Pace and Space

The Golden State Warriors always prided themselves on “strength in numbers”, but the only numbers anyone’s counting in Oakland as the team prepares to depart across the Bay next season are the ones on the potential lost free agent contracts for Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson. Durant suffered what history says will be a career-ending injury to his Achilles in Game 5, while Thompson, after scoring 30 points, collapsed in a literal sense down the stretch when his ACL finally said “no mas” in his left knee. Although, to Klay’s credit, holy crap: Klay walking back onto the court WITH …

I am, in my heart of hearts, a deeply religious man. I believe in the gods, and I believe that the gods are the arbiters of probability, the referees who decide whether Schrodinger’s Cat lives or dies, and in their various guises made manifest at sporting events. And not in the performative Christianity “thank God for this championship” sort of way. Just once I’d like to hear a player on the losing side say “well, we’d have won, but you heard the other team. God wanted them to win, clearly.” No, I’m talking about the kind of divine intervention that …

The Golden State Warriors finally failed to hit 109 points in a Finals game, a score they’d posted like clockwork in each of the first three games of this championship series despite losing two of them. Too bad for them, because 109 would’ve been enough to win this one. As it stands they lost 105-92 to the Toronto Raptors and look an awful lot like a team that’s going to be forced to surrender when the battle shifts back to Canada for Game 5. In some small way, this is validation for Kevin Durant. Stephen Curry looked completely spent in …

Granted, Shaun Livingston is not J.R. Smith, but for Stephen Curry, his 47-point, 14-of-31 shooting, 6-of-14 from three and 13-of-14 from the line, eight-rebound, seven-assist gem of a game, one of the greatest performances in defeat in NBA Finals history, was wasted in a listless 123-109 loss in Game 3 as the Toronto Raptors grabbed back home-court advantage. Not since LeBron James‘ 51-point, 8-rebound, 8-assist performance last year, which was ruined when Smith lost track of the clock and launched a thousand Internet memes has one player done so much with his teammates just standing around watching. Although on the …

The Golden State Warriors scored 109 points in each of the first two games of the NBA Finals. Trouble for Toronto came when they scored 118 in the first game and just 104 in the second, leaving the series tied at 1, home court advantage for now having evaporated, and the series on its way back to Oakland for Games 3 and 4 as the Dubs send off Oracle Arena in potential in-six championship fashion before heading into the new fancy digs in San Francisco next season. Game 2 was made possible by one of Golden State’s patented third quarters, …