The shot bounced off the rim again. The gang fell silent. Seconds later, the Toronto Raptors had been celebrating their first NBA championship. At the time, we knew it was his final sport at Oracle Area; however, none of us might predict that the last missed 3-pointer by Stephen Curry could be his final significant shot try in 18 months.
Even essentially the most pessimistic minds anticipated the Golden State Warriors to, on the very least, compete for a playoff spot final season without Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson, each of whom had suffered career-altering accidents within the Finals. As an alternative, in simply the fourth sport of the season, all 260 kilos of Aron Baynes proved an excessive amount for Curry’s left hand to bear, sending the two-time MVP to the sidelines for four months. Curry made his triumphant return in March, with the Warriors properly out of the playoff hunt, just for his season to be stifled as soon as once more — this time by a menacing, relentless virus infinitely extra harmful than the harm bug that appeared so fixated on Golden State’s locker room.
Finally, nevertheless, frustration turned to hope. The Warriors’ futility and lottery luck earned them the No. 2 decide within the draft. The decide, who turned out to be huge man James Wiseman, coupled with the wholesome return of Curry and Thompson, a refreshed Draymond Inexperienced, and a refocused Andrew Wiggins meant the Warriors could be again within the championship image as soon as once more.
However, because the outdated adage made well-known by John Lennon reminds us, “Life is what occurs to you when you’re busy making different plans.” This sentiment must be ingrained in our psyches after enduring the horrors of 2020; however, it’s a testimony to human resiliency that we frequently enable optimism to conquer despair.
And identical to that, with one awkward step by Thompson throughout an offseason pickup sport in Southern California, the Warriors’ potential resurgence has change into a rescue mission. The {news} of Thompson’s torn proper Achilles tendon — following a season misplaced to an ACL tear — is a sucker punch that induces extra sympathy for Thompson than concern over the franchise’s basketball future. On Thursday, throughout a press convention that was imagined to be a celebratory introduction of the Warriors’ future stars, common supervisor Bob Myers spent the primary 15 minutes greedy for phrases to encapsulate the devastation of Thompson’s newest harm.
“In my job, these are these cellphone calls the place the color drains out of your face,” Myers stated.
“It isn’t that we won’t take care of these items. We do, and we are going to, and now we have. However, what hurts essentially the most is the time we put into our jobs, the sacrifices we make to do what we do and to do what [Klay] does. And for him to need not to be capable of playing basketball, that is the ache. That is the ache we really feel for him being right here since day one, since Klay confirmed up nine years in the past, or nevertheless a few years in the past it was.”
In essentially the most unfair of manners, right here the Warriors are, in a virtually identical place that they had been earlier than a final season. No Thompson. No Durant. No sage veteran leaders like Andre Iguodala and Shaun Livingston. Only an eagerness for what might have been, and confusion about what comes subsequent.
“We discovered ourselves with a gap at a place that we won’t discover many higher guys to fill than a Klay Thompson,” Myers stated. “So now we write our board up, and beneath the two-guard place now we have a clean area.”
So as soon as once more, the destiny of the season, and maybe the Warriors’ championship window, rests squarely on the shoulders of Stephen Curry.
Earlier than Curry’s harm final 12 months, we puzzled whether or not head coach Steve Kerr would alter the ball-movement-based offense to supply extra pick-and-rolls for his famous person within the absence of Thompson and Durant. That proved troublesome within the restricted time Curry was on the court docket as a result of the presence of D’Angelo Russell, a ball-dominant guard whose off-ball abilities by no means progressed to the Warriors’ liking. With Russell gone, Curry is now flanked by Wiggins and the lately acquired Kelly Oubre, two athletic wings able to sporting opponents down with back-cuts, and who will deliver delight to the group if they’ll constantly sink 3-pointers at a very good clip.
As at present constructed, the Warriors haven’t any secondary ball-handler within the backcourt. These honors to go Inexperienced, who has led the group in assists per sport in every of the previous five seasons. So it is not laborious to check an offense the place Curry runs extra pick-and-rolls and dribble hand-offs, although Kerr has been reluctant to revamp his offense previously.
Regardless of the way it occurs, Curry goes to have to show in a monstrous season to ensure that the Warriors to compete within the Western Convention. Along with the star-studded Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Clippers on the prime, there are at the least nine different respectable playoff contenders, perhaps ten relying on how the Houston Rockets proceed.
But when there’s any participant able to — and prepared for — such an explosion, it is Curry.
The final time Curry was unbridled, again within the 2015-16 season when he was freed from the sacrifices that got here with welcoming Durant into the fold, Curry assaulted the league with one of many biggest seasons in NBA historical past — 30.1 factors, 6.7 assists, 5.four rebounds and a pair of. One steals per sport on 50/45/90 splits with an absurd 5.1 3-pointers made per sport. That earned him the primary unanimous MVP choice in NBA historical past, and he may approximate that manufacturing this season for the Warriors to have an opportunity on the playoffs and past.
Everybody within the NBA is adjusting to this unusual offseason, and no one is aware of the way it will play out. Some groups are coming off of a fast turnaround from the playoffs, whereas others, just like the Warriors, can have gone nine months since enjoying an NBA sport. Curry can have performed precisely five video games — 139 minutes — in 18 months. You possibly can say he’ll be rested — Curry all the time retains himself in phenomenal form — however, it might be silly to suppose there will not be a major interval of rust-shedding to start the season. With the Warriors state of affairs what it’s, a rocky beginning might imply lacking out on the postseason.
Whereas it is untimely to shut the e-book on the Warriors dynasty, there is a rising likelihood that they do not get again to the Finals throughout Curry’s tenure. Thompson shall be getting back from a torn ACL and a torn Achilles after lacking two years. He could be the one participant in main sports activities historical past moreover former Warrior DeMarcus Cousins to undergo each of these accidents. There has long been concern that Inexperienced’s efficiency might deteriorate quickly as he ages. There isn’t any assure that Wiggins and/or Oubre ever fulfill the potential that their pure expertise suggests. Wiseman might find yourself being what some draft evaluators warned us about — an overhyped Hassan Whiteside. The Timberwolves may very well be a surprisingly good subsequent season, crushing the worth of their 2021 top-three protected decide — by far the Warriors’ finest asset. And if Curry will get damage, properly let’s not even go there.
That is clearly the worst-case state of affairs; however, after the final 12 months and a half, it is solely pure for the Warriors to anticipate catastrophe. And that is the place the problem is available in. That is the place having a frontrunner like Curry, each on and off the court docket, could make all of the distinction. If Curry can preserve the Warriors in competition, Golden State can stay a possible vacation spot for the subsequent disgruntled star, at which level Myers and the entrance workplace can deploy no matter belongings essential to bolster the roster for when Thompson returns. Then we’ll be proper again to speak concerning the Warriors as title contenders subsequent summer season.
It is a troublesome process; however, Curry has confirmed in his 11-year profession that his contagious work ethic and enthusiasm can encourage and provoke his teammates.
“The problem in these instances is staying collectively when your material is examined,” Myers stated on Thursday. “Our material was examined final 12 months. Folks do not know it; our document was 15-50; however, we did not break as a corporation. We did not falter. We did not begin blaming individuals. And that is laborious to do at the present time.”
