Entering his 10th National Basketball Association season without a championship, the superstar’s dash to the Warriors to join fellow All-Stars Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green and create a potential dynasty has split opinion among National Basketball Association observers: Durant is either lame for creating a Warriors “Big Four” or sensible for joining the best team possible. The threat of KD overstepping someone else’s role is very real, and that could ruin the dynamite chemistry that the Warriors have built.
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When you think about it, Durant really doesn’t have a comfortable role for him on the team. We just won a championship two years ago. Now maybe no one could have foreseen what a triple – which is what the number was – of the TV deal was going to be, but they should have had some more foresight.
For the Warriors, Durant will fill a specific need as a player who is far more adept at getting to the basket than anyone on their current roster, a flaw exposed by both the Thunder and the Cavaliers in the recent play-offs. Intuitively, it might seem as though you take a 73-win team, add another superstar to it, and wind up with a win total in the stratosphere, somewhere in the mid-to-high 70s. The only hope any western conference team can have now is if the Warriors fully meltdown.
He told them he wanted to play with Curry & Co., and he loved Steve Kerr’s system, and the Silicon Valley sensibilities of Joe Lacob’s front office. This will probably mean Iggy will leave, and the Warriors bench will not be as solid as they were the past few years.
As of Sunday night, maybe even into Monday morning, Warriors executives were still not sure if they were going to convince him to make the jump. The suggested Minnesota-Oklahoma City NBA rumors is one of the best deals for the Thunder, who are expected to rebuild after Durant left them this summer.
However, it might’ve been a better idea to remove Kevin Durant’s face from the arena in the cover of darkness or something. You may now not worry about LBJ killing the vibe, your time to triumph as a Golden State fan is here once again.
Unfortunately, for the Los Angeles Lakers, Durant wouldn’t even grant them a meeting. Golden State will have to trade center Andrew Bogut while also letting forward Harrison Barnes and center Festus Ezeli walk in free agency to clear enough cap room to sign the former Thunder star.
As for the rest of the Warriors’ bench? He can’t get a player as good as KD and the Cavs now have no salary cap room. From 1994 to 2013, they had just two winning seasons. Warriors now have players like Stephen Curry, Clay Thompson, Draymond Green and Kevin Durant.
But how does this impact the Warriors’ 2016-2017 season and beyond? This was his choice to chase titles for the rest of his career.
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At $9,000 a second, teams have been making some hard choices as well.
