Obviously there are a lot of moves to happen still, including possible Beal and Harden trades. Without accounting for those, I would say my early predictions for bottom 5 (unordered):
1. OKC - I think the above comments cover it pretty well. This roster is SGA, spare parts, and a ton of draft picks. They are tanking hard this year.
2. Detroit - After the draft, I thought they could at least compete for the 8 seed with a healthy Blake and an extended Christian Wood. Of course, they proceeded to then sign a million centers and assemble a dinosaur era team. Blake is still a great player when healthy, top 15 in the league IMO, but he cannot drag this awful roster to the playoffs
3. NYK - Their roster is pretty barren. The spacing is pretty bad and all their intriguing talent is young. This team is not built to win games right now. I am not sure this team is even built to develop their young talent. I have no idea what they plan to do but winning sure isn't it.
4. NO - Agree with the above. Their spacing is awful. The Adams pickup (and especially extension) are very confusing. BI is an all-star talent but beyond him, JJ, and Hart, I am leaving every other shooter wide open from 3. Zion is still a bit of a mystery. Is he coming back as Duke Zion, January Zion, or bubble Zion? If they get Duke Zion then this prediction looks dumb and they will be in the hunt for one of the play-in spots. Bubble Zion and this might be the worst offense in the league.
5. Cavs - We have a lot of interesting young talent and a few solid vets who aren't good enough to win a lot of games on their own. I think we will be fun to watch, lose a lot of games, and hopefully tank our way to a really good pick. Gilbert loses nothing tanking this year since there are no fans anyway. Might as well maximize development time for the young guys and try to shine our older dudes to trade (Drummond, Love, Exum?).
I would say beyond these 5, Cha, Was, Hou and Minny are the teams to watch. Cha should be better than all the above bc of Hayward+Lamelo alone, but who knows. Washington is really dependent on what they get back in Wall. If he is 80% of pre-injury Wall, they are a low playoff seed team. If not, and especially if Beal is traded, this is a bottom 5 team.
Ditto for Houston and Harden being traded. Russ is great but this isn't 2017. He won't get you to the playoffs anymore. Minny I think has been covered above. They feel so boom or bust. That team can easily be a top 10 offense, bottom 5 defense. They could be competing for a play-in spot or in the dumpster with the other guys.