It's time for our 13th annual Tiers of the NBA -- my alternative to power rankings. With exceptions both happy (the San Antonio Spurs from the mid-1990s through the Kawhi Leonard disaster, perhaps the Golden State Warriors now) and sad (KANGGGZZZZZ!!!), team-building flows on a soft boom-and-bust cycle: stars rise, peak and then fall -- taking teams along the same path.
Grouping teams helps clarify who is where on that spectrum -- and which teams might be on the verge of moving up or down.
Order within tiers does not matter.