Let's start here — new, exciting, potentially unproven, but with the wealth of opportunity at their fingertips. There are few better avatars for this than Deni Avdija POR and Tyrese Maxey PHI.

Oh, and by the way, other than Victor Wembanyama, Deni is the cheapest mega-star in the league at $14.4M this season. He's also one of only 3 players under $20M in the top 20 PRA.

In case you aren't sold on his insane value just yet, this is his second year in a front-loaded — yes, front-loaded — $55M contract. He's going to get cheaper next year. I didn't double-check this, but I'd be willing to bet he's the only 25, 5, and 5 or better player in the NBA with a decreasing salary in his contract. Dollars to delivery, Deni just might be one of the most valuable long-term assets in the game.

Deni is the future of Trailblazer basketball, and the future is now.

Look, I get it. Break-ups are hard. I've recently had to break up with my dear friend Ben & Jerry for lacto — uh, I mean — "personal" reasons. It's never easy. But unlike Deni, Tyrese isn't getting cheaper. The 76ers have committed about $130M into the league's 5th-best bucket-getter for the next 3 seasons.

Their window with this superstar is now. If Tyrese has a post-season anything like his almost 30-point, 7-assist, and 6-rebound playoffs last year, the 76ers are running out of excuses to not get over their ex and just commit, already.

There is a band I love that I discovered in college. They are called Billy Boy on Poison. They rocked. Hard. Seriously, their debut album, Drama Junkie Queen, was by most accounts a success and lent its single, "On My Way", to hit shows like Entourage and Gossip Girl.

But their Achilles heel? Chaos.

I love LaMelo. He may be my very own Billy Boy on Poison of the NBA. High energy, unexpected, breaking molds and expectations. Unfortunately, just like the band, chaos is both his superpower and his kryptonite.

As it stands, LaMelo is 10th in assists around the league this season. And in the past week, he's been genuinely sensational. He's third this past week in total PRA at 39, trailing only Deni Avdija and the King. He also hit a game-clinching layup on Miami to close out a 30-point, 10-assist play-in showcase of his undeniable talent.

But to be clear, chaos isn't always bad. LaMelo is a perfectly above-average 36% from behind the line, where a mind-boggling 10 of his 17 attempts a night take place. He also has a 2.5 TO/assist ratio — perfectly middle-of-the-road with his assist-leading PG peers like Cade Cunningham at 2.7, Stephon Castle at 2.3, and James Harden at 2.27.

The bigger chaotic question is whether LaMelo's on and off-court behavior is worth the high-energy chaotic success on the stat sheet. These are well-documented, so I encourage you to look into LaMelo's Hornets-Heat antics for yourself, or the dozens of driving-disaster takes on his four-wheeled Charlotte antics.

But for LaMelo, this postseason and a couple of show-stopping success flashes could be the difference between his fading light as a once high-octane superstar and a breath of new life into one of the most electric distributors in the game.

Paolo edges in at 18th this season in PRA (35.8) and is the 3rd of our trifecta of budget stat-stuffers alongside Deni and Wemby. His biggest challenge is that he's pretty good everywhere — averaging 22 points, 5 assists, and 8.4 rebounds — but not necessarily elite anywhere.

In the modern league, Paolo appears to have Jokić-style aspirations. And why not? That should be the goal of every offensive hub of a big in basketball today. But in the words of Meek Mill, "There are levels to this…". Right now, Paolo's competing at a level closer to Bam Adebayo, not the three-time MVP.

However, that gap is about to close, dramatically. Paolo will make $41M next year compared to Bam's $49M. And Paolo's stack only gets taller from there, as he'll make a whopping $54.45M in 2030.

So, all that said, this will be a first-impression post-season for Paolo's career. Rookie contracts are always less scrutinized. You're hoping to pay pennies for princes in those opening seasons. But this is the real test. He'll eat almost a third of Orlando's total cap next year (and the next year, and the next year, and the next year...).

I hope this sets the stage for what's at stake, but don't forget that Paolo in the postseason averages 28 points and 8.5 rebounds through his two campaigns. He was 6th and 15th, respectively, in those categories in last year's run.

As the next track will argue, the postseason is where the money is truly earned. And it just so happens to be the most important time for Paolo to really embody some Orlando "Magic".

It's one of the most wonderful times of the year, in my opinion. Playoff basketball. Win or go home. High stakes, low margin for error.

It's also LeBron season.

Look, the Lakers are hurting right now. Dončić and Reaves are both out without a clear timetable for return. That's MVP candidate and walking 30-burger Luka Dončić, and 23-5-5 most-improved candidate Austin Reaves. It's like if Mike Tyson had to fight without his hook and his uppercut. You've effectively defanged a lion.

We've watched weeks of "is LeBron too old to be LeBron anymore?" Heck, my own article a few weeks back called him "human" (LeBron, if you're reading this, first, I'm sorry for that. Second, we should totally hang out, right? Taco Tuesday? No?).

This mixtape has emphasized the importance, the opportunity, and the impact of great postseason campaigns. So if you're gonna make a mixtape, you have to include the guy with the most games played. The guy with the most points scored. The second most assists. The third most rebounds.

And to make things that much more exciting, we've talked about the top PRA guy in the last week in Deni. We talked about LaMelo, who's third. We even talked about Maxey (5th), Paolo (6th), and, briefly, Bam (7th).

LeBron, at 41 years of age, is 2nd.

Call it load management. Call it the time tax. Call it whatever you want. Just make sure you also call it what it is. It's LeBron-esque.

Only King James knows if this is his swan song to the NBA, his penultimate season, or just another chapter in one of the greatest sports stories ever written. But LeBron is still one of the NBA's chart toppers. He's been everything we've seen above. He's reinvented himself from a slashing bucket-getter to a distributing 3-point shooter. He's been the most exciting player on the hardwood and the smooth and steady pace-setter. He's scored 48 on a Pistons team 3 years removed from a title, and has maybe the most iconic defensive play in basketball history with "the block".

His regular season was unexpectedly human (there I go again. Sorry, LeBron...). For maybe the first time in his career, he didn't break into the top 20 in PRA this season. He taught a generation of sports fans what sciatica is, and appeared to pass the reins of the Lakers on to Luka Dončić.