THANKS, K.D., IT’S BEEN WEIRD
The NBA landscape has shifted since social media all-star Kevin Durant and the Warriors hauled in the hardware. Doug Smith wraps it up.
The NBA has come through a summer like no other, with wave after wave of unrelenting news, laying waste to any silly notion of an extended summer off-season.
All-stars were traded, a franchise fetched more than $2 billion on the market (all dollar figures U.S.), players signed deals worth more than any in the sport’s history; it was a whirlwind of activity leading up to the opening of training camps across the league this weekend and the start of next week.
Chris Paul is in Houston, not Los Angeles.
Paul George wears an Oklahoma City uniform, not an Indiana one.
Jimmy Butler is reunited with Tom Thibodeau in Minnesota, rather than sharing court time with Dwyane Wade in Chicago.
And the Cleveland Cavaliers and Boston Celtics swapped all-star point guards in Kyrie Irving and Isaiah Thomas in the most active summer of the era.
The Rockets were sold for $2.2 billion in the biggest business transaction of the off-season, while Stephen Curry inked a “super-max” contract of five years and $201 million, the first ever given out, and when Golden State teammate Kevin Durant agreed to a two-year, $53million extension, it allowed the Warriors to retain the bulk of the roster that won the Larry O’Brien Trophy last June.
The contract might not have been the most newsworthy thing Durant did, however. He was caught out using a ghost social media account to defend himself and criticize his former Thunder coach and teammates, just another chapter in a crazy few months. And it’s not over yet. The league’s board of governors will meet next week and likely make substantial changes to address two issues that have plagued the NBA for years.
Commissioner Adam Silver will seek — and presumably get — approval for a plan to smooth the draft lottery odds to give more bad teams a better chance at getting the No. 1 draft pick beginning in 2019, hopefully to do away with teams “tanking” to enhance their position. The worst three teams will soon have basically the same odds at getting the top pick and teams can slide four spots instead of three.
But the most important move in the coming season is that teams will face fines for resting players at key junctures. Part of the rest issue will be taken care of by an elongated regular season and reduction of backto-back games, but Silver will now have the ability to levy fines on teams that rest multiple players on the same night, or high-profile players for games on the U.S. national broadcast.
One area where there wasn’t was any change was in the coaching ranks.
Every head coach who finished last season will be back with the same team to start training camp, unexpected stability in one of the most volatile jobs in the league.
The same couldn’t be said for front offices, though, where there was substantial change in the leadership of four franchises.
Phil Jackson, an abysmal failure as the president of the New York Knicks, was fired shortly after the draft, replaced by highly-regarded long-time executive Scott Perry.
Despite the fact his team had been to three straight NBA finals, Cleveland general manager David Griffin couldn’t find middle ground with Cavs owner Dan Gilbert and walked away from one of the most successful franchises in the league, starting a summer of major change for the team.
And two men who doubled as head coaches and top executives gave up their front-office powers. Doc Rivers of the L.A. Clippers and Mike Budenholzer of the Atlanta Hawks both saw their powers diminished with management roles taken away.
Other major stories are sure to develop once training camps and the pre-season start unfolding this weekend, but it’s going to be hard to match the craziness of the supposedly slow summer.