2024 NBA playoffs - The four trends that have defined the field so far - ESPN

Nearly three weeks into the NBA playoffs, things are taking shape — but not as we expected.

The defending champion Denver Nuggets find themselves on the ropes after losing the first two games of their series with the Minnesota Timberwolves in Denver, while the Timberwolves — who hadn't won a playoff series since 2004 — have been the most impressive team in the playoffs, sweeping the Phoenix Suns in Round 1.

Out East, the Boston Celtics have yet to be tested in a blowout-laden 4-1 series with the Miami Heat and a dominant Game 1 win against the Cleveland Cavaliers, leaving all eyes on an Eastern Conference throwback series between the Indiana Pacers and New York Knicks for a spot in the conference finals.

After two games apiece, we looked at the early statistical outliers to see what was real (scoring being down) and what was not (Pascal Siakam as the playoffs' leading scorer). Now that we've seen at least five games from each team, it's time to revisit the biggest trends of the playoffs thus far and what we can learn from them.

Here are four of the biggest trends, starting with Minnesota's Anthony Edwards making the leap at age 22.

When ESPN's Neil Paine ranked the best players of the first round using advanced stats, Edwards finished second behind three-time MVP Nikola Jokic, but that was before Edwards' Timberwolves took the first two games of their series against Jokic's Nuggets in impressive fashion.

Add in the tendency for many all-in-one stats to favor big men over perimeter players and no one has been close to Edwards' value thus far. His 1.7 wins above replacement by my WARP metric are 26% above the next-highest total — Kyrie Irving of the Dallas Mavericks, who benefited from playing an extra game.

Although