Or, to put another spin on it: Green had somehow become even more detrimental to the Warriors than when he swiped at James’s groin in Game 4 of the 2016 finals, triggering a one-game suspension and the beginning of Golden State’s meme-worthy collapse. Worse, Draymond Green, the heart and soul of the team, had turned into a liability with his slacking offense and his shellacking of teammate Jordan Poole, a clutch contributor to last year’s title run. Stephen Curry had a shoulder injury, and Klay Thompson was a shadow of the offensive threat that had made the Splash Brothers so hard to stop. The Warriors, too, looked cooked earlier this season – at Christmastime they sat 11th in the West. While the new supporting cast has gelled and Davis has bounced back with a fury not seen since his most outstanding player run in the 2012 NCAA tournament, James has been free to pick his spots to make his presence felt – a luxury players rarely enjoy during the playoffs. Over the course of 28 days in April, the revamped Lakers went from pinching themselves amid the possibility of finishing with a winning record, to pipping Minnesota in the play-in game for the seventh seed, to toughing out No2 Memphis in the first round. Just as the Lakers seemed doomed to finish with their worst record since the last days of Kobe Bryant’s NBA career, GM Rob Pelinka shipped Beverley to Orlando and engineered a three-team trade for Westbrook that returned a bounty that included D’Angelo Russell, the No 2 overall pick in the 2015 draft. In January, insiders were talking about the Lakers possibly trading James to the Warriors in the offseason. All the while James carried the load, logging so many 40-minute games on a bad foot that people within the Lakers wondered if he was at risk of permanent rundown.

First-year coach Darvin Ham fumbled to close out games. Injury-prone forward Anthony Davis stumbled out of the gate with a bum foot. And even though both parties managed to summit the mountain again without getting in the other’s way – James won his fourth title in 2020 with the Lakers two years after his lowkey free-agent signing, while Golden State beat Boston in the NBA finals last year to keep the sun from setting on their dynasty – there was scant reason to believe the prevailing powers of the past 16 NBA seasons would be drawn into another battle royale.įive months ago the Lakers were a 2-10 mess that featured Russell Westbrook and Patrick Beverley, two guards with shooting ranges as short as their tempers.

Recall: in 2018 the Warriors swept James out of the NBA finals for the third time in his august career, sweet revenge that came just two years after James made the 73-9 Warriors a laughing stock for blowing a 3-1 finals lead while delivering on his championship promise to Cleveland.

Four seasons stephen king