Would it be better to finish 7th in West? (Avoiding Lakers, Clippers to play with Suns)

Like most Mavs fans, I have been looking at the standings closely for the last 2 months. Intuitively, everyone likes to finish at a higher seed and avoid play-in games. How about the first-round matchup? It's not the same to play against PHX and LAL.

When you look at the standings and potential matchups, it'd be better to avoid 3-4-5-6 seeds to not have a first-round matchup against the Lakers or Clippers. Especially after the Lakers' injuries, Jazz-Suns looks destined to finish at the top 2 in the West. The Clippers would probably be 3rd or 4th seed. The Lakers look bad for now but they'll recover after AD-Lebron returns. So overall, I don't think they'll drop the 7th. Lakers to finish 5th would not surprise me.

1- Jazz 2- Suns 3- Clippers 4-Denver 5-Lakers

If the 1-5 standings are like that, I'd not want to be 6th to play with the Clippers at 1st round. Just be 7th, play a single game with Spurs, then Suns sounds easier than going against Kawhi-PG again.

Even if Dallas somehow climbs to 3rd seed, we can still have 6th seed Lakers to deal with. Who would you prefer to play against in the 1st round of playoffs?