The dream teams start in one place
U.S. training camp is where players plant the free-agency seeds
LAS VEGAS— When LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh publicly donned matching Miami Heat uniforms for the first time — at a raucous pep rally in American Airlines Arena on July 10, 2010 — the sight of three all-stars in the same jersey represented something larger: a shift in how NBA teams are constructed.
Three in-their-prime superstars linking up was a line of demarcation, when top talents showed they can have as much say in shaping rosters as the executives hired to do just that.
Eight years after the Big Three danced onstage amid billowing smoke, NBA stars are dictating player movement more than ever. Nothing has fueled that power more than Team USA, an incubator of sorts for such boldname partnerships.
“If you don’t have a superteam, or three superstars, or three all-stars on your team, it’s very hard to win,” Washington Wizards star John Wall said at Team USA’s minicamp last month.
The Americans’ return to prominence over the past decade has allowed the league’s stars to mingle with the sport’s other elite players, further developing relationships that sometimes date from college or high school or youth ball.
Those connections have created high-profile unions across the league: The Heat’s Big Three wererumoured to have initially begun discussing plans to play together while they were part of the so-called Redeem Team at the 2008 Olympics; the Golden State Warriors’ recruitment of Kevin Durant and DeMarcus Cousins was helped, in part, by Team USA experiences; and the same goes for Carmelo Anthony agreeing to join Paul George and Russell Westbrook in Oklahoma City last summer, then teaming up with Chris Paul and James Harden in Houston this month.
Even future rumoured partnerships, such as one involving Kyrie Irving and Jimmy Butler, are created from the same group of candidate.
Such movement has already led to a direct pooling of talent on Team USA itself. Of the 35 players in contention for spots on next year’s World Cup roster, five — Durant, Cousins, Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green — are Warriors. Three others — Paul, Harden and Eric Gordon — are Rockets. With another eight teams featuring two players in the program, 24 of the 35 players on Team USA’s preliminary roster come from 10 of the NBA’s 30 teams.
Retired stars from Charles Barkley to Scottie Pippen to Michael Jordan have derided modern superstars for joining forces to chase championships, which baffles current players.
“No team has won (a title) where one single guy was the lone star and it was their team. It’s not that era. I’m not sure how the veterans, the legends, don’t understand that part,” said George, who stayed with Westbrook by re-signing with the Thunder this summer. “It’s a different game now.
“The best guy in our league right now couldn’t do it. (James) got swept (in the 2018 final). So that just goes to show you at this point what it takes to win.”
Through the first seven decades of NBA history, championship teams were built by general managers drafting, trading for and, occasionally, signing one star free agent. Regardless of the era — the Boston Celtics of the ’60s, ’80s and even late 2000s, the Los Angeles Lakers of the ’80s and early aughts, the ’90s Chicago Bulls — championship DNA was forged only one way. James, Wade and Bosh changed that paradigm.
“Back in the day, guys were stuck on teams,” George said. “It was up to the front office to build around that one guy, and that one guy was going to bring championships to them. It’s not the same now. . . . (Players) understand that, and we know what it takes.”
Not everyone, though, can participate in this arms race. Mike Conley Jr. he has been a key part of Memphis’s wildly successful run this decade,but his Grizzlies had no realistic shot at stars like James, Durant or Harden on the open market.
“Yeah, it definitely can be frustrating,” Conley said. “Being in Memphis, being part of a smaller market, you have … to build through the draft. With all the things teams have been able to accomplish through free agency, and through all the player movement, you kind of miss out on that.”