If the Clippers made the Western Conference Finals or the Wizards made the Eastern Conference Finals, it would be considered progress.
The Hawks made the Eastern Conference Finals last year and people considered it a magical season.
It is the equivalent of the nerdy kid finishing 3rd place in a race, not much was expected, so it is celebrated.
For certain teams and players though, just doing well is not enough, there is an expectation of championships and anything less than that is considered a failure. LeBron James said something very interesting after losing the NBA Finals. He wondered if it would be better to lose early in the playoffs than lose in the Finals, considering how the weight of those losses are seen.
Think about it like this.
Say LeBron only went to two finals in his career, but was 2-0. Would he be perceived differently than going to six finals and going 2-4? It is a legitimate question, but nothing that LeBron can do about it now because he is in a situation where every year he is judge by if he has won the championship or not regardless of the circumstances and obstacles he is dealing with.
The only players recently who had that weight on them was Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan, but it was different for them. Duncan is 5-1 in the Finals and Kobe is 5-2. Their legacies are cemented and locked in. LeBron’s legacy is still evolving, but now LeBron has someone to share that burden with.
The Golden State Warriors.
The Warriors winning the title last year was a feel good story. It was no fluke, they won 67 games in the Western Conference and never went to a 7th game in the playoffs. It wasn’t their fault players got hurt, their job was to wins games and the championship, not be miracle healers for their opponents hurt players.
Some people thought the Warriors run was more of the one and done variety and they would come back to Earth this season.
But the opposite has happened, all the criticism over their “lucky” title has FUELED them and they look more dominant than ever.
When you start a season 16-0 and people are comparing your team to the Jordan Bulls, you can’t just be good, you have to be GREAT every single night.
It is early in the season, so the pressure is not on yet, but when the playoffs come around, if the Warriors don’t go back to back it will be a colossal failure on their part.
This is a team that legitimately has a shot at 70 wins. When you are that good in the regular season, you can’t fail in the postseason. Ask Ronda Rousey what happens when a dominant champ gets KOed as heavy favorite. They are riding the wave right now, probably feeling invincible and everyone loves them. But, the photoshoppers and memes are just waiting in the wings. They build you up, just so when you fail they can put Jordan cry faces on you. They have to fight the urge to become overconfident because things are so easy right now. They aren’t getting punched in the face yet and like Mike Tyson once famously said, everyone has a plan until they get hit.
The Warriors will have the experience and confidence of being the champs on their side, but they are slowly but surely turning into the team opposing players despise.
It isn’t personal, it is the same way teams got JOY out of beating the HEAT and LeBron in general. When you are the top dog, people want to knock your off your throne. They are going to get the best effort from every team night after night.
When the playoffs start every team is going to want to be the team that knocks off the mighty Warriors.
That is pressure that only LeBron gets at the moment, we will see how the Warriors handle it as they try to go Back to Back….