Golden age of basketball leaves LeBron lost again
It’s crazy to think how basketball history can shift on such little things. For instance, imagine if Draymond Green hadn’t slapped LeBron James in the groin in 2016. If Green doesn’t flick at the king’s jewels like that, and instead lets him walk away ... well, may as well ask the famous parable scorpion on the back of the frog in the middle of the river not to kick said frog in the groin, causing them both to drown. It’s in his nature.
Anyway, had Green managed to avoid LeBron’s groin he doesn’t get suspended for Game 5, and maybe the Warriors don’t blow the 3-1 lead. And assuming everything else goes as planned, that would mean they would now be one win from four titles in a row, after beating the Cleveland Cavaliers 110-102 in Game 3 Wednesday for a 3-0 lead in the series. The NBA is a dynastic league by nature: since 1980, 11 franchises have won the 39 titles, including this year. But nobody had won four straight titles since the Celtics, ending in 1966.
And that’s how close they came. The Warriors had a weird Game 3, in that Steph Curry and Klay Thompson both forgot how to shoot for long stretches, but luckily they signed Kevin Durant back when they were a 73-win final team, so he scored 43 on 23 shots and added 13 rebounds and seven assists.
It’s nice to have options in life.
It’s the same old story. They’re too good. The Warriors went 16-1 in the playoffs last year with Durant missing two games, and they are 15-5 this year with Curry missing six games. The Houston Rockets made them genuinely uncomfortable, largely thanks to two things: the Rockets were stocked with stout, switching defenders who bombed threes around an MVP-level offensive force, and made the Warriors lapse into existentially weird isolation basketball. And also the Warriors spent the year spacing on their class assignments, and weren’t quite ready for the test.
And they are going to win a third title in four years, and LeBron James is three-quarters of the way to another league-shaking free-agency period. After Game 3 he sounded like he had accepted the inevitable.
“It’s almost like playing the Patriots: You can’t have mistakes, they’re not going to beat themselves. You know, so you’re able to force a miscue and not be able to capitalize and then you have to be so in tune and razor-sharp and focused every single possession: you can’t have miscommunica- tion, you can’t have laws, you can’t have ‘my faults’ or ‘my bads’, because they’re going to make you pay. And when they made you pay it’s a 3-0 or a 6-0 or a 9-0 run, and it comes in bunches. So the room for error is just, you just can’t have it.
“You guys asked me this last year: What was the difference between the Warriors the previous year and this year, and what was my answer? All right. There it is. Kevin Durant was my answer. He’s one of the best players that I’ve ever played against, that this league has ever seen. His ability to handle the ball, shoot the ball, make plays at his length, his size, his speed. So there it is.”
He probably knew when they lost Game 1, truth be told. Back when he was young, Boston pulled together Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce and Ray Allen, and Cleveland was trying to patch holes with putty. So LeBron went to Miami with Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade, and then Cleveland with Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love.
But Golden State went and got Durant and won the arms race. So now Cleveland has been broken by Golden State the way Cleveland broke Toronto, and LeBron is one more loss from another decision, and staying in Cleveland seems like a sucker’s bet. He was drafted by the Cavs, and they are one bad Draymond Green decision from never winning a title in his 11 seasons there with Dan Gilbert as an owner. Which, to be clear, is embarrassing.
So if you’re LeBron, what might be the greatest basketball ever played has been wasted, so you have to hit the road again, don’t you? You have to be looking for that perfect blend of competitive quality and narrative appeal. He can’t go to Golden State, but he could go to Houston. People will bring up the Lakers and the Clippers, the Spurs and the Heat. But if he wants to contend, Cleveland isn’t the place to be.
It could have been different. A healthy Cleveland team might have won in 2015, but it didn’t. A Cleveland team with Kyrie Irving might have won this year, but it didn’t happen. Houston could have won Game 7, had Chris Paul not blown his hamstring. Even in this series, the Cavaliers could have won Game 1, or Game 3.
But they didn’t, and they are slated for demolition now. They tried. Houston tried. Everyone tried. But the Warriors beat basketball, and now LeBron has to find new teammates to fly at the death star. Just think: if Draymond Green had controlled himself for one second two years ago, Golden State would be staring down four straight titles. Of course, if they’re willing to pay for it, they still could.