How do you go about projecting the win total for next year's Golden State Warriors? There's no precedent for a team that won an NBA record 73 wins adding one of the top two or three players in the world. With Kevin Durant in the picture, 74 or 75 seems at least within the realm of possibility, which is crazy because few people thought the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls' record would ever be topped.
For the Warriors, this unprecedented situation means that their are unprecedented expectations. Going into training camp, it would be counterproductive to be thinking about winning 70-plus games again. Draymond Green, who followed up his two straight trips to the NBA Finals by spending much of his summer with Team USA, indicated at Monday's media day that the mere thought of chasing another record is exhausting.
"To be quite frank with you, I don't even want to win 74 games, or 75 games," Green told reporters, via USA Today's Sam Amick. "It's brutal."
This would be a significant statement from anybody on the team. The fact that it's Green, though, speaks volumes. More than any of his teammates, he was vocal about wanting to go after the record last year. After the way the Warriors went out, though, it's understandable.
The mental and physical toll of these long seasons add up, and that's part of the reason why it's rare for teams to get to the NBA Finals multiple times in a row. This Golden State team made history and seemed set to repeat as champions before surrendering a 3-1 lead to the Cleveland Cavaliers -- after an experience like that, it's difficult to get excited for the everyday grind of training camp, the preseason and then the long slog that is the 82-game schedule. Fatigue and motivation can become challenges, and getting ready for the playoffs becomes much more important than getting a certain number of wins.
Warriors coach Steve Kerr has said recently that this is one of the extra benefits of signing Durant -- it has given the group a new energy that wouldn't have been there if the same roster had returned. People are excited about making this work with Durant and trying something different. No one knows exactly what it will look like, but everybody knows it has the potential to be special.
For that reason, and because this team might employ the three best shooters on the planet, perhaps it's unwise to totally dismiss the idea of Golden State having another record-breaking season. Even if the players themselves don't want to talk about it.
