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It seems safe to say that the Golden State Warriors' dynasty is over.
Yes, the team will certainly be much better once everyone gets healthy and may very well end up contending for a championship again when that occurs, but the days of the Warriors steamrolling the NBA are over.
It all started back in 2015, when Golden State won 67 games and defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers in a six-game NBA Finals that featured a rather unhealthy Cavaliers squad that was missing Kevin Love for the entire series and Kyrie Irving from Games 2 through 6.
But before the Warriors even defeated the Cavaliers, they were given a pretty admirable fight by the Memphis Grizzlies in the second round.
Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol, Mike Conley and Co. even took a 2-1 series lead over the Warriors before Golden State reeled off three straight wins.
The Dubs will face the Grizzlies in Memphis on Tuesday night in a matchup that consists of two of the worst teams in the West, a stark change from the battles these clubs used to have.
So let's go back in time for a second and wonder: what would have happened to the Warriors' dynasty had the Grizzlies beaten them in 2015?
While Golden State looked dominant during the regular season that year, that club was a far cry from the 2017 and 2018 Kevin Durant-led squads that won back-to-back titles.
The Warriors were still very talented, featuring Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Draymond Green and Andre Iguodala (not to mention a deep bench), but it was also fairly clear that they could be had.
For a little while, it looked like Memphis may have had them.
The biggest weakness many felt Golden State had was that it relied too heavily on its perimeter-oriented offense and ran the risk of getting beaten up by the bigger teams in the league, like the Grizzlies.
So, when Memphis went up 2-1, everyone thought the Dubs had been exposed.
Of course, that didn't happen, but if it did, the Warriors would have only won two championships instead of three, and that would have made a rather colossal difference in how people viewed them going forward, especially considering their latter two titles came with Durant.
Think about it: if the Warriors would have lost to the Grizzlies in 2015 and then fell to the Cavaliers in the NBA Finals the following year, the stigma would have been that Golden State wasn't able to win a championship without Durant.
That would have certainly altered the public perception of the Dubs going forward, especially because there are plenty of people who question whether or not the Warriors would have beaten a healthy Cleveland squad in 2015.
Heck, one can even question if Golden State would have won 73 games the next season and then gotten Durant during the summer of 2016 had any of this occurred. I personally think Durant would have come regardless, but you never know how different dominoes falling in different places will change overall outcomes.
Obviously, none of this really matters. What's done is done. But it does show just how fragile reputations are in the NBA and that a couple of more wins from the Grizzlies could have changed how the Warriors were regarded forever.
