The Athletic released the second part of their anonymous player poll, this one asking players who will win the NBA championship (besides your own team).

Out of the 161 players polled, 146 responded over the course of late February through the start of April. The results:

Oklahoma City Thunder - 50.0% (73 votes)
San Antonio Spurs - 25.3% (37 votes)
Boston Celtics - 8.2% (12 votes)
Denver Nuggets - 7.5% (11 votes)
Detroit Pistons - 4.1% (6 votes)
Cleveland Cavaliers - 1.4% (2 votes)
Los Angeles Lakers - 1.4% (2 votes)
Minnesota Timberwolves - 1.4% (2 votes)
Atlanta Hawks - 0.6% (1 vote)

Previous season poll results:

2025 - Boston Celtics (57.7% of 137 votes)
2024 - Denver Nuggets (55.9% of 127 votes)
2023 - Milwaukee Bucks (62.2% of 90 votes)
2019 - Golden State Warriors (79.5% of 110 votes)

Scodo810 | Cavaliers

63 | 3 hours ago

Kudos to the guy who went Atl

Cutmerock | Thunder

23 | 3 hours ago

If someone gives you 10000:1 odds on anything, you take it!

soilentgleem

5 | 3 hours ago

What is this from? I swear I heard that before.

Silly_Ostrich_5116 | Spurs

8 | 3 hours ago

The office, Kevin says it.

soilentgleem

2 | 3 hours ago

Ah yes. Thanks!

not-a-potato-head | Hawks

1 | 20 minutes ago

I’d put $10 on it being Trae

Jack_1080

36 | 3 hours ago

Not one vote for the knicks in interesting to me.

needapermit | Thunder

14 | 3 hours ago

Just don’t see them sustaining a run then also beating a juggernaut from the West

AllOutRaptors | Raptors

15 | 3 hours ago

That’s fair but why tf does Atlanta have a vote then lmao

Less-Tax5637 | Knicks

6 | an hour ago

Sorry that was me

not-a-potato-head | Hawks

1 | 19 minutes ago

I’d be willing to bet that that was Trae lol

Drew13800

4 | 3 hours ago

I mean against you guys ya but we randomly have Denver’s number and are 2-1 against San Antonio this year.

PassMeTheBackwood | Knicks

2 | 2 hours ago

OKC is the only team in the West that scares me

randotd152

4 | 41 minutes ago

Really tough road and never exactly looked threatening this season.

Good solid team that seems like a huge stretch to win 4 tough series in a row.

Nuclearsunburn | Heat

2 | an hour ago

Both they and Detroit just seem…very beatable, I guess?

EmbarrassedRing7806 | Lakers

14 | 3 hours ago

Vegas odds rn

OKC +115
SAS +550
BOS +550
DEN +1100
CLE +1100
NYK +1800
DET +2000

So pretty respectable order for the players, though there the difference between Spurs and Celtics on the survey is too high

peanut-britle-latte | Knicks

2 | an hour ago

I’m a bit surprised with the Gap in odds between Cleveland and NYK, I think there’s some bracketology there because TOR is viewed as weaker than ATL and CLE actually looks like a basketball team vs DET.

BrotherSeamus | Thunder

1 | an hour ago

I’m curious if OKC’s odds increased when Denver clinched the 3 seed

OKC2023champs | Thunder

1 | 20 minutes ago

Yes.+140 to +115

Clipgang1629 | Clippers

1 | 29 minutes ago

Denver’s odds went from +1000 to +1100 so yeah I would think so

OKC2023champs | Thunder

1 | 20 minutes ago

+115 is way too high. A single injury fucks that up immediately

EmbarrassedRing7806 | Lakers

1 | 16 minutes ago

Can be said about any team ever lol

OKC2023champs | Thunder

1 | 14 minutes ago

Yes but that’s not the point I’m making. I’m saying taking +115 odds is terrible because of that

EmbarrassedRing7806 | Lakers

1 | 4 minutes ago

I’m saying that vegas knows better than u

SquimJim | Celtics

14 | 3 hours ago

I think voters are too confident in our ability to beat the Knicks and Pistons. I think we are all on relatively equal footing and any of those matchups can go either way. Knicks in particular beat us last year and have done well this year. The Brunson/Kat PnR gives us issues along with Mitchell Robinson. I think we can beat them, but they can beat us too.

TatumBrownWhite | Celtics

7 | an hour ago

Agreed.

I obviously think we can win both series, but they feel like 7-game series.

MatchAffectionate951

1 | 31 minutes ago

NBA players prolly knew Tatum was coming back strong and that he was gonna come back as he’s friends with many players/ players who share trainers .

VeniceRapture | Spurs

8 | 3 hours ago

These people are sleeping on the Wolves man. Like ok they’re probably gonna fall to OKC like everybody else, but 1.4%?

Odoaiden | Timberwolves

5 | an hour ago

We do have the hardest schedule of anybody with Nuggets-Spurs-Thunder-East team being the most likely path

-xXxMangoxXx- | Raptors

1 | 35 minutes ago

They face a nuggets that are on their longest win streak in the jokic era, and are close to full health now and watson will likely be back beginning or middle of the series.

If they manage to beat the nuggets, they see the spurs who have the best defender in the league and multiple other good defenders.

If they beat the spurs, they see the thunder who are the defending champs and while their record is worse, they have the experience they gained from winning a ring and are more poised.

If they manage to get through all that, they get the reward of seeing whoever gets out of the east who wont be nearly as battered.

TravelDaWorld81 | Nuggets

1 | 5 minutes ago

Why is this hard to understand they’re not even getting through the Nuggets?

Bouldershoulders12 | Celtics

5 | 3 hours ago

So what you’re saying is spurs/OKC WCF to increase Celtics odds 😎

fireemblem4812 | Spurs

6 | 3 hours ago

Only 6 votes for the Pistons, really? I’d expect at least an on-par number of votes with the Celtics, they’re underrating the shit out of the Pistons.

Mobile-Entertainer60 | Thunder

10 | 3 hours ago

It’s the exact same discussion as the Thunder from 2 years ago, or frankly, the Spurs this year; it’s nearly unprecedented to go from non-contender to Finals champion in a single year. The teams that did acquired multiple Hall of Famers in a single offseason, like the 2008 Celtics.

Clipgang1629 | Clippers

1 | 27 minutes ago

On top of that they are bottom of the league in 3PA and 3pt% which is pretty important metric for a team you’re expecting to win the championship.

Idk when that will catch up with them but it definitely will

OwnGuarantee6838

2 | 3 hours ago

Their offense is horrendous

No team in the modern era is winning with exactly 1 good offensive creator/playmaker and a decent backup offensive player

Previous champs

Thunder: SGA, Ihart, Jdub all strong offensive players

Celtics: Tatum, Brown, Holiday, White

Nuggets: Jokic, Murray, MPJ, Gordon

Warriors: Curry, Klay, Poole, Wiggins, Green

You need a large amount of offensive creators if u want to win, halfcourt offense was a nightmare for the thunder in the playoffs last season, they barely got through it via historic defense. Pistons have an even worse offense and a not as strong defense.

They’re pretenders until they get another strong offensive creator next to Cade

Whenis-dinner

-1 | 2 hours ago

Jdub/ihart are not strong offensive creator/playmakers. Pistons have a good amount of ballhandling in Cade/Jenkins/Levert/Huerter. Thunder were MUCH better without Josh Giddey by just replacing him with a strong defender to put on the other team’s best player. Pistons have multitudes of that with Green/Thompson/Holland. If they’re allowed to play defense the way they are in the regular season and Cade comes back into rhythm after the collapsed lung it’s closer than you think. Duren is turning (or has turned) into more than just a lob catcher and he did pretty well getting his own shot against Wemby/Kat this season.

OwnGuarantee6838

1 | 2 hours ago

That’s not true at all and no one other than cade is at those two’s level

Ihart is an incredible impactful playmaker, rebounder and inside scorer, there’s always massive improvements to their on/off whenever he plays.

Jdub is also huge for the team because him being around means Shai can’t be doubled every play.

The pistons don’t have anyone like that aside from jenkins, its been noticeably bad all season pretty much and that halfcourt offense will be exposed by real elite defenses.

Whenis-dinner

2 | an hour ago

You can’t deny that no one other than cade is at jdub/iharts levels by saying subjective statements about how good ihart and jdub are. Directly comparing them is hard. Duren is an all star who averaged Dwight Howard stats on ridiculous efficiency without cade. Thunder are definitely way worse without hartenstein’s boards and handoffs. To say Duren is “nowhere near” jdub/ihart’s impact in attracting defensive attention is definitely wrong though.

Watching Pistons games Jenkins/Huerter/Caris spread the ball handling load enough such that they all made up for Cade’s playmaking when he had his collapsed lung. What team isn’t worse without their best player or when the best player gets locked up? I won’t deny that trying to say a combination of huerter levert jenkins backup playmaker rotation is particularly good, but it sure has been working. Believe!!!!

fatkamp | Warriors

1 | 3 hours ago

Not really

Lack of secondary playmaker is usually a red flag for teams in the postseason.

Celtics can confidently share the playmaking with White, Tatum, Brown, Pritchard. When teams seek out Cade, where do the pistons go?

Awanderingleaf

1 | 3 hours ago

They have very little playoff experience right now.

wombatpup55 | Spurs

5 | 3 hours ago

It’s really hard to tell how the spurs will do this post season. Both Timberwolves and Nuggets are a matchup nightmare. Either way this post season should be pretty fun

tagen | Spurs

4 | 3 hours ago

to me it’s much more about getting as much playoff experience for the youngins as possible, obviously if we do win that’s fucking incredible and i’ll be in that parade, but a mostly first time playoff team is bound to have glaring issues come playoff time

Adorable-News-9364 | Spurs

1 | 2 hours ago

“Matchup nightmare” is absurdly hyperbolic

OurHorrifyingPlanet | Spurs

1 | 2 hours ago

Nuggets are definitely not a “matchup nightmare.” They’re a really fucking good team, but we lost one game with Wemby in OT, and split the series without. It’s definitely not a terrible matchup, very balanced even

PrestigiousWelder190

0 | 3 hours ago

I wouldn’t be worried about Minnesota. They’ve been up and down all year. Haven’t really shown that they’re gonna be able to hang in a 7 game series against the best

Adorable-News-9364 | Spurs

3 | 2 hours ago

I’m worried about both and both provide genuine matchup issues. We also have some matchup issues for them and home court.

Odoaiden | Timberwolves

0 | an hour ago

If there’s any team we could upset it’s the spurs we’ve played them extremely well despite being injured vs them this season

RCA1202 | Thunder

3 | 3 hours ago

Who the fuck voted for the Lakers bro

sbenfsonwFFiF

2 | 3 hours ago

Late Feb through early April was when the lakers went on a hot streak, it’s not the craziest pick

RCA1202 | Thunder

-1 | 3 hours ago

If the Lakers were healthy I think 2 votes would be about right

Without Luka and Reaves they are going to be the worst playoff team in the field

SadisticSpeller | 76ers

1 | 3 hours ago

Charles Barkley. He snuck in to support his favorite team.

KL2ConspireLLC | San Diego Clippers

-1 | 3 hours ago

~~Probably a couple Lakers players. I’m assuming the teams that got 2 or fewer votes were just players picking themselves.~~ WRONG

Edit: Nvm, didn’t see that they couldn’t pick themselves.

EmbarrassedRing7806 | Lakers

0 | 3 hours ago

It says not your own team

KL2ConspireLLC | San Diego Clippers

1 | 3 hours ago

Yup my bad.

bhris_cratt321

4 | 3 hours ago

For what it’s worth, it seems that the majority vote for the players has been incorrect every time.

WD51 | Spurs

4 | an hour ago

I find the comparison to previous year results interesting. Its clear and makes sense that the previous years winner would be highest rated to win, but of the last 4 years the Thunder have the lowest confidence to repeat among the players despite having one of the best regular seasons in this half decade.

FirstPreparation8538 | Pacers

2 | an hour ago

Detroit > Boston

One_Seaworthiness323

2 | an hour ago

People are gonna be mad, confused, shocked even when the Pistons cleanup the east lol

EarthWarping | NBA

0 | 3 hours ago

SAS over DEN is crazy

Humble_Complaint_413 | Celtics

18 | 3 hours ago

Hey have eight more wins this year lol why is that crazy

Kiriegloom | Bulls

2 | 3 hours ago

Playoff experience. The current Thunder team everyone says will be a dynasty failed to make it out the 2nd round the first time they were in the playoffs, even as the 1 seed

needapermit | Thunder

11 | 3 hours ago

This SAS team is much better built than our team was at that point. We had no true big, an offensive black hole in Giddey, no real successful vets, and Dub was not ready to be a true 2nd option yet. SAS also has a truly game changing player in Wemby (Shai is game changing but Wemby’s impact is insane)

Clipgang1629 | Clippers

1 | 25 minutes ago

Because the regular season isn’t always indicative of what happens in the playoffs. And young teams like the Spurs, always get a regular season boost.

Not to mention the Nuggets dealt with so many injuries this season. Those long odds for the Nugs are a bit disrespectful imo

Awanderingleaf

3 | 3 hours ago

Denver with Jokic has only ever beat a single 50 win team. It would be asking a lot to expect him to lead the Nuggets past multiple 50, or even 60, win teams.

MatchAffectionate951

1 | 30 minutes ago

This was when Denver was injured

composer_7 | Hawks

1 | 2 hours ago

Lmao who voted Atlanta

##BELIEVE

OldOrder | Hawks

1 | 40 minutes ago

I appreciate the anonymous NBA player who voted for us. I hear it was some guy who goes by T. Young

The Athletic’s Anonymous Player Picks - Who’ll win 2026 NBA Finals; Top 3 - Thunder (50%), Spurs (25.3%), Celtics (8.2%)