The first few weeks of the season always see dramatic moves in the NBA Power Rankings. Some teams are better than we thought, others are worse, but mostly it's small sample size theater — if the Knicks dropped three straight games in January, the NBA would just shrug.
Still, we have a fair amount of ground to cover in our first edition of Stock Up, Stock Down, looking at the teams that are the most dramatic risers and fallers in the NBC Sports NBA Power Rankings. Here are the teams to keep an eye on.
Stock up
• The Oklahoma City Thunder move up two spots to take over No. 1, although the gruesome leg injury to Jalen Williams has put a dark cloud over any celebrations of the team's fast start.
• The Detroit Pistons and Houston Rockets each move up four spots to take over the No. 2 and No. 3 spots in the power rankings.
• The Minnesota Timberwolves jumped up seven spots from outside the top-10 to No. 4. We knew their LaMelo Ball and Anthony Edwards offense would be good, but the defense has been near the league's best to start the season.
• The Toronto Raptors jumped up seven spots to be No. 7 in this week's rankings, another team with an elite defense — when Kawhi Leonard is healthy.
• The Memphis Grizzlies jumped up eight spots to No. 17 after an unexpected 3-0 start, behind the equally surprising but unstoppable Ty Jerome, who is averaging 34.7 points a game so far.
• Shout out to the Charlotte Hornets, which climbed seven spots up to No. 19 behind a fast start from Brandon Miller, while still missing some key players (such as Kon Knueppel).
Stock Down
• Nobody's stock fell faster than the New York Knicks, who fell a dozen spots from No. 1 all the way down to 13th. Losing to East contenders such as Philadelphia and Boston is one thing, but losing to a Banchero-less Orlando is another. Physicality and shooting seem to have gone missing in NYC, but nobody there is panicking. Yet.
• The winless Miami Heat fell 10 spots down to 23rd in the latest power rankings. The Heat have trailed by at least 20 points in every game, and the defense that was supposed to anchor them is bottom-five in the league. There might be a little panic in South Beach.
• The San Antonio Spurs fell six spots to No. 8, and Victor Wembanyama has looked almost human to start the season. Expect that to change.