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The Roar

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It’s become ‘cool’ to say the Warriors won’t win the NBA title

The Golden State Warriors are more likely to chase a championship than records this year. (Photo: AP)
Expert
20th February, 2018
43

In NBA circles, it’s become trendy to pick anyone but the Golden State Warriors to win this year’s NBA Championship.

At a base level, it makes complete and utter sense, for if you’re making predictions, it’s neither bold nor interesting to say the Warriors will win the title.

You’re not going to be given a lot of credit for doing so, because Golden State are still $1.50 favourites to take home the Larry O’Brien Trophy. Considering their vast array of talent, along with their championship pedigree, even those odds seem high.

As such, in order to say something worthy of even a smidgen of attention, many pundits and fans have taken to picking other teams to win.

Which is completely defendable; except when they start to justify their selection as anything other than simply being contrarian.

By all means, pick another team because it’s boring to choose the incumbents. Most definitely pick another team if it just so happens to be the franchise you support. However, one should tread carefully using any type of rational argument as to why the Warriors shouldn’t remain the overwhelming favourites.

They currently have a 44-14 win-loss record – the second best in the league – and sit a mere half-a-game behind the first-placed Houston Rockets. They are the defending NBA champions, and lost just one playoff game on their way to the title last year. In Kevin Durant and Steph Curry, they have two of the best four players in the world on their roster, along with two more All Stars in Klay Thompson and Draymond Green.

Draymond Green

Draymond Green (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez)

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I could go on, but you get the point: they’ve been great, they are great, they continue to be great, and the title goes through them.

Yet in the desire to try to find a story, a number of people have been picking at the seams, attempting to find a valid reason why they will not win.

The Warriors have lost two games to Houston this season, and that has some suggesting that the Rockets will bump them out of the playoffs.

Though Houston have been impressive – particularly in losing just one game when James Harden, Chris Paul and Clint Capella have played together – it’s important to remember that both Harden and Paul have a history of flaming out in the playoffs, and that regular-season losses mean little to a team that has gone to three straight NBA Finals.

The Rockets are undoubtedly a challenge, but Golden State fully deserve the sentence to be written that way: the Rockets are a ‘challenge’, rather than being even remotely close to ‘favourites’.

On the other side of the country, Cleveland’s trade-deadline flurry of activity has re-energised their season, and given birth to the narrative that they now have a roster around LeBron James that can topple the Warriors.

Though the moves the Cavalierss made were brilliant and the new team is undefeated, they have still only played two games together, which – needless to say – isn’t a massive sample size. The Cavs have unquestionably improved, but it remains to be seen if they’re anywhere near Golden State’s class just yet. Putting together an NBA championship roster mid-season is difficult, and somewhat unprecedented.

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Cleveland Cavaliers forward LeBron James is defended by Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry

AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez

Another ‘story’ was created when Steve Kerr let some of his players coach the team against the Phoenix Suns; a game the Warriors won by 46 points.

Though Kerr was adamant it was simply a way to keep things fresh for a team that was “tired”, it didn’t stop words like ‘arrogant’ and ‘disrespectful’ surfacing, with more than a suggestion that it showed they were complacent this season, which would eventually cost them a ring.

In actual fact, Kerr believed his team had started to tune him out, and revealed that he believed he hadn’t “reached” them for over a month before the Suns game. That type of self-awareness is the polar opposite of complacency, and evidence that he has a good handle on the psyche of the team.

That should scare opponents, because it’s proof the Warriors aren’t just supremely talented, they’re well-managed.

The Warriors curiously lead the league in tech fouls and ejections, which has also fuelled talk of the team’s arrogance. To be fair, this angle does have some substance, because they definitely need to curb their chat to officials and keep their emotions more in-check, especially Draymond Green. The enigmatic forward has already got himself suspended during an NBA Finals, which was the turning point in the 2016 series loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers.

It was a big enough area of concern that general manager Bob Myers addressed the team about it recently, yet if other teams are relying on tech fouls and ejections to beat the Warriors, it’s confirmation of how much better Golden State are than everyone else.

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Yes, the Rockets look dangerous, and you should never count out a team with LeBron James – particularly with an improved supporting cast. The Warriors certainly have a touch of arrogance about them, while their tech fouls issue is a legitimate concern.

Yet, I’d stop well short of saying they’re vulnerable, complacent or ready to be dethroned.

On the contrary, the Warriors may be better than they’ve ever been, and ready to unleash pure hell once the playoffs begin.

Despite what some may have you believe, ‘daylight’ is still in second place behind the Golden State Warriors in the race to the 2017-18 NBA championship.

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