Kerr knows Warriors’ five-year finals will be ‘very unlikely’ to be repeated originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
We’re almost six weeks into the NBA playoffs and it’s abundantly clear that the Warriors making five consecutive trips to the Finals, winning three championships, was remarkable enough in real time, but seems downright monumental in retrospect.
It’s entirely plausible that the Warriors are the last team to accomplish such a feat.
“I think it’s highly unlikely,” coach Steve Kerr told NBC Sports Bay Area this week.
The Warriors are not only the last team to win back-to-back NBA Finals, but are also the last team to make back-to-back trips to the Finals.
The entire cast has changed every year since 2019, when Golden State lost to the Toronto Raptors in its fifth straight trip to The Finals. With both the reigning champion Denver Nuggets and their 2023 Finals foe Miami Heat having both been knocked out of the playoffs, two very different teams will face off next month.
The Nuggets were ousted from the playoffs last Sunday, falling victim to the same beast that has plagued every defending champion since 2018. Fatigue. It is as merciless as it is ruthless, and it grows bigger every year.
“I think last season’s run and coming back and the amount of minutes our starters had to play,” Nuggets coach Michael Malone said after the Game 7 loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves, “I think mentally, emotionally (and) physically, guys are gassed. They are exhausted.”
Of course they were. Denver’s 2022-23 season lasted nearly nine months, from the opening of training camp on September 27, 2022, through June 12, 2023, when the Nuggets reached the NBA Finals. That was necessary to become champion.
They didn’t have enough to repeat. The same goes for the 2022 champion Warriors, who were eliminated in the Western Conference semifinals the following season. It also applies to the Milwaukee Bucks, who won it all in 2021 but were sent home in the Eastern Conference semifinals in 2022.
The Los Angeles Lakers, 2020 champions, exited in the first round the following season. After winning the crown in 2019, the Raptors were stopped in the conference finals the following year.
“The first thing you realize is that everyone is building their team to beat you,” Kerr said. “They’re not just focused on you. They’re literally building their team to beat you. (Denver’s Nikola) Jokic said it even after the loss. He said, ‘That team was built to beat us.’ If (the Timberwolves) don’t have all three of those 7-footers, I don’t think they win Game 7 or that series.
“Once you win one, not only is everyone focused on you, emotionally excited, but they’re also making plans for you. It just gets harder and harder.”
Each of the final eight teams to reach the finals faced different factors, but what they had in common was a season that lasted longer than eight months. Regardless of fitness, the fatigue factor is real and has undoubtedly contributed to Denver being exhausted after one long season.
Any team that manages to document five consecutive, longer seasons successfully embraces and endures an element of torture.
“I’m still amazed at our guys and the energy they generated during that stretch,” Kerr said. “To tackle all newcomers and keep coming back there. Of course we had a lot of talent, but it takes more than that. It takes incredible passion and competitive desire. And our guys had that.”
It also requires a willingness to adapt quickly and manage practice schedules carefully. Yet there is more to it than that.
The NBA and the Players Association reach collective bargaining agreements to promote lasting equality. The CBA, with its various financial hurdles, is intended to combat the concept of dynasties and generate roster turnover.
“That’s definitely a problem,” Kerr said. “It puts more emphasis on developing young guys. And developing young guys while trying to win a championship – I know that firsthand – is not easy. (Malone) recently talked about it after they lost Game 7. All the forces kind of conspire against you when you’re the champion.
Deft moves this offseason and at the trade deadline could change the balance of power. Winning a title is hard enough, but building a roster of champions and maintaining it – even after the NBA Finals – is nearly impossible.
The 2022 champion Warriors lost a key player in Otto Porter Jr. The 2023 champion Nuggets lost crucial reserves Bruce Brown Jr. and Jeff Green. After leading the Raptors to the 2019 title, Kawhi Leonard signed with his hometown Los Angeles Clippers.
Then there is the natural evolution of the league and its players. The Warriors have done a fantastic job of maintaining a three-man core of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green. They are appreciated now, but their legend will expand over time.
“The competition is just much better now than it was 10 years ago when I came here,” Kerr said. “Part of it is the example that Steph and Klay set with the shooting. It really inspired a lot of young players, but also a lot of teams. There were also a lot of other trends going on, like floor spacing and bigs around the league shooting 3s.
“Given the pace and the skill and the number of shotmakers that people have, the competition is just dramatically better. When you have to beat four opponents in the playoffs – and most likely all of them can bury you and make 25 threes on any given night – dominance just becomes that much harder.
The Los Angeles Lakers went to three consecutive NBA Finals (2008-10) and won two. Miami Heat went to four in a row (2011-2014) and won two. The Warriors went to five (2015-19). It was as if each team passed the torch to the next over a twelve-year period.
The torch has gone out. The run-up to the final is a crowded field that becomes thinner along the way. And the teams that made it last year will have to conquer the biggest beast of them all.
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