How do you build a world championship team in the NBA?
Despite what some might say, this is far more art than science.
What is really known is that this national team needs two or three stars or superstars, several reliable role players, based on a strong offense and a consistent playing style and the right head coach.
But what do you need to get those things?
How should teams achieve what they need to do to bring home hardware in the summer?
There may not be a “right” way, but it’s a copycat league, and in this era, the Golden State Warriors are going to be the closest thing to how a team can be formed.
The Warriors used the draft really well
A few years ago, the Warriors were a second-rate NBA franchise that rarely made the playoffs and rarely made it past the first round.
In 2009, things started to change, and it all started when they had the good fortune to draft Stephen Curry that June.
A year later, the new ownership team took over and in 2011 Clay Thompson was drafted.
Suddenly, a clear vision was established.
Instead of breaking the backcourt combo of Curry and Thompson, consistent with the traditional basketball philosophy and getting a prominent big man, the team decided to stick with both of them and build on their exceptional shooting skills.
Golden State made play-offs under head coach Mark Jackson in 2013 and 2014, but the owners saw that he was not unlocking the potential of the roster or assembling the locking room, and they fired him in favor of first-time head coach Steve Kerr.
Kerr, a longtime former player, decided to employ an offensive scheme that was used when Kerr was coaching a number of years ago using a hybrid of offensive schemes using Mike D’Antoni’s “Seven Seconds or Less” Phoenix Suns philosophy. Phil Jackson and Greg Popovich.
Warriors Motion Offenses. pic.twitter.com/qMYQZsJqEg
– Gonzalo Vazquez (@GVazquezNY) February 13, 2022
But the real key to the team was its defense, which has become one of the best in basketball.
Defense: Crime pic.twitter.com/dBzMKzM4sK
– Golden State Warriors (Warriors) February 1, 2022
As a result, the Warriors zoomed in on 51 to 67 wins in 2015 and won their first NBA Championship since 1975.
When the league’s pay cap felt a huge leap in the summer of 2016, they took advantage by signing future Hall of Famer Kevin Durant as a free agent, and they went from great to dynasty, winning two more rings in 2017 and 2018.
The team split in 2019 due to Durant’s move to Brooklyn and serious injuries to Curry and Thompson, but it did find a way to turn Lemon into Lemon.
It has developed young players like Andrew Wiggins and Jordan Poole and now healthy Curry, Thompson and the Drymond Green Warriors have eight wins from one more world title.
They are trend-setters
They say the really great people change the way they play, and the Warriors do.
In 2015, when they won their first championship in the Curry era, the average NBA team scored just 100.0 points per game and they were the only team to score at least 110 points per game.
Just four years later, the league average has risen to 111.2 points per game, and two-thirds of the league is at the top with 110 points per competition.
Almost every team across the NBA, somehow, adopted the Warriors’ run-and-shoot system right after they started winning the championship.
More interestingly, unlike what happened to a few “superteams” around the league, Golden State did not control or influence any of its stars.
There is a clear chain of command and leadership structure that no one really challenges.
Like the Los Angeles Lakers or Boston Celtics of the 1980s and the Chicago Bulls of the 1990s, the Warriors have formed teams “organizationally”, but more importantly, they have a core contract and philosophy from which they have never wavered, even when times are hard. Went and it seemed their dynasty was over.