Based on NBA history, the Brooklyn Nets have no chance to win the NBA championship. Every single title-winning team throughout the past four decades of NBA history has fit a certain mold – one that isn’t shaped like this 2020-21 Nets roster. If Kevin Durant, James Harden, and Kyrie Irving want to raise the Larry O’Brien trophy at the end of the season, they’ll need to destroy everything we know about what it takes to win a title.
The Brooklyn Nets don't fit the championship mold
For the last 37 NBA seasons there's been a surefire way to determine which teams are actual title contenders or just regular season pretenders. It's actually been much simpler than some complex formula or intangible quality that the team possesses. Virtually all 37 NBA champions from 1984 to 2020 were in the top 10 of defensive rating. Every single one. The number might actually be much higher than 37, but that's the furthest that the stat seems to have been tracked.
There have only been three teams ever to disregard this metric, and even that is easily explainable. Those champions were the 1996 Houston Rockets (12th in Defensive Rating), the 2001 Los Angeles Lakers (22nd), and the 2018 Golden State Warriors (11th). Notice anything similar about those teams? They were all on their championship hangover, having won the title in the previous season. In fact, all three teams were ranked in the top 2 of defensive rating the year prior. The Rockets were second in 1994, the Lakers were first in 2000, and the Warriors were second in 2017. Those teams knew that could turn it on when they needed to, and had nothing left to prove in the regular season as reigning champions.
There are only five teams left in the 2021 NBA playoffs that fit the requirement. The Philadelphia 76ers (2nd), the Utah Jazz (4th), the Phoenix Suns (6th), the Los Angeles Clippers (8th), and the Milwaukee Bucks (9th). Where do the Brooklyn Nets rank, you may ask? They're a dreadful 113.1 in defensive rating during the season, good for 22nd behind stalwart teams like the Detroit Pistons and the Chicago Bulls.
The Nets have played by their own rules
This has been the knock on Brooklyn ever since the trade for James Harden was consummated. “How will they be able to defend anybody?” was the question raised by every skeptic and hater. But doubts were also cast on the Heat when LeBron James and Chris Bosh joined Dwyane Wade in Miami. Wade and James played too similar a style, and they'd just have overlapping skillsets that wouldn't maximize the roster enough to win a championship. They wouldn't be able to co-exist. But while they did stumble at first, they racked up two titles in four years.
Just like the Heat, the Nets' triumvirate of NBA superstars does indeed have players who have similar strengths. But at the end of the day, the playoffs are all about how far your superstars can carry you. And despite the lack of a conventional defensive roster, they do have something no other NBA champion in 37 years has either – the greatest offense the league has ever seen. The Brooklyn Nets carry an unprecedented offensive rating of 117.3, the highest mark ever recorded. In this modern era defined by some of the greatest scorers to ever play, this group perhaps personifies the offensive revolution this game is going through.
In this second round series, the Nets were matched up against a Milwaukee Bucks team that was supposedly a “true” title contender by the existing metric. But after two lopsided affairs played while James Harden has been sidelined with a hamstring injury, the Nets are looking like a true threat to the NBA title, if not the absolute favorite. Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving haven't even broken a sweat yet. The pair has combined for just 104 points through Games 1 and 2. But given the offensive ceiling that those stars have, there's another gear left to reach assuming they'll need it.
Perhaps the only true roadblock they have left would be to face a team with an imposing threat in the paint. Joel Embiid and the Philadelphia 76ers could disrupt the offensive flow the Nets have had thus far. But after they themselves gave up Game 1 against an inferior Atlanta Hawks side, you'd be hard-pressed to make the argument that they could truly challenge the Nets, who've wiped the floor with Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Bucks thus far.
At this point in the playoffs, the Brooklyn Nets raising the Larry O'Brien trophy under a steady stream of confetti seems more like an inevitability rather than a fantasy. But there's a reason why it's never happened for an offense-only team in the NBA's recorded history. Kevin Durant and the Brooklyn Nets have to prove it first, and break the championship mold to get there.
Follow Us
Subscribe