There is a certain contingent of basketball fans who love to lament the way superteams have permanently altered the NBA landscape in recent years. Much of that criticism is a bit melodramatic, but some of it is perfectly valid. If you happen live anywhere outside of the Bay Area, then you’re probably bored sick with watching the Warriors cakewalk their way to multiple titles.
Fair or not, there is also a nagging underlying feeling among many fans that players who choose to team up with other superstars are somehow taking the easy way out, that they are somehow less passionate or competitive, and that those titles are therefore less meaningful than if they would’ve taken a more principled approach.
Nobody is more vocal about their distaste for this than retired players, whose holy triumvirate of complaints also include that the league is too soft now and that guys are too buddy-buddy with one another. Of course, the criticism against modern-day super teams is far too nuanced to be dismissed so easily.
Here’s what Paul George had to say on the matter in a recent interview with Tim Bontempts of The Washington Post:
“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. For those guys to chime in and say we’re not built the same … I never understood that, because who would we be fooling if we went out alone and tried to go up against the Warriors?
***
“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.”
It’s certainly true that players today are more empowered than ever and have more control over their destinies. That’s a good thing. Guys can choose to play wherever they want, and they each deal with the backlash on their own terms. Some guys simply ignore it and go about their business. And some guys are Kevin Durant.
League-wide parity, however, is a more complicated topic, particularly in regard to smaller market teams that already face challenges landing marquee players and the compounded effect on morale that, in reality, only one or two teams each season have a legitimate chance at a title. Nonetheless, George illustrates a crucial point from the players’ perspective: It’s impossible to challenge a team like the Warriors without a small arsenal of elite-level players.
(Via The Washington Post)
