A (Somewhat) Instant Reaction to the 2017 NBA Finals
What could’ve amounted to an epic rubber match left me feeling, well, ‘meh’.
The NBA Finals are over, and, to everyone’s immense surprise, the Golden State Warriors come out on top.
Yawn.
Look, of course I’m bummed. The end of The Finals signifies the most dead time of year for sports fans. The Stanley Cup just wrapped up, college sports find themselves in a lull, and NFL teams are still over a month away from opening camp.
But, more importantly, the series to end all series — the rubber match between the latest and greatest NBA rivalry — went out on nothing short of a whimper.
That’s what happens when, ya know, the greatest regular season team of all time adds the second-best player in the world.
Yeah, two weeks ago, I submitted my prediction: Cavs in 7. Everything sounds ridiculous in hindsight, but deep down, I knew all along that the 2017 season would begin with a banner being raised in The Bay. I just stuck with the Cavs because, well, as a casual basketball observer, I wanted to see an epic, down-to-the-wire matchup where the most dominant basketball player of our generation came out on top.
Is it petty to fervently root for the Jordan of my childhood to pass His Airness in the NBA’s pantheon, as opposed to just enjoying the ride for whatever it’s worth? Sports Gods, I think it’s best if you leave that one as a hypothetical.
This series was unsatisfying for a whole slew of reasons, but I’ll just stick with using my high school tennis career as a direct comparison.
If you’re unfamiliar with the ins and outs of tennis culture, just know that the premier players out there are the ones that have been playing and taking lessons since they were little tykes. You could be as athletic as Adrian Peterson, yet without getting in the adequate amount of practice, your strokes will most certainly be flat-out poor.
Even if I took exactly four lessons in four years, I never put in what I considered enough time to truly consider myself a through-and-through “tennis kid”. Nevertheless, I had the necessary coordination and athleticism to win against most of the competition I faced during the regular season, even if I did not feature textbook mechanics.
When it came to postseason play in the state tournament, though, it was a whole different story. Sure, my partner and I were able to make some noise, winning a pair of matches. Once we went up against true “tennis kids”, though, we really didn’t stand much of a chance.
My coach, ever the optimist, would never have any of it. Before the match, he would advise us to just play our game and not give the opposition anything easy. Afterwards, he commended our work and proclaimed how we were really just “one shot away” from having a shot in most of the points.
Either my coach watched a different match or he decided to stick with kind words, because we got absolutely schmacked. I get it, though—it’s oh-so tempting to view things through rose-colored glasses.
I hate the Warriors, and I can’t really explain why. Sure, Draymond is a tool and Steph is cocky, but what NBA team isn’t chock full of those guys? The Cavs start someone just as unbearable, and his last name is Smith.
Something about the Dubs just rubs me the wrong way; couple that with a not-so-low-key love of watching LeBron, and it’s pretty clear where my bias laid in this matchup.
What does this whole unrelated excuse for some semblance of an article amount to? Well, I admit, I’m probably looking through the same pair of glasses as my tennis coach when I say that I honestly feel that throughout the whole series, the Cavs were just “one shot away” from legitimately contending for the championship.
Seriously. I think that the Warriors were obviously the better, absolutely stacked team. But I watched all five games, and at various points in each contest, Cleveland was truly sticking right with Golden State. Kyrie Irving and LeBron James took over in a similar fashion to last year, pouring in buckets at a torrid pace.
The divide between the clubs was that, here and there, if the Cavs started playing just one tiny step below their full potential, the Warriors would go on one of those runs, capitalizing in a big way. On the flip side, the Warriors had so many weapons that they never had to play to their full potential. Many times throughout the series, Steph and KD would sit, and the Dubs would have no problem keeping a lead, sometimes even adding on to it.
That’s what happens when your seventh or eighth guy off the bench is, ya know, a former All-Star and NBA Finals MVP.
Many people stressed the drop-off in defensive performance the Cavs experienced from last year’s championship squad, but I blindly went with the belief that everything would change once they reached the biggest stage. Spoiler alert: Cleveland’s defense didn’t get any better in June than it was in January.
You won’t hear any excuses from me regarding Lebron and his performance in The Finals, as too many outlets seem to be pushing a James-sympathetic narrative. His defense was visibly horrible, consistently lacking the effort needed for his team to have any chance of repeating. It’s easy to rag on Tristan Thompson for never showing up or Richard Jefferson getting cooked, but the truth of the matter is that LeBron should’ve been marking #35 the whole way. It was embarrassing to watch Durant absolutely dominate on both sides of the floor while James stood by as the likes of Curry and KD ran right by him.
Don’t get me wrong, though — The King is still The King. He averaged a jaw-dropping triple-double in the series to the tune of 34 points, 12 rebounds, and 10 assists on fantastic shooting percentages. I by no means subscribe to the notion that this five-game sample is enough proof that Durant (or anyone else) has officially passed LeBron as the league’s top dog. And yet, I don’t feel like James put in the work we all know him to be truly capable of.
Then again, it’s pretty easy for Kevin Durant to look unstoppable in comparison, as he did lace up for what might’ve just been the best team to ever hit the hardwood.
