Playoffs add perspective

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In a sense, it’s good for Thunder fans that they did not qualify for the playoffs this season. Sure, it would have been heartwarming if a team held together with chewing gum and bailing wire had managed to sneak into the West’s top 8. I’ve written before that I thought the playoff experience would be better for the team in the long run than a lottery pick. I still feel that way. But this is what it is. Grab lemons, make lemonade.

Some fans (and Thunder players) have sworn off watching the playoffs this season. If you have, please reconsider. It’s enlightening, especially if less than, say, 80% of your NBA intake involves the Oklahoma City Thunder. As some events have unfolded, I couldn’t help but wonder what the reaction would have been if the Thunder were the team in question instead.

Such as…

The Warriors enter the 4th quarter down 20 points to the Pelicans in game 3.

“Scott Brooks didn’t prepare his players!”
“This team is playing so bad it doesn’t deserve to win!”
“Thunder’s going to mess around and lose this series!”

The Warriors mounted a comeback and won, because they are freaking awesome. It’s only the second time a playoff team has overcome a 20 point 4th quarter deficit. Imagine the reaction if it were the Thunder in the Pelicans’ place.

“Thunder can’t take care of business!”
“They relaxed and let them right back in!”
“Thunder can’t blow 20 point leads like that! They don’t deserve to win this series!”

On the last play in regulation, the Warriors were down 3 with 9.6 seconds remaining. The Warriors called a 20-second timeout and advanced the ball. Steve Kerr grabbed a whiteboard and drew up a play. He sends out Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Marreese Speights, Draymond Green, and Harrison Barnes. Green inbounds. Curry curls off a screen toward Green and gets the inbounds pass. Very little movement occurs elsewhere, save for a downscreen or two. Curry launches a 3 point attempt with 8.2 seconds remaining.

Again, imagine the Thunder in this position instead.

“What are they thinking? Way too much time left on the clock!”
“No creativity!”
“Hero ball at its finest!”

Curry’s attempt comes up short, but it’s rebounded by Speights, who spots an open Curry in the corner. This time he nails the shot despite being pummeled like a crooked Russian mobster in Hell’s Kitchen. It was a thing of beauty, the likes we’ve seen on multiple occasions in the heart of Oklahoma. The oft-seen reaction?

“Bailed out by a superstar!”

For the Pelicans, a 20-point lead evaporated quicker than Lake Hefner in the summer. It’s a scene we’ve also seen in Oklahoma City. And we’re quite familiar with watching our team fall victim to a last-second shot.

“How can you let the best shooter in the world get the ball in that situation?”
“Can’t even rebound a missed shot! They have no heart!”

The Warriors went on to win in overtime, but it was dicey. The Pelicans were down 3 with 13.8 seconds remaining. Inexplicably, Thompson fouled Anthony Davis off the ball, very questionably, with 10.9 left on the clock. The Pelicans got one free throw and the ball.

“Undisciplined! They should be coached better than that!”
“How can that player be so dumb? He’s the worst!”

Davis drills the free throw, shrinking the Pelicans’ deficit to 2. The Pelicans called a full timeout. The ball is inbounded to Davis at the three point line, guarded by Andrew Bogut. Davis turns, faces, and takes a two dribble drive toward the basket. With 8.5 seconds remaining, he puts up… let’s describe it as not the most functional shot ever attempted. It was well defended by Bogut, perhaps the league’s best defensive center. Slow motion replays show a potentially wide-open Tyreke Evans across the court.

“Selfish! He had a guy wide open and here’s the screen grab!”
“He’s not doing the things that are expected of a player at his position and he should stop that!”

(All right, all the fake quote creation finally wore me out)

That one game is not the only place you can draw parallels. Consider the Clippers/Spurs series. Greg Popovich, also known as the greatest active NBA coach, made some questionable calls during game 2. As the Spurs are wont to do, they played Hack-A-Player with DeAndre Jordan. The strategy kept backfiring, however, because the Clippers collected a few offensive rebounds off of Jordan’s misses and regained possession. After the game, there was this tweet from NBA sponge Haralabob Voulgaris:

I’ll go out on a limb and say the local fanbase wouldn’t have been sympathetic, either. But Pop has five rings and Brooks leaves Oklahoma City with none. Again, Pop is great. He’s also like that older, overweight, unattractive guy with a ton of money and a 20-something supermodel girlfriend. Money is the great equalizer in real life. Ringzzz are the great equalizer in NBA life. It’s a credit line of immeasurable value.

Or consider the end of game 4 between the Bucks and Bulls. With the score tied at 90 late in the game, Derrick Rose committed a costly turnover, his 8th of the night. A few moments later, with only 1.3 seconds left on the clock, he fell asleep on defense and lost his man, Bucks guard Jerryd Bayless. Jared Dudley threw a pinpoint pass across the court to Bayless, who got an easy game-winning layup. Brilliant play call by Bucks coach Jason Kidd and excellent execution by the Bucks players. Rose had been instrumental in the 4th quarter, breathing life back into a listless Bulls squad. But a pair of plays rendered it all moot.

I couldn’t help but wonder what people would have tweeted and said out loud if the player were Westbrook instead of Rose.

* * *

Less I sound like I’m admonishing fans from my throne high above them, I’m not. This experience, taking in a number of other non-Thunder playoff games, has been enlightening for me. It’s not that I don’t watch any other NBA games. I do, but during the season it’s limited to mostly highlights and probably less than a dozen other full games. I’d love to ingest NBA action 16+ hours per day but in real life, it’s not realistic. Keeping up with the Thunder is difficult enough. 82 regular season games at an average of 2.5 hours per game. One regular season of Thunder basketball is like seven seasons of “LOST”. Twice. It’s like watching the entire run of “LOST” back-to-back. And that’s before the playoffs.

When one becomes hyper-focused on one team, it’s easy to lose sight of the rest of the league. That doesn’t mean all fan critiques carry no value. When Russell Westbrook heaves a desperation 35-foot three with plenty of time left on the clock, there’s no good way to positively spin that mess, if there’s a way at all. Similarly, I have no problem with taking Monty Williams to task for what was drawn up at the end of that Warriors/Pelicans game. I’d imagine some Pelicans fans did.

Consider the Thunder’s April 1 game against the Mavericks, a brother-in-law brand of basketball where both teams had zero interest in exerting defensive effort. The Thunder was down by three with 13 seconds remaining and no more timeouts. Kyle Singler was the inbounder but had difficulty getting in a clean pass. It appeared something was drawn up to free Anthony Morrow, who was 6-9 from three point range in the game. That didn’t happen and the Thunder had to quickly improvise.

Westbrook frees himself and gets the inbounds pass. He hoists a contested three point attempt from the top of the key with 10.2 seconds left. He appeared more interested in drawing contact than drawing net. The shot missed, but Westbrook chased down the rebound in the corner and immediately launched another three point shot with 6 seconds remaining. It clanged as well. There would be no overtime in this barn burner.

I wasn’t alone, but I criticized Westbrook. The first attempt was way too early, in my opinion. The second shot was also not a good look, though it can be argued that Westbrook wasn’t entirely aware of how much time remained. Like “one of those people”, I took a screenshot of that final shot and pointed out a wide open Morrow a mere quick pass away.

I instantly thought of this play when I saw the Warriors play that I described at the beginning of the article. Now I admit, it’s an imperfect analogy. Westbrook is a shaky three point shooter whereas Curry could probably hit at least 9 out of 10 threes in a pitch black gymnasium with his right arm tied behind his back. But the situations were similar, and it made me re-think the instant analysis I offered up about the Thunder and Westbrook at the time. It wasn’t a terrible stance to take, but in hindsight it was probably unfair.

The hardest part for me as a fan and an analyst is to take my enthusiasm and zeal for the Thunder out of the equation. I’ve become what I describe as a “fanalyst” (not to be confused with Tobias Fünke’s “analrapist”) and I’m not alone on that island. Maintaining complete objectivity is difficult when you’re analyzing something that you’d really like to see succeed.

But all fans should venture out of their comfort zone a little. Tune in elsewhere. See what’s happening with other teams that you’re more or less neutral about. Find teams with superstars and see what they do. Make note when LeBron James gets a rebound, dribbles upcourt and takes a long two with 18 seconds left on the shot clock. Notice how a superstar like Blake Griffin can commit two costly turnovers late in a tight game. This stuff isn’t owned solely by the Thunder. And if this all sounds like common and obvious knowledge to you, congrats. You’re not in the 5-10% of folks this was intended to speak to.