Looking at the NBA Finals, there’s really only one “Big Three,” and all of the stars — Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green — are natives. The Celtics may be the closest, but the Heat have five undrafted players on their roster. Arguably, the two teams that have invested the most in superteam mode — the Nets and Lakers — are deep into the Cancun holiday season.
It’s not just personality that needs to be managed. It’s the salary cap and luxury tax bill, rehabilitation programs, and more. Of course, it’s in Golden State, Miami, Boston, and San Antonio (where the “Big Three” don’t congregate. It’s organic.)
But after the debacle in New York and Los Angeles, there are now doubts that it will work, as Brian Lewis and Stefan Bundy have written over the past few days.
Lewis spent a long time returning to Spencer Dinwiddie at the start of the 2020-21 season to track the decline of the Nets’ “Big Three”, which ended in a Celtics sweep. He noted that the week before Dinwiddie went down, the Nets had won two games by a historic margin, and within a week of his surgery, Kyrie Irving was gone and the Nets traded for James Harding. , gave up their young team and took control of all their first games. As Bundy pointed out, until 2028.
Investing so much owner wealth in such a small team and hoping to find the low-priced talent needed to fill a roster year after year can be tricky. The same goes for managing personality and health outcomes.
“I think they have the potential to have a good squad. The real problem is they have problems,” Turner Sports’ Stan Van Gundy said at a promotional event this week, revising that to “They have a lot of problems… .
“Over time – Reggie has been there with the team – are people going to look around and really trust other people? Or are they going to look around and say, ‘You know what, that guy is going to let us down.’ Knowing he is. We can’t count on him,'” Van Gundy said. “So they have to overcome a lot of obstacles in this way, and I think that’s maybe even more important than their talent on the field.”
His Turner Sports partner basically agreed.
“It’s hard to say what their Big Three is because now their Big Three is with Ben Simmons,” Hall of Famer Reggie Miller said at the same event, as Lewis said. “So until we see Ben Simmons with Kyrie, KD, healthy Joe Harris and healthy Seth Curry, it’s hard to say what the Nets can or can’t do. So it’s hard to say, ‘Hey, This lineup is flawed’ or the ‘big three are flawed’ because we haven’t seen it yet.”
Of course, we haven’t seen it yet, because life can intervene – either in terms of injury or political convictions – and sabotage any GM New Zealand plans.
However, Max isn’t thinking about changing the model, as two of his “Big Three” are in the prime of their careers, while the third is still only 25 years old. Assuming the Nets and Kyrie Irving get the job done, they’ll both be signed for the next three years. They promise.
When asked if the Nets might want to get out of this pattern, Marks said the same thing.
“I don’t know if we’re going to think about it now this summer,” Marks said during his end-of-season news conference with Steve Nash. “I mean, I think you’ve got to play the cards you’ve got. And … we’ve built some really attractive places here in the first four or five years. Brooklyn is a great place for star players. The attraction. I mean, it’s a big market. Obviously now people… want to come here and play with people like Kevin. He’s an attractive audience for them. “
Max has also repeatedly said he wants to restore the gritty culture that has allowed a group of young players, including their owners, to win 42 games in 2019. Player empowerment seems to be a challenge. Responsibility for doing this work will be broad, but will especially fall on the team leader. As Bundy writes, culture can become fragmented if stressed too much.
As David Stern’s NBA transitions to Adam Silver’s, players have more control over the business. No matter how many years are left on his contract, the threat of the superstar giving up on the franchise has become so powerful that the scope of appeasement widens and any “culture” is quickly lost. Coaches are easy to change. Accountability is vague. Players become GMs and recruit their friends, sometimes to the detriment of victory.
Of course, there is talent. there. Even assuming a worst-case scenario, the potential of the “Big Three” is undeniable. But if the season doesn’t work in Brooklyn or Los Angeles, we could see the last superteam for a while.
