Hard to believe but here the Oklahoma City Thunder are but with only one member left standing from their original Fab Five which Sam Presti drafted piece by piece to make the team a championship contender in a few short years. It makes you fully understand the challenge of sustaining a high level franchise in a small market especially during a time when there’s such an influx of television money escalating the salary cap with little sanity attached.
Sam Presti has a formidable challenge in front of him with Kevin Durant leaving for the Warriors. Only Russell Westbrook and Nick Collison remain from the 2012 core of OKC’s Finals team. Collison is set to step down from playing after next season and I think most would agree it will be tough to keep Russell Westbrook long term.
Jeff Green is a journeyman vet with the Clippers and has had a nice career, but not a stellar one. He was the first to go being sent to the Celtics in the trade which brought Kendrick Perkins to Oklahoma City.
James Harden was next to go in the infamous trade which sent The Beard to the Rockets in exchange for basically what turned out to be Jeremy Lamb and Steven Adams with some other pieces attached.
Serge Ibaka just recently was dealt to Orlando in exchange for Victor Oladipo, Ersan Ilyasova, and Domantus Sabonis.
The face of the franchise in Kevin Durant has now moved on to the newest super team in the NBA in Oakland.
And like those Fab Five teams at Michigan at the collegiate level OKC’s Fab Five never won a championship as well. More to the point, unlike that Michigan team which did return to the NCAA Championship Game, the Thunder’s Fab Five never again returned to the NBA Finals.
With Durant’s departure the dream of Oklahoma City ever returning to the NBA Finals is pretty much over. More to the point, Sam Presti will have to roll up his sleeves and pull every rabbit out of his hat to sustain the Thunder as a playoff contender albeit a championship contender.
As I see the Thunder down the immediate road I see a nice young core of Adams, Oladipo, Kanter, Payne, and Sabonis. Maybe Dion Waiters will be retained, maybe not. A team more like the Utah Jazz and the Portland Trailblazers in terms of Western Conference pecking order. If Westbrook would stay, perhaps a notch or two higher.
From Day 1, Sam Presti’s mantra in Oklahoma City has been to maintain sustainability and to date he’s done an incredible job as the Thunder have been the fourth winningest franchise in all of professional sports.
I hope people don’t blame Presti for what has transpired because he’s done a marvelous job in Oklahoma City. I’m of the firm belief even if he kept James Harden this story evolves pretty much the same way except possibly with more ego and trashing like we’ve seen this week in the Howard Beck piece directed at Russell Westbrook.
Again, it’s more of an indictment of the times and our culture than what Sam Presti did or didn’t do.
I hope Presti stays in Oklahoma City long term. He better or else Clay Bennett and his other owners could be in a much tighter spot than they are now.
Oklahoma City as an NBA city will have to come to terms with what just happened from 2009 to the present isn’t likely to happen again. Generational players like Kevin Durant don’t just fall into your lap everyday. Just think what would have happened in Oklahoma City if the Portland Trailblazers hadn’t selected Greg Oden as the No. 1 pick over Kevin Durant. Think about feeling cheated then.
Oklahoma City was not in anyway cheated. It was a glorious ride for a small market city which made four Western Conference Finals in the past six years.
Who would have ever thought in their wildest dream Hurricane Katrina could have started a chain of events which would put Oklahoma City in the center of the NBA universe for almost an entire decade.
Books will be written. I would suspect an ESPN 30/30 movie will be made.
In no way do I feel cheated. Quite the opposite, I feel like the basketball gods woke me up and whispered into my ear one night, “Enjoy the ride, Michael from Deer Creek, Oklahoma. Enjoy the ride.”
And I made sure I did every step of the way because things like this were never meant to be permanent or a given. But more of a blessing.
I’m good and can’t wait to see what kind of players Steven, Victor, and Cam turn out to be in the next several years.
Life is nothing more than an evolution of rotating cycles. The Thunder’s new cycle pretty much begins now. It won’t be as glorious. The bandwagon jumpers will bitch and moan, but for those of us who love hoops we’ll be okay.
Mike Jackson
Wonderful reflections on this slice of Camelot in OKC!