Golden State Warriors are breaking basketball

This might be a bit off from the usual topics of C99P, but I thought a little diversity is a good thing.
Let's start with yesterday's news.

Remember when the Los Angeles Lakers signed LeBron James? That was adorable.

The Golden State Warriors responded to one of the most seismic moves the NBA has ever seen on Monday night by reminding the other 29 teams in the league they’re only nominally playing the same game. They pulled off the surprise of the summer: a one-year, $5.3 million bargain deal with free agent DeMarcus Cousins. Which means they now have five players from last year’s NBA All-Star Game on the same team that won last year’s championship, and the one the year before that, and probably next year’s, too.

Now it’s worth asking the question that echoed around the league as demoralized teams began to reckon with the depressing reality that the Warriors, who are coming off what is statistically the best four-year stretch in the history of professional basketball, might have gotten even better: Um, how?

boogieGSW1.png

Adding Cousins to an already dominant group is just flat out unfair, and also unprecedented.

On the surface, the Warriors’ lineup with Cousins on the floor would be overwhelming. Stephen Curry is a five-time all star and three-time scoring champ, earning back-to-back MVP awards in 2015 and 2016. Kevin Durant, the 2014 MVP, is a four-time scoring champ and an eight-time All-NBA team member. Draymond Green was the 2017 defensive player of the year and has been named to four All-Defense teams. Klay Thompson, the least decorated of the group, is a four-time all star and two-time All-NBA team member. When Cousins joins them on the court in 2018-19, Golden State will have five players who were All-Stars last season on the court together, which has not been done since the 1975-76 Boston Celtics did it with a lineup of Jo Jo White, Charlie Scott, Dave Cowens, Paul Silas and John Havlicek.

538 put it this way:

Golden State strengthened their grip on the NBA with another deal that turned the salary cap’s rules against their own underlying purpose. The Warriors proved once again that the most exciting time on the pro basketball calendar is during the summer free-agent frenzy — when no games are played, but the fate of the following season is sealed.

The thing is, the Warriors didn't cheat to get to this point.
Curry, Thompson, and Greene were all drafted by the Warriors, fair and square (as well as several bench players).
Key reserves like Livingston, and now Cousins, were picked up cheap as free agents after other teams were scared away for health reasons.
Undrafted free agents like Quinn Cook, and now Kendrick Nunn, were picked up after other teams passed over them.

In other words, the Warriors front office was simply better at finding talent than anyone else.
So why is everyone complaining?

The Warriors have broken basketball. Time for a new super-team

Though the Golden State Warriors play the game beautifully, their dominance could quickly become boring

If the games are boring, you can't blame the Warriors.
They are by far the most unselfish basketball team on the court, with players choosing the pass the ball to more wide-open teammates almost to a fault.
The love to play a rapid-fire, fast-break game that lends itself to excitement, while still playing some of the best defense in the league.

But the signature element of the Warriors game, the part where they truly broke basketball and caused every other team to change how they play the game, is their shooting.

On the other hand, the Warriors aren’t trying to get more balanced or plug holes here and there: They’re trying to break the game.1

The Warriors are betting on the belief that certain skills — if stacked beyond a certain, typically unattainable threshold — can disrupt the balance of a game so completely that instead of producing diminishing returns, they produce increasing ones.
...
Durant is a great NBA player from a lot of different angles, but what’s truly remarkable about the Warriors’ acquiring him is the extent to which it doubles down on the team’s greatest (or GOATest) strength: shooting the rock. They’ve added one of the game’s best shooters to what was already the best shooting team in NBA history — without sacrificing defense or all-around skill at his position. We’ve never seen this concentration of shooting talent on one team. Actually, we’ve never seen anything even close to it. There may be stumbles along the way, but this could also be something entirely new.

durant-1.png
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So what does this dominance look like?
In May, the Warriors broke a 60-year old record for winning margin in a playoff game.

In 2016, Curry set a record for most 3-pointers in a game.

In 2015, Thompson set a record for most points in a quarter.

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mhagle's picture

I enjoy watching basketball. It is so fast moving. Coping activity?

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Marilyn

"Make dirt, not war." eyo

37 pt. quarter has never been approached (even by Wilt). Cousins looked ill on the Sac bench in that clip. So if you can't beat 'em, join 'em.
I was sad to see West leave, but you have to love his replacement.
The main thing about the W's is the joy they play with. Steve Kerr brought that. He reminds me of John Wooden. Enjoy the W's, it can't last forever but while it does, it shows what teamwork is all about.
I really need something to smile about these days.

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chuck utzman

TULSI 2020

@chuckutzman

His 37 pt. quarter has never been approached

I've watched that video several times.

Curry and Durant are more consistent, but only Klay can get white hot.

However, only Curry can do this

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Just to give the Warriors a little competition.

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Beware the bullshit factories.

@Timmethy2.0
Their young guys are good already. They should win the East next year.

Houston "just" needs a talented big guy.

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snoopydawg's picture

@Timmethy2.0

he is going to be paying in California. I'd think that anyone being paid $154 million a year to play a sport can afford to pay his taxes and lucky to have that opportunity to do so. Very few people get the chance to make the obscene amounts of money they get paid.

Phil Mikkleson used to be one of my favorite golfers until he moved from California because of his taxes. You should just appreciate that you get to make that amount of money in the first place, but maybe that's just my opinion.

I wasn't at all upset when Tiger fell from grace. His unsportsmanlike behavior on the course effected the game when newer players thought that throwing ones club after a bad shot was acceptable. It's not.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

Pricknick's picture

how long before they demand a new court as the oracle arena is the oldest venue in the nba.
Bend over taxpayers.
How I hate professional sports.

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Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.

@Pricknick
on the San Francisco waterfront thereby exchanging their diverse Oakland, local working class fan base for a fan base of male techies in their twenties who have no clue about anything that has made SF unique.

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Beware the bullshit factories.

@Timmethy2.0
It's just down the street from where I work.

To be fair, working-class people haven't been able to afford Warrior tickets for years.

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Pricknick's picture

@gjohnsit
That is the reason I dislike professional sports franchises.
The laborers that make the venue run couldn't afford to attend the event unless they worked there.
Meanwhile, some who work for a very few hours per day can afford anything they want.

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Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.

@gjohnsit

To be fair, working-class people haven't been able to afford Warrior tickets for years.

But at least they played in a poor, working-class part of Oakland and represented that area well. Now they're moving to an area that represents the worst of gentrification. I believe that part of San Francisco used to be very working-class and poor. Now it's a lot richer and more sterile and souless.

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Amanda Matthews's picture

of all this?

Maybe Lebron’s going to LA will shut LaMar’s open trap about Lonzo and how ‘special’ he is.

LaVar Ball Claims Lonzo Ball Is Lakers Leader Even With LeBron James

“Everybody got made when I said yes, bring LA-Bron, that’s what I call him because he’s coming. [Ball] makes everybody better. That’s what his job is. That’s what he does. That’s his characteristic. Brandon Ingram, best time he ever had in his life. Julius Randle, been here for a while, best time he ever played. What’s the key element? They brought that Ball boy in. And then they say, ‘It’s LeBron’s team.’ No, this is Lonzo’s team. He’s coming over here. We ain’t going to Cleveland.”

Despite what LaVar says, it would be difficult for the Lakers to truly be considered “Lonzo’s team” with James in town.

https://www.lakersnation.com/lavar-ball-says-lonzo-ball-still-team-leade...

The Lakers - working and spending their damn hardest to be the best team that money can buy.

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I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks

Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa

Something (I'm going to get the exact numbers wrong) like 58 of the last 72 NBA championships have been won by 5 teams, usually in blocks, the most famous being the Celtics (9 in 10 years) the Bulls (5 in a row - except for MJ's baseball vacation)and the Warriors. The only decade that didn't feature a "dynasty" was the 70s, and the game almost died, only being "saved by Magic and Bird". His premise was that people liked to complain about dynasties, but that complaining was only part of their enjoyment. People prefer seemingly invincible winners/heros/villains. (se also the Yankees, the Braves, the Cowboys, the Patriots, the 70s Steelers, the Big Red Machine, the Swinging A's)
I would like to add that those dynasty teams have to have at least some legitimate opposition to be good for the game, but I'm really not that sure of that.

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On to Biden since 1973

snoopydawg's picture

@doh1304

and yet they would put together a great team year after year before players would leave for more money.

I used to take BART for $5 and then buy a $5 ticket to sit in the bleachers behind right field. Those were the years that they made the playoffs, but what was exciting was seeing the bigger teams like the Yankees and others. I was at the SF ballpark when Tony Gwinn had his last at bat before he retired. And if I couldn't afford to buy a ticket I could watch the game from the back. This is Cruz who dropped a fly ball during the World Series in the 9th inning. His mistake set up the winning run for the other team who went on to win the series!

IMG_2325.JPG

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jobu's picture

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9zBndgbHKs]

The GS Warriors have done right by the greater global basketball community for what they did for the small basketball crazed country of Lithuania. They hosted the premier of the indie film The Other Dream Team.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmFDMsd0xJg]

Basketball is broken at the youth level

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Bollox Ref's picture

provides unending possibilities over 5 days.

Lovely stuff.

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Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.

Cassiodorus's picture

in the Sixties? Oh that's right -- it was nine.

https://www.nba.com/celtics/history/championships

But anyway, since you were saying...

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

Song of the lark's picture

Swish.

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Big Al's picture

runaway neoliberal capitalism. I don't think people are really looking at what's happening. I hear the progressive left complain about bank and corporate CEO salaries, but all but a very few pale in comparison to what the top NBA, NFL, and MLB players are making now. As I've said before, Michael Jordan is a billionaire and he did it because of basketball and the endorsements. Lebron James, Durant, Curry, Irving, the list is long now of future billionaire NBA players. Pretty much ALL top players coming into the league now are charted for billionaire status. It is an accepted and sought after goal for every new star entering the league.

As an aside, I was invited as a free agent to Golden State in 1979, made the summer league team and almost made the team. I ended up getting hurt and having to drop out of the summer league, then went over to Europe and played five years. Back then they didn't have the D league and for most it was a one and done thing if you didn't make it initially.

So I'm quite familiar with basketball, have loved the game since I was a kid and I was good enough to be a professional. But the money involved now is absolutely ridiculous. The thing that separates sports from say, the movie industry and top actors who also "make" obscene amounts of money is the pro sports highlight their salaries as part of the overall package.

That's why I'm Big Al, I'm tall, not fat.

Boycotting pro sports should absolutely be at the top of the list in the class war. The advantage is we'd be targeting people who for the most part were not silver spooners with a large minority segment that could be used to highlight the extreme wealth inequality that directly contributes to the poverty and lack of opportunities of minority population, especially the black population.

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Big Al's picture

@Big Al adding Cousins doesn't necessarily mean they'll get better. Remember when Karl Malone and Gary Payton joined Shaq and Kobe on the Lakers. Bust, after the Kobe and Shaq had won 3 titles together. There's only one ball and Cousins is a high usage player, not to mention volatile. Hard to see how one ball is going to suffice.

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@Big Al

There's only one ball and Cousins is a high usage player, not to mention volatile. Hard to see how one ball is going to suffice.

They will deal with Cousins the same way they dealt with all the other centers on the rosters.
He's going to sit a lot more than he's been used to.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Big Al I have a hard time making the few people who manage to get into the 1% from the bottom ranks of society my preferred targets, especially since I know that they don't actually have the power in this equation. However much money they make, it's piss in a pot compared to what the owners have, and it's the owners who control what happens. Apparently in the case of Golden State, it's some Randian Silicon Valley sonofabitch.

That said, yes, of course, we should all boycott sports, not because LeBron James is a multimillionaire, but because it's an increasingly fake competition which increasingly amounts to a bunch of rich fat cats playing with themselves for TV dollars.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Big Al's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal don't forget Jordon and Magic Johnson are owners. There's Jeter in baseball and many current players have their sites set on club ownership. The same type of generational advantages are taking place in sports as in the rest of the one percent as well.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Big Al yeah, and when they become owners, they become what I'm talking about. There could be a way to own teams that would have a different outcome, and occasionally I think LeBron James has a good idea about player takeover of the NBA with a different aim than "I climbed to the top and I'm an owner now;" sometimes I think he has the idea of a more democratic, or at least republican (small r) situation where the players collectively own the league. I don't know if that's really in his mind, and I know even less whether he will be able to pull that off, if he is contemplating it. My guess would be no. The 1% won't allow any of their infrastructure to be run in a way counter to their ideology. Anything that makes billions of dollars must be run in the manner the oligarchs wish.

But yeah, Jordan is a profoundly selfish individual who is only distinguishable from the rest of the 1% in that he knows what it is to suffer racism, and most of them don't. That difference won't make him act any differently, though.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal @Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal
That's from where the money ultimately comes.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFrag8ll85w]

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Timmethy2.0 I am all for the Green Bay Packers model, but you can bet that no group of current owners is going to allow that to ever happen again. The NFL sure as hell won't.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

@Big Al @Big Al
A relative of mine is an architect who participated in a group designed to encourage at risk kids to have good life goals. When the kids were asked what they want to do as adults, almost all the males said they wanted to be NBA players, regardless of their height. I guess that's why NBA players are so good, but it is tragic since almost all these kids will have to figure something else out.

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detroitmechworks's picture

@Timmethy2.0 always seems to be our obsession with being a winner.

Americans have never believed that it's "All about how you play the game."

I vastly prefer the Judo philosophy on this one.

"It's not about whether you win or lose, it's whether you learned something and did better than yesterday."

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

GreyWolf's picture

@Big Al the NBA & NFL are the most socialist businesses around (because of their unions).

Under the current labor deal, NBA players get roughly half of all league revenue before expenses. ... There are mechanisms in place to ensure that players get their share of basketball-related income guaranteed to them under the collective bargaining agreement.

The NFL revenue split is more complex ... But the upshot is that NFL players are collectively guaranteed just under half of league revenues.

Why NBA players get paid so much more than NFL stars

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@GreyWolf
Owned by the fans.

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GreyWolf's picture

@Timmethy2.0 That is halfway to socialism, in which the workers would get all profits.

In every other industry the workers get 0% of the profits, with the odd exception here and there (i.e. Nucor Steel, worker-cooperatives...)

Edit: Obviously the team owners recognize that the "workers" produce the profits.

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@GreyWolf

But the WORKERS get 50% of the profits

Health care consumers, credit consumers, oil consumers, ISP consumers, Utility consumers, news consumers etc.... We have huge untapped power that can break even the Kochs but we just got to stop letting them divide us and come together and use it.

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Big Al's picture

@GreyWolf global capitalism and why the salaries and wealth keep skyrocketing at the 1% and above levels. What I've seen is pro sports is a barometer of sorts in that as the salaries increase they also are increasing with the rest of the one percent. In the case of pro sports, the athletes are the product. I don't think a socialist system where the means of producing and distributing goods is owned collectively should be compared to a system where people are now "earning" over 100 million per year. Unless you believe it's fine to have people being paid that much money to play a sport, act in a movie or run a bank.

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Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

It is the lack of competition and uncertainty, without which sports is pointless. The NFL already went down this road, albeit with a great deal more corruption, propping up their chosen team like Vince McMahon pushing Hulk Hogan, with just as much prearrangement. The lowest point was the Patriots/Seahawks Superbowl, though the outright cheating the Patriots were caught at twice and the obvious favoritism given them over many seasons by the refs were bad enough.

The NBA is not corrupt like the NFL. I hope it never is. But it's already replicating the same story that we get everywhere else: a few people get everything, the rest can't possibly compete, the outcome is already known. Sports becomes pointless under those conditions.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Cassiodorus's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal You don't really need to watch the games anymore. All you need to do is watch videos like this one:

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Cassiodorus @Cassiodorus Right. I don't mind exhibition games--hell, I used to watch pro wrestling, which used to be, essentially, an exhibition sport. But I object to a whole league that pretends that it's really competing when it ain't.

It may seem odd, my having said that, that I used to be a pro wrestling fan, but I see pro wrestling as a fiction the fans willingly enter into, not something on the level of the Chicago Black Sox. The wrestling feds weren't really screwing over the fans by promoting a fiction, any more than carnies are. I know that people say wrestling fans used to believe the fights were real, but I bet a lot of them were simply willingly suspending their disbelief and entering into the spirit of the thing. It would be hard to believe that guys could beat each other up night after night for real, nearly 365 days a year, and keep coming back for more. The whole reason the fakery of wrestling started was that you can't have real fights that frequently. You gotta have guys able to come back. Anybody who thought about it for two seconds would have to realize that.

Anyway, wrestling was interesting even though fictional, because I didn't always know what they were going to do next--unlike the way basketball is now. The NFL had reached the same place of no uncertainty that basketball has, until last year, when they apparently figured out that they were wrecking their product with their endless promotion of the Patriots, and turned themselves from a crappy prearranged wrestling fed to a better, more entertaining wrestling fed. But unfortunately for them, they made that move too late, after there had been many, many tells indicating the fraudulence of their business practices. By the time the owners started saying "Oh, shit, we're actually losing people, and pretty soon we won't be able to blame it on Colin Kaepernick and Black Lives Matter," I had already left forever. There are some bridges you just can't rebuild once they're burned.

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"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver