a shortened season).

To further illustrate the lack of dominant teams this year, consider that only two squads (Boston and Memphis) currently boast average point differentials of at least plus-5.0, the fewest number in a season since 2000-01, when only San Antonio and Sacramento achieved the feat.

One reason for the rare balance this season is that the league's star talent is well dispersed rather than clustered. Though fans of the Nets, Lakers, and Celtics may disagree, you can make an argument that the 15 All-NBA favorites at the moment represent 15 different teams.

In the 34 seasons that the NBA has selected three All-NBA Teams, there has never been a year where those 15 players come from 15 different teams. In fact, the last time every All-NBA selection came from a different team was 1973-74, when only 10 players were selected.

Meanwhile, 15 different teams are represented in the top 15 of Basketball Reference's Value Over Replacement Player metric, while 14 teams are represented in the top 15 of both ESPN's Wins Above Replacement (two Celtics) and FiveThirtyEight's WAR (two Sixers).

Another factor helping level the field is the variance that comes from the proliferation of 3-pointers. Though 3-point frequency is down slightly compared to the last two seasons, the NBA's average 3-point attempt rate of 38.9% would still be the third-highest ever. When players are also converting at a 35.7% clip from behind the arc, the randomness of results increases.

That quick trigger from deep also ensures no lead is safe. According to The Athletic, 21 teams have already lost at least five games in which they held double-digit leads, with more than a quarter (26%) of all losers from this season's games blowing a double-digit lead in defeat.

Last week in Toronto, the Raptors forced overtime against the Bucks after trailing by 21 points with only 3:07 remaining in regulation and by 16 points with 75 seconds remaining. Eight days earlier, Luka Doncic's Mavericks completed a nearly incalculable comeback.

A more somber explanation for the league's even playing field is that a number of stars have already been sidelined by injuries and that teams continue to rest, employ load management, or sit stars for injury-prevention purposes. That certainly helps narrow the gap in some matchups, especially when contending teams strategically rest players against lesser clubs, but it doesn't come close to telling the full story of the 2022-23 campaign.

There's more star talent across the league than ever before, that talent is more evenly distributed than it has been in the past, scoring has exploded, 3-point shooting has ensured you can't turn away until the final buzzer sounds, and half the league is currently close enough to sniff both a top-six seed and a top-five pick. What more could the NBA and its fans want?

What will be fascinating to watch is whether this kind of parity and unpredictability can continue into the season's second half and, ultimately, the playoffs. The NBA has long had sports' most predictable postseason, but if ever there was a year for a Cinderella team, this might be it.

Joseph Casciaro is theScore's senior content producer.