OKC best team last season?

[Twinkie defense]

I remember thinking after the OKC series that I couldn't believe the Warriors won that thing. OKC was a beast during the playoffs... Completely different team than they were in the regular season. What's weird is I felt the Warriors totally blew the series vs the Cavs...on the other hand, I'm still surprised they beat OKC. OKC was an awful matchup. It took a total Hail Mary game from Klay in game 6 to win that series.

I completely agree.

I think the Warriors success totally changed how other teams were plying last season - positionless basketball, switching everything on defense. When other teams gave the Warriors a dose of their own medicine - and of course not everyone has the personnel to do that - they caused the Warriors offense problems. OKC was the prime example here - Steph was obviously a little less mobile (no excuse, every team has injuries), but the fact that Adams was able to effectively switch out on Curry on the perimeter was huge.

For the Cavs, losing Kevin Love helped - he can't switch on anyone. Cavs went all in on trapping Steph and Klay - and Tristan Thompson was also huge - and atypically, nobody else on the Warriors roster was able to hit their open shots. Warriors had great shots vs. Cavs. It's not that Cleveland is suddenly some great defensive team - they're not (especially with Kyrie and Love in the starting lineup) - it's that the Cavs put all their defensive marbles on Steph and Klay, and everyone else was gripping: Barnes, Festus, Andy, Bogut were horrible. (In fact how defenses changed last season is one reason why Bogut and Festus have been diminished - they play a game that no longer exists.) Draymond was out one game. Iggy's back was locked up.

Ar the end of the day, winning is what matters. Can't take that away. Warriors have no excuses - but both they and OKC are better than the Cavs, both teams just gripped when it counted.




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[DAWill1128]

The Warriors didn't really choke the series, it just evolved due to unfortunate circumstances. We had the perfect roster to continue winning, Igoudola as the on ball defender for LeBron, Draymond as the main help defender, and Bogut as the back line rim protector. The Cavs were never gonna win the series with the layers of defense we had. But of course LeBron crotches Draymond into a suspension, that would get anyone fired up. Bogut gets injured, and Igoudolas back gives out so he can't even bend the slightest bit. All of a sudden you go from an amazing on ball defender and rim protector to just draymond as a help defender. It just turned from a very favorable matchup to a situation where it would be tough to beat any good team. If your on ball defender can't get in a stance and your rim protector is out then it's just easy lobs and a collapsing defense getting grilled on open 3's. Crazy enough the Warriors still would have won if they just subbed someone in for Barnes. Barnes shot the ball so horrendously that Irving was just hedging off as a free safety help defender, disrupting any attacks.

I don't know if Okc was better then the Cavs, but I get what Igoudola is saying. It took some insane outside shooting to beat Okc, took some very unfortunate circumstances to end up a shot away from beating the Cavs.

[turk3d]

The Warriors didn't really choke the series, it just evolved due to unfortunate circumstances. We had the perfect roster to continue winning, Igoudola as the on ball defender for LeBron, Draymond as the main help defender, and Bogut as the back line rim protector. The Cavs were never gonna win the series with the layers of defense we had. But of course LeBron crotches Draymond into a suspension, that would get anyone fired up. Bogut gets injured, and Igoudolas back gives out so he can't even bend the slightest bit. All of a sudden you go from an amazing on ball defender and rim protector to just draymond as a help defender. It just turned from a very favorable matchup to a situation where it would be tough to beat any good team. If your on ball defender can't get in a stance and your rim protector is out then it's just easy lobs and a collapsing defense getting grilled on open 3's. Crazy enough the Warriors still would have won if they just subbed someone in for Barnes. Barnes shot the ball so horrendously that Irving was just hedging off as a free safety help defender, disrupting any attacks.

I don't know if Okc was better then the Cavs, but I get what Igoudola is saying. It took some insane outside shooting to beat Okc, took some very unfortunate circumstances to end up a shot away from beating the Cavs.

I think you're essentiially right, the only thing I'd add is that our shooting was horrendous from the 5th game on. That was the first time that happened all season. Througout the season, Steph and Klay would have a bad shooting night (usually not both) but during this series, was bad throughout. Couple that with no help from Iggy, Livingston, Barnes and Ezeli, and the task just became insurmountable. Credit also has to be given to Cleveland for excelolent game planning and very good defense. And still with it all, we barely lost (which says how good this team actually was).

[GQ Hot Dog]

I stand by my consistent assessment that beating OKC took so much out of the Warriors that they couldn't muster enough to win Game 6 or 7 in the Finals. If we had Dray for Game 5 we win that one and the conversation is entirely different. We would also be paying Barnes 4yrs/$95mil at this point and that alone could have derailed our team's chemistry. As it is, we're in a better position now than had we beat the Cavs. It's super easy to look on the bright side of things.

[GQ Hot Dog]

The Warriors didn't really choke the series, it just evolved due to unfortunate circumstances. We had the perfect roster to continue winning, Igoudola as the on ball defender for LeBron, Draymond as the main help defender, and Bogut as the back line rim protector. The Cavs were never gonna win the series with the layers of defense we had. But of course LeBron crotches Draymond into a suspension, that would get anyone fired up. Bogut gets injured, and Igoudolas back gives out so he can't even bend the slightest bit. All of a sudden you go from an amazing on ball defender and rim protector to just draymond as a help defender. It just turned from a very favorable matchup to a situation where it would be tough to beat any good team. If your on ball defender can't get in a stance and your rim protector is out then it's just easy lobs and a collapsing defense getting grilled on open 3's. Crazy enough the Warriors still would have won if they just subbed someone in for Barnes. Barnes shot the ball so horrendously that Irving was just hedging off as a free safety help defender, disrupting any attacks.

I don't know if Okc was better then the Cavs, but I get what Igoudola is saying. It took some insane outside shooting to beat Okc, took some very unfortunate circumstances to end up a shot away from beating the Cavs.

I think you're essentiially right, the only thing I'd add is that our shooting was horrendous from the 5th game on. That was the first time that happened all season. Througout the season, Steph and Klay would have a bad shooting night (usually not both) but during this series, was bad throughout. Couple that with no help from Iggy, Livingston, Barnes and Ezeli, and the task just became insurmountable. Credit also has to be given to Cleveland for excelolent game planning and very good defense. And still with it all, we barely lost (which says how good this team actually was).

Without Dray in game 5 we had no way to generate good shots. By games 6 and 7 our shooters had no legs. The one game of rest allowed Dray to shoot well in game 7 but it wasn't enough.

[turk3d]

The Warriors didn't really choke the series, it just evolved due to unfortunate circumstances. We had the perfect roster to continue winning, Igoudola as the on ball defender for LeBron, Draymond as the main help defender, and Bogut as the back line rim protector. The Cavs were never gonna win the series with the layers of defense we had. But of course LeBron crotches Draymond into a suspension, that would get anyone fired up. Bogut gets injured, and Igoudolas back gives out so he can't even bend the slightest bit. All of a sudden you go from an amazing on ball defender and rim protector to just draymond as a help defender. It just turned from a very favorable matchup to a situation where it would be tough to beat any good team. If your on ball defender can't get in a stance and your rim protector is out then it's just easy lobs and a collapsing defense getting grilled on open 3's. Crazy enough the Warriors still would have won if they just subbed someone in for Barnes. Barnes shot the ball so horrendously that Irving was just hedging off as a free safety help defender, disrupting any attacks.

I don't know if Okc was better then the Cavs, but I get what Igoudola is saying. It took some insane outside shooting to beat Okc, took some very unfortunate circumstances to end up a shot away from beating the Cavs.

I think you're essentiially right, the only thing I'd add is that our shooting was horrendous from the 5th game on. That was the first time that happened all season. Througout the season, Steph and Klay would have a bad shooting night (usually not both) but during this series, was bad throughout. Couple that with no help from Iggy, Livingston, Barnes and Ezeli, and the task just became insurmountable. Credit also has to be given to Cleveland for excelolent game planning and very good defense. And still with it all, we barely lost (which says how good this team actually was).

Without Dray in game 5 we had no way to generate good shots. By games 6 and 7 our shooters had no legs. The one game of rest allowed Dray to shoot well in game 7 but it wasn't enough.

Again (and I do want to harp on it), when Bogut went down at the in the first quarter in game 5, it totally wrecked ovur defense for the remainder of the series. Even though we may have lost game 5 (and that's not even a certainty as we were actually up by 1, 41-40 when his injury took place) we wound up losing by 15 (a net 16 negative).

With Dray back and a healthy Bogues, we probably win easily. Iggy likely doesn't get hurt either (wittout Bogues in there protecting the rim) everyone had to work harder on D which could affect them injurywise as guys tend to overextend themselvs to make up for the loss on the boards. And Tristan doesn't dominate the boards the way he did (Bogut and Dray would keep that from happemng). When Bogut went down, everything got out of whack defensively. He'll definitely be missed but Durant will help in that regard to make up for his loss.

[Frozzy]

I think the Warriors success totally changed how other teams were plying last season - positionless basketball, switching everything on defense. When other teams gave the Warriors a dose of their own medicine - and of course not everyone has the personnel to do that - they caused the Warriors offense problems. OKC was the prime example here - Steph was obviously a little less mobile (no excuse, every team has injuries), but the fact that Adams was able to effectively switch out on Curry on the perimeter was huge.
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Steven Adams rebounding was huge but I think I think it was Serge Ibaka's perimeter defense that was the biggest game changer in that series. Serge had the highest +/- on his team through the series I believe. He seemed to neutralize what Dray wanted to do offensively and did a great job on switches.

[whocurrz]

I think the Warriors success totally changed how other teams were plying last season - positionless basketball, switching everything on defense. When other teams gave the Warriors a dose of their own medicine - and of course not everyone has the personnel to do that - they caused the Warriors offense problems. OKC was the prime example here - Steph was obviously a little less mobile (no excuse, every team has injuries), but the fact that Adams was able to effectively switch out on Curry on the perimeter was huge.
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Steven Adams rebounding was huge but I think I think it was Serge Ibaka's perimeter defense that was the biggest game changer in that series. Serge had the highest +/- on his team through the series I believe. He seemed to neutralize what Dray wanted to do offensively and did a great job on switches.

I thought KD guarded Dray mostly and Ibaka guarded Barnes which allowed him to cheat off and do work as a weak side shot blocker.

[jamesnamida]

if they did beat us, they might have a chance against the cavs. people bring up durant vs lebrons record, but those were totally different teams. plus the thunder peaking in the playoffs ( since we swept them in the regular season too).

if we are just ranking best teams in the playoffs:

warriors
thunder
cavs
spurs


people talk about the cavs 5-7 games in the finals being so good, but that isn't fully true. the offense was OK, it's just that kryie (3 games)and lebron got hot (1 and a half games), while the warriors stars didn't show up. both teams were terrible in the final half of the 4th quarter in game 7. But they made a couple of buckets while we went ice cold. i mean lebron was bricking left and right until kryie dropped that 3. curry missed his that was the difference.

Of course credit to the cavs for stepping up. champions are the best team since you only get 1 go in a series, but if the playoffs were replayed multiple times where everything goes to the norm, then I would say warriors then thunder and cavs being close. kryie is a baller ( when he is on).

Kyrie vs Westbrook, who do you think wins that matchup? And do you think that Tristan would have dominated the boards against Adams and Ibaka the way he did against us? I seriously doubt it.

yea thats why i would put the thunder at a close 2nd to the warriors. cavs 3rd.
but doesn't matter now xD its cavs 1, warriors 2, thunder 3 from the results **** i can't wait till next year.

[Beesuit]

I think the Kanter + Adams combo would have squashed the Cavs just as it did with the Spurs. KD and WB would also have done a better job on defense than Curry and Thompson. So yeah, I'm confident OKC would have won.

[and1GS]

I don't think they were the best team last season. We basically saw Steph take a fat **** for two series straight after being injured for 3 weeks. Then Draymond actively played us out of 2-3 games in the OKC series - I don't think that was OKC being incredible. Great team, sure, and they put him in positions to be an idiot...but Draymond trying to do too much and playing like a prick is on him. If he played like regular Draymond and Steph didn't disappear, I don't think we would've needed a historic comeback.

OKC is an incredibly deep team, but on the perimeter they were sorely lacking depth. Plus there's always the Russell factor - if he falls in love with the 3 pointer you lose huge chunks of time to mount significant leads. I think they were a clearly flawed team when put up against top 2 competition. There's a reason we've always come out on top and I'm pretty sure the Cavs would've beat them as well.

With that said if Bogut didn't get injured and Ezeli rendered useless, we might be champions right now. So who the **** knows.