The Warriors' Quest to Defeat History

The Golden State Warriors have moved through the regular season like the protagonist of a pulpy revenge flick with little interest in setting dramatic stakes. The rest of the NBA kidnapped their son during the opening credits, and two hours and eight minutes of Tony Scott-directed carnage have followed in their wake. The typical Warriors game this year has consisted of Steph Curry dropping 18 points and six assists in the first half, Klay Thompson drilling some threes to start the third quarter, then a long, leisurely coast toward a rosy conclusion. The starters are playing NBA 2K at the hotel by the time the final buzzer sounds.

With the playoffs starting this weekend, though, this is the part where the going is supposed to get tough. While the Warriors will breeze past the Pelicans and might not encounter a worthy opponent until the Western Conference Finals, at some point, their momentum will meet resistance. This is a normal and obvious thing: every team sweats through the latter stages of the playoffs. What will be peculiar about the Warriors attempting to grind out wins against the Spurs or Cavs is that we're accustomed to seeing them levitate toward victory. They obliterate the competition and then nap through the fourth quarter. By a whole mess of metrics, they're the most dominant team the league has seen since Michael Jordan's Bulls.

The crucial difference between these Warriors and the celebrated ghosts they're chasing is that the Dubs haven't actually accomplished much yet. Last season's squad lost a scoring bonanza of a game seven to the Clippers in the first round. The year before that, they were waxed in the Western Conference Semifinals by the Spurs. They've still got the untested label affixed to their backs; they don't truly know pain yet. This is worth mentioning because, as a general rule, youngish NBA teams don't show up one season and freight train their way to a title. They usually suffer a high-profile failure first. It's as if the league is governed by some rigid cosmic force that insists upon humbling every up-and-comer before it allows them to be happy.

This isn't to say the Warriors can't get where they're trying to go. They're just swimming against the current, history-wise. Magic Johnson nabbed the Finals MVP in his 1980 rookie season, but he had a little help from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who was the league's best player at the time. Tim Duncan in 1999 is probably the finest example of a star neophyte leading a previously not-title-worthy squad to a title, unless you want to reach back to Bill Walton cobbling together enough healthy games to carry the Trail Blazers to the top of the heap in 1977. Deep, frustrated playoff runs aren't absolute prerequisites to success.

However—big intake of breath here—Wilt's Sixers, Clyde and Willis's Knicks, Kareem's Bucks, Bird's Celtics, Dr. J's Sixers, Isiah's Pistons, Jordan's Bulls, Hakeem's Rockets, Shaq and Kobe's Lakers, and LeBron's Heat all flashed promise and came up agonizingly short once or several times before hitting their respective apexes. Plus there are a smattering of other aspirational teams—Barkley's Suns come to mind—who burned bright, but never quite broke through.

The point being: what Steph Curry and Klay Thompson are trying to pull off is barely precedented. The notion that a group of players need to, in studio show gasbag parlance, learn how to win sounds like bullshit conventional anti-wisdom, but the NBA record books suggest it contains some truth. Progressing through life is becoming acquainted with previously unknown terrors. Perhaps playing in the NBA Finals is such a terror. A strange challenge that freaks you the fuck out until it doesn't anymore; something you learn to cope with only through experience.

If any team can thrive in an unfamiliar environment, it's these Warriors. The dream-like state that has characterized their season will dissipate soon—Kawhi Leonard's mere existence is the sound of pots and pans banging together—but that doesn't mean they're wholly unprepared for what's to come. They're too talented and elegantly organized to enter the crucible and collapse completely. What might come will be new, and they might struggle with it, but struggling and sinking are not the same thing. The Warriors aren't as ready as their rivals, but they might just be better.