The West is currently 14 teams deep. How is that possible?
I think the west has one truly standout team and the rest of the truly elite teams are in the east. While the average west team is probably pacers w/ oladipo or maybe 76ers level. Which is above average in the east.The West will be better than the East for a long time. The problem is that the West is so good that teams that would be fighting for the 8th seed in the East get top 5 picks because of how strong the conference is.
This creates a talent disparity that will take a long time to fix.