Nuvendil said:
My point was that the Warriors outside Durant still have road game quality ranging from spottty to utter crap. They still have sections of games and entire games where they turn the ball over embarrassingly. For the 4th finals series in a row the big three have proven incapable of having a solid baseline of quality, having games where they are just garbage. They still get loose and commit stupid fouls when they are under pressure. They sacrificed some of their depth. But not all of their depth, they are still more well rounded than any team with 4 big names has any right to be. Far more so than, say, the Miami Heat.
That 73 win season literally shoots this point in the foot. Curry, Thompson, and Green have a championship under their resume in 2 trips, including that season. Do they lapse and have a stretch where they play sloppy and do stupid things. Yes, but what team doesn't? All of LeBron's teams have had those stretches, as well as every other great team in history. No team is perfect, no trio is perfect. But they were still good enough to get the job done 1 out of 2 times, which is far more chances than any other Big Threes get.
And no, I am 95% sure the Warriors in 2017 without Durant would have lost to the Cavs. Durant cleaned up after them at multiple points, kept them in games where the Cavs would have steamrolled them. And yes, they would have had their better supporting cast. But the Cavs also made improvements. Just not enough to offset the Warriors bringing in Kevin Durant.
And I am 100% sure that a 100% healthy Warriors team in 2016 would have finished the job, gone back-to-back, and possibly could have 3 peated as champions. Oh yeah, Durant sure was important for the Warriors in Games 1 & 2 where the Warriors crushed the Cavs. They would never have done that if they had their original roster... Oh wait a minute, they most likely would have won anyways. Because the year prior, the crushed them in the first two games by a margin EVEN BIGGER than last year's first two games. The Cavs would have made it more competitive with the pieces they added. But the Warriors didn't need Durant to beat them. He needed them FAR MORE than they need him. He just took them from an all-time great team, to arguably the greatest team ever.
And I never put all that much stock in the 73 win thing. It's not as impressive as the next 3 records behind that for a ton of reasons, most notably the number of cannon fodder teams.
There have only been 2 teams that have won over 70 games in a season. The other team had Michael Jordan on it. It's incredibly hard and equally impressive no matter who the competition was, (which included the Thunder with Durant and Westbrook.)
Edit: And don't give me that Green suspension nonsense. The game may have been closer in 5 but they shredded them. And Green was invisible in 6. And then in 7, Green had a phenomenal night and all the Warriors needed was for ANYONE to step up. None of them did, not one of them did. The Cavs won, the Warriors lost. They had the single highest odds scenario in basketball: Game 7, at home, after being up 3-1. They were outplayed, end of story.
Still didn't address my other points about the injuries to Bogut, Iguodala, and Curry. So, if the Warriors were outplayed in 2016, then the Cavs were outplayed in 2015. You'd have to try hard to not outplay a team that is missing its Starting Center and has injuries to its Sixth Man, and Unanimous MVP.
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