The Warriors dynasty has come and gone. It was not a mirage but a reality: the one that says that you can daydream, that the records of the past can be surpassed in the present and that there is nothing so anachronistic and at the same time so novel than doing things that were done more than half a half ago. century or, directly, that they had never been made. Now, we are in a new era: the Celtics are NBA champions, the sixth team to do so in the last six years. The last ones to repeat, of course, were the Warriors, who have also fished in this competition without an owner, when in 2022 they won their fourth ring in their sixth Finals and put the finishing touch to the dynasty. The last one that the best League in the world has seen in its long history. One of the best. That of the impossible victories, the crushing ones, the 73-9, the rivalry against LeBron James and his Cavaliers… All that and much more has had a team that has been eaten up, like many others, by the passage of time. You simply can’t always win. And innovation is not precisely in insistence.
Of course, the Warriors are willing to die with their boots on despite not even having reached the playoffs this season. Stephen Curry will continue to be 36 years old and on his way to 37, Draymond Green will do the same at 34 and Steve Kerr will continue as the boss on the bench. The only doubt is that of Klay Thompson, who is in negotiations with the franchise and has not yet reached an agreement. In February 2025 he will turn 25 years old, he has had a poor level in recent campaigns after suffering two of the most important injuries in basketball (meniscus tear and then the Achilles tendon), which he has suffered since then. He no longer makes three-pointers, his level of defense has fallen to many levels and he does not have the ability he once had, physically or mentally. And yet, the Warriors want to renew him: but the shooting guard refuses to accept a contract of only two seasons and is looking for a three-year contract. “It’s a matter of pride,” he says.
There was another option: Orlando Magic. A booming project that this season has returned to the playoffs for the first time since 2020 and that is beginning to see the light with Jamahl Mosley on the bench. The Florida entity is looking for a luxury veteran with whom to continue growing and tie up the project and Klay would have agreed to the transfer. However, they offer the same thing: two seasons. And they don’t want to move from there. Something understandable if we take into account that we are talking about a star who has begun to lose light and who has suffered greatly in a basketball season in which he has even come off the bench on several occasions (something unprecedented in the best years of the dynasty) and that ended in the worst possible way: with a defeat against the Kings in the play in (118-94) and a horrible performance by the shooting guard, who finished with 0 of 10 in field goals, 0 of 6 in triples and a -12 with him on the track. Bad thing.
Now, it will be Klay who will have to decide. The Warriors have already shown that they want to finish the project with the big three on the court and everything that this entails, that they have no problems not competing as in the past and living off nostalgia in the last vestiges of what was once a squad historical and today is one of older players who do not have the level to face a generational change that is already a fact. But they also have to settle accounts: they are the franchise that pays the most in luxury tax and they are not going to give away for the sake of giving away. And here comes Klay, who is looking for one last big contract before ending his career and thus adding more money (as anyone else would try) to the more than 225 million that he has earned during his sporting life in contracts alone. A legend that will be remembered as such despite this bitter (for now) ending. And one of the best shooters of all time. Which was, for a long time, the support of one of the greatest dynasties in history. Almost nothing.
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2024-06-22 15:40:49
#Klay #Thompsons #dilemma #goodbye #Warriors
