With the 2010 NBA season kicking off tonight, we wanted to see which teams were most popular heading into the season. Each week ESPN publishes its NBA Power Rankings, which ranks teams based on overall performance. We thought it would be interesting to create a popularity ranking based on how much the teams were being talked about online.

We measured overall buzz for each NBA team throughout the last month. The table below lists ESPN Power Ranking and our Social Radar Buzz Ranking side-by-side for comparison:

Not surprisingly, the Miami Heat are the most talked about team after acquiring LeBron James and Chris Bosh this summer. The Cavs are also one of the most highly talked about teams, although they are one of the worst rated teams in ESPN’s ranking.

Interestingly, one of ESPN’s best teams, the Oklahoma City Thunder — picked by some, including Bill Simmons, to reach the NBA Finals — are ranked 20th in online chatter. Should the NBA be concerned that MVP candidate Kevin Durant and one of the its best teams is in a small market generating little chatter online? If the Thunder reach the Finals, how will television ratings be effected?

One of the biggest story lines of the summer was LeBron James’ decision to leave Cleveland and join the Miami Heat. Yesterday, Nike unveiled a new 90-second advertisement addressing the decision in an attempt to rehabilitate James’ image.

We ran sentiment on LeBron James in August after his announcement and found that while James’ chatter online was consistently near 80% positive throughout the 2009 NBA season, negative chatter equalled positive chatter for the first time after his announcement. In the weeks since, positive chatter around LeBron online did spike sporadically, but as Heat prepare to tip off the season tonight in Boston, LeBron’s sentiment is about 50% positive and 50% negative.

Should be an interesting NBA season to say the least.

After announcing his “Decision” to join the Miami Heat on July 8, 2010 in a much maligned hour-long ESPN spectacle, many have speculated that LeBron James went from one of the most loved to the most hated NBA players overnight.

James faced further criticism last week after taking out a full-page newspaper ad in the Akron Beacon Journal thanking his hometown of Akron, but not mentioning Cleveland, where he played basketball for seven years.

We decided to run a sentiment chart on LeBron James to compare positive and negative sentiment over the course of 2010. After being consistently near 80% positive throughout the NBA season, negative chatter is about to overcome positive chatter for the first time. Will the trend continue once the season starts? If so, how will James react to being a villain this season after being a hero most of his career?