NBA Training Camp 2016: Notable Position Battles to Keep an Eye On

Opening night for the 2016-17 NBA season is less than an eternity away, which means training camps will be ready for business in (slightly) less than a lifetime. That means we can already address the elephants in certain locker rooms around the league.

Some teams have their preseason playing-time battles all figured out. Their rotation is set, and every player knows his role. Other squads aren't so lucky. They need time to answer questions and experiment with different lineup solutions. 

The most pressing training-camp battles usually don't entail one fringe player trying to seize a roster spot from another, but rather two or more talents on guaranteed contracts jostling for a starting slot or a specific spot in the rotation.

These are the kinds of head-to-head, intra-squad matchups we'll soon be watching—the ones that significantly impact how a team intends to play.

Not every spot in the Denver Nuggets rotation is up for grabs. But there are a ton of questions that arise on their 15-man depth chart, in all its overcrowded-in-a-good-but-kind-of-bad-way glory:

This loosely interpreted depth chart gives a sense for the Nuggets' pecking order, but there's also a chance we know nothing beyond Emmanuel Mudiay's starting spot being safe.

Do the Nuggets view rookie Jamal Murray as more of a point guard or swingman? Will the combination of him and fellow newbie Malik Beasley eat into the playing time of Will Barton and/or Gary Harris? 

Does Kenneth Faried begin the season as the starting power forward? Do the Nuggets move him to the bench and slot Danilo Gallinari at the 4 to make room for their glut of wings? Can Joffrey Lauvergne beat out Jusuf Nurkic for minutes as a backup 5?

Will JaKarr Sampson (non-guaranteed) make the roster? Or will he be ditched in favor of supposed draft-and-stash prospect Juancho Hernangomez, whom Denver is smitten with and may want to keep stateside, according to Altitude TV's Vic Lombardi.

Life's book of cliches identifies these as good problems to have, but this laundry list of questions and unknowns won't help head coach Mike Malone sleep any easier at night—you know, unless he's an avid fan of chaos.

With Miami Heat president Pat Riley guaranteeing Justise Winslow will start at small forward next season, per the Palm Beach Post's Anthony Chiang, all attention shifts toward the shooting guard void Dwyane Wade left.

Josh Richardson seems like a logical replacement at 6'6", but the 6'4" Tyler Johnson has to be in play. Most of his career minutes have come at the 2, and he's being paid starter money after signing a four-year, $50 million deal. Miami, though, appears to view Johnson as a point guard.

As Johnson said of his summer workouts, per the Miami Herald's Manny Navarro, “All the drills we're doing this year are kind of skewed toward being a point guard. So it's definitely going to be an important development to continue to get better."

Johnson and Richardson will be competing for minutes even if the former is groomed as a floor general. Goran Dragic is the $90 million man and set to receive the lion's share of the backcourt ticks, so the Heat must figure out whether they're more intrigued by a traditional union, with Johnson at the 2, or a dual-point guard pairing that sticks Johnson beside Dragic.

That process won't be easy. Johnson and Richardson are both above-average shooters, and neither separates himself from the other on defense. The former is the better playmaker and more turnover-prone; the latter drilled 46.1 percent of his threebies as a rookie but attempted just 115 and shot a lower percentage on two-pointers.

This isn't a battle that will be settled in training camp. The Heat, in all honesty, might look to play Johnson and Richardson together most of the time, as part of some space-crazed lineup that keeps Dragic at point guard and pushes Winslow to power forward.

Shoutout to John Henson for rocking the reindeer antlers in the only picture we could find that includes him along with Greg Monroe and Miles Plumlee. Secondly, the Milwaukee Bucks are weird.

"It seems like John Henson may never get his chance," Behind The Buck Pass' Adam Coffman wrote. "The list of players who have started at center for the Milwaukee Bucks during his tenure with the team is extensive, including Larry Sanders, Zaza Pachulia and Greg Monroe, and it appears as if Miles Plumlee may soon be added to that list."

Plumlee's four-year, $50 million contract is the real smack in the face here. Yes, the new salary-cap climate and yada, yada, yada. But Monroe (starry signing), Pachulia (seasoned vet) and Sanders (in Milwaukee first) all superseded Henson in an obvious way. Plumlee does not, and he received the starting nod during the middle of last season when head coach Jason Kidd (temporarily) moved Monroe to the bench.

Henson did miss 25 games amid back injuries and logged more minutes in fewer appearances than Plumlee, so there's that to consider. Either way, it's tough to get a read on what the Bucks are doing up front. They pay Plumlee substantial money, habitually underuse Henson and were shopping Monroe as recently as late July, per ESPN.com's Marc Stein. 

If this were purely a best-fit situation, Henson would be the alpha at center. He is a better pick-and-roll slasher, a superior rim protector and the only one of the three to find success with Giannis Antetokounmpo, Michael Carter-Williams, Khris Middleton and Jabari Parker:

Sample size, schmample pies. Henson seems like the clear choice. But if the Bucks have proved anything over the last few years, it's that their center rotation is etched in sand.

Nothing is a given for New Orleans Pelicans rookie Buddy Hield. Being selected sixth overall carries a certain cachet, but it doesn't, in this instance, guarantee playing time, let alone a starting spot.

The push for minutes in New Orleans' backcourt is not limited to any two players. There will be plenty of starting hopefuls trying to capitalize on the team's limbo, as The Bird Writes' David Fisher mapped out:

E'Twaun Moore and Langston Galloway, each acquired in free agency, will push for playing time at either guard spot. Quincy Pondexter could also be looking for minutes at the 2 thanks to the arrival of Solomon Hill at small forward. If his knees cooperate,Tyreke Evans may also push for time. Even Jrue Holiday could log minutes at the 2 position in lineups alongside Tim Frazier.

Moore figures to be Hield's most direct competition. Evans won't be available to start the season, per ESPN.com's Justin Verrier, and with neither Frazier nor Galloway standing taller than 6'2", the Pelicans aren't optimally sized for double-headed point guard lineups.

Hield and Moore are eerily similar in size (6'4") and function. The former enters as the more celebrated shooter, but the latter drilled 45.2 percent of his 104 three-point attempts last season after carving out a consistent role with the Chicago Bulls. 

Both can play on-ball as a primary playmaker or circle the three-point arc, awaiting kick-outs from Anthony Davis or Jrue Holiday. Moore's perimeter closeouts need work, but he harassed the hell out of players for a full 94 feet and assumed defensive assignments that would have made Derrick Rose cringe.

But Moore's defensive edge is not so much that he'll deserve an unconditional nod over Hield. He isn't built to guard longer swingmen and didn't see enough time in isolation last year (15 possessions) to offer any insight into his one-on-one chops. 

New Orleans' decision will most likely come down to a matter of preference: Is the team interested in baptizing Hield by fire as a starter, or will Moore's experience trump his running mate's long-term ceiling?

After failing to make any big offseason trades, the Philadelphia 76ers are left touting three high-end frontcourt prospects: Nerlens Noel, Jahlil Okafor and Joel Embiid, the latter of whom is, as head coach Brett Brown told ESPN.com's Zach Lowe, on track to make his NBA debut sometime during the preseason.

For most teams, this would be a problematic trio. For the Sixers, it's a migraine wrapped in a cluster headache cloaked in the the worst Sunday morning hangover of all time.

Not one of Embiid, Okafor and Noel is ideally fit to play power forward. The Noel-Okafor frontcourt pairing from last season was a spacing nightmare, and while Embiid might have the jumper to survive at the 4, his best defensive sets will come against 5s.

Playing any of these bigs out of position forces Ben Simmons and Dario Saric to spend more time at small forward, which in turn gobbles up minutes otherwise dedicated to the combination of Robert Covington, Jerami Grant and Hollis Thompson.

There is no way around this personnel jumble without making a trade. And the Sixers shouldn't sell low just for the sake of selling at all. They don't yet know what they have in Embiid, which keeps them in a holding pattern if prospective trade offers for Okafor and Noel aren't up to snuff. 

Philadelphia must still find a way to tap the full potential of its roster, leaving room for lineups that surround one big with Simmons or Saric and three other shooters. For that to happen, a clear-cut frontcourt hierarchy that prioritizes the importance and playing time of one big over the others must be established—preferably before the season starts.

Dragan Bender and Marquese Chriss will forever be tethered—they are two bigs who were selected in the same draft, within four picks of each other, and ended up on the same team, vying for the same minutes.

Their story isn't one that will end in mutually beneficial gains either, at least not next season. The Phoenix Suns, although rebuilding, aren't blessed with multiple frontcourt openings—not even for two teenagers who should be able to soak up time at power forward and/or center.

Tyson Chandler and Alex Len have the 5 on lock. With Eric Bledsoe, Brandon Knight and Devin Booker all healthy, minutes at the 4 are reserved for more rangy wing types—Jared Dudley, T.J. Warren, even P.J. Tucker.

Every team could use a solid third big off the bench, and there will be times when the Suns pine for size over mobility at power forward to offset inches given up on the perimeter. But that suggests there is room for only one of Bender or Chriss in the everyday rotation.

Who will it be? The sweet-shooting, playmaking-able, nimble-footed Bender who fits the bill for this era's stretch 5 movement? Or the 6'9", above-the-rim Chriss, who already projects as Phoenix's best shot-blocker?

These are the exact types of questions training camps exist to answer.

Evan Turner didn't sign up for this. Or maybe he did. It's not entirely clear what type of role he was promised upon striking a four-year, $70 million deal with the Portland Trail Blazers. As Joe Freeman of the Oregonian wrote:

President of Basketball Operations Neil Olshey and coach Terry Stotts sold him on the players-first mantra of the organization, the culture of the locker room and his fit in Stotts' free-flowing, team-first system.

Turner, a 6-foot-7 small forward/shooting guard, said he was told he will be given the chance to start at small forward, alongside franchise cornerstones Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum, and will also take over some of the ball-handling responsibilities in the second unit.

It sounds as if the Blazers left Turner's actual role, as a starter or reserve, in flux—a smart move, since they eventually re-signed Maurice Harkless, who finished last year in the starting lineup, to a four-year, $42 million pact. 

Follow the money and Turner still seems like the smart bet to unseat Harkless. He is a lateral move at worst defensively, and the Blazers can use him as the primary ball-handler while running Lillard and McCollum off screens.

Portland also shelled out four years and $74.8 million to retain Allen Crabbe, a presumptive reserve, and cannot possibly stash two of their three highest-paid players on the bench (can they?).

Still, continuity is king in the NBA. The Blazers have the opportunity to stick with the starting five that finished out last season: Al-Farouq Aminu, Harkless, Lillard, McCollum and Mason Plumlee—a group that posted the sixth-best net rating (plus-14.4) among the 50-plus lineups in the league that logged more than 250 total minutes.

Breaking up that band won't be easy. Crabbe, Ed Davis, Meyers Leonard and Turner make for a tantalizing defensive amalgam off the pine, and Portland wouldn't have to introduce a potentially extensive learning curve into its starting five. 

Then again, the Blazers aren't paying Turner $70 million to play it safe. Their eyes are fixated on an immediate leap, which will, at minimum, make the Harkless-or-Turner debate one of the NBA's most pivotal preseason issues.

Stats courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com and NBA.com unless otherwise cited.

Dan Favale covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter, @danfavale.