michaelm wrote:DimesandKnicks wrote:ShootersShoot wrote:
The shaq/kobe lakers were contenders for like 4 seasons before breaking up..it took 4 yrs for them to get back into contention post shaq. I would not count that as sustained success for longer than 5 seasons.
Warriors..they contended for 5 seasons..then had to retool in 2020 after losing KD, losing klay for two seasons, and iguodala aging out...so yea we have an example of a superstar allowing the team to retool around him.
So neither of those teams really had much longer sustained success than the heat with bron on it. Warriors had one more season of contention than brons heat team before they had to retool which isnt a huge difference.
If we count the 80s celts/lakers, mj bulls, and duncan spurs..thats 4 teams in 45 years that were able to be championship contenders and win chips in a longer than 5 year span.
So yea, I would say its difficult wouldnt you? In the era lebron played, only one team really fits that criteria (spurs), and thats spanning two decades plus.
The Lakers had at least the third-best title odds every year from Shaq’s arrival, held the top odds in ’98, won three straight titles, and stayed contenders for two more years — about eight straight years at the top before a short three-year gap post-Shaq.
The Warriors aren’t an example of a player “letting” them retool. They won three titles in four years, went to five straight Finals, then missed contention for just two seasons — one due to Curry’s injury — while adding young tradable assets like Wiggins, Poole, and Wiseman who could be leveraged in a trade for more ready talent.
Not to mention, Curry was under contract, and even if he wasn’t, where could he have gone that offered a better shot at another title while staying in the city where he raised his family.
When the team that drafted you builds a roster so dominant you win three rings without a Finals MVP, and they “retool” into both a proven veteran squad and a youth-loaded asset base, they’ve earned goodwill.
The Heat, had no such pipeline after LeBron, Wade, and Bosh — those stars came together on their own, and the organization had no future assets to stay in contention.
GSW are a particularly poor example to offer in support of your argument Ask Andre Iguodala whether the organisation or Steph Curry is more responsible for their recent success. Curry was also drafted by the previous completely hopeless ownership and management.
Bob Myers joined GSW the year they drafted Klay. GSW subsequently traded Monta Ellis for Bogut and a 1st round pick (at a time where Curry had yet to prove his durablity and there was debate on whether to trade Ellis or Curry).
GSW may serendipitously or due to tanking for a year have had the draft choices to revamp their team but hardly used them successfully.
Myers literally admitted to tanking to keep their pick in the 2010 draft that they used to draft Barne's who'd play PF during their initial championship run and drafted future DPOY Green in the second round. A year later the get Iggy- who was intriged by the young upstart that just beat his Nuggets that summer - in a three team sign and trade where I think that Bucks pick was a part of the deal. The next year they'd replace Mark Jackson with Steve Kerr and win a championships. Myers was also an early adapter of analytics and was a master understanding the cap. This is a front office regime drafting three members of their championship core, and trading for the other two.
The management/ownership were indeed prepared to pay a large amount of luxury tax to sign Wiggins and I love the guy and what he gave GSW, but he was seen as one of the worst contracts in the NBA at the time and they were ridiculed for signing him. His success at GSW compared to elsewhere just might have had something to do with Curry and particularly Draymond Green who many are calling over-rated on another current thread.
Wiggins averaged 22 points the previous year and had better numbers after his trade to MIA than he did in GSW. That front office, was also able to leverage "a bad contract" to trade for Jimmy Butler.
Klay Thompson was crocked by then and pretty much a role player for the less than half season he played in the season they won the 4th title.
Klay averaged 20 pts a game and was the second leading score during their 4th title won. Hell of a role player.
Poole was picked 29th, and has been an inefficient chucker away from Curry and Green.
With GSW, Poole was their third leading scoring on nearly 50,40, 90 splits. Since His two years away from GSW have been nearly identical to his time their sans scoring a few more points. His last year in Washington is almost identical to his last year in GSW...and he was the 29th pick. That's another great pick by a great organization.
Players like the aforementioned Iguodala and KD are on the record as saying they joined GSW to play with Curry, and David West is probably similar and effusive about how great it was to be on Curry’s team.
Igoudala joined the Warriors after they beat his Nuggets in the playoffs. This was the first season Curry topped 20 points. Him being an MVP was on no ones radar. But the Curry, Klay and Barnes were all under 24 years old. Iggy joined because signing with the Warriors gave him a better chance to compete than the Mavs and the Kings which were the other competitive offers. Plus, he was also seduced by the proximity to Sillicon Valley as an impassioned tech investor.
KD joined the Warriors after they already won a championship than won 73 games - i.e to win a championship. PLayers who want to winn tend to play on teams that have the talent to do so and the Warriors effectively did so.
This is a prime organization that hit on nearly all their draft picks, executed a master class in managing cap space, and was early on embracing analytics.
