Every week through the 2024-25 NBA season, we are going to take a deeper dive into a number of the league’s greatest storylines in an try to find out whether or not traits are based mostly extra actually or fiction shifting ahead.
[Last week: The NBA season is too long]
Reality or Fiction: Playoff Scars. The Thunder lack them.
The Oklahoma Metropolis Thunder are having fun with one of many biggest common seasons in NBA historical past, which is exceptional, contemplating in addition they entered this marketing campaign because the league’s youngest workforce. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Co. are shattering championship expectations for the event of a roster on the rise.
With that comes questions on their postseason prowess, as was the case final yr, once we warned you concerning the Thunder’s lack of Playoff Scars (or a workforce’s variety of playoff video games and collection victories in its earlier 4 years) compared to champions previous. Having gained a single playoff spherical in 2024, did Oklahoma Metropolis develop the requisite battle wounds to extra severely compete for the title this season?
The quick reply: No. The Thunder have performed 10 playoff video games over the previous 4 seasons, successful solely final yr’s first-round collection sweep of the New Orleans Pelicans. They misplaced in six video games of the second spherical to Luka Dončić’s Dallas Mavericks, who made the NBA Finals, earlier than the Mavericks traded Dončić.
(Pause for laughter.)
By each different indicator the Thunder are as critical a title menace as there may be or ever was. Their web score (12.8) is larger than any in historical past aside from Michael Jordan’s 72-win 1995-96 Chicago Bulls, a champion. They’re on tempo to turn out to be the seventh workforce to win 68 video games, and 4 of the opposite six are champions.
They’ve gained 75% of their video games in opposition to opponents with successful information and are even higher on the street, marks of an amazing workforce. Solely the Cleveland Cavaliers and Boston Celtics are inside Oklahoma Metropolis’s stratosphere by most metrics this season, however one factor separates Boston from the others: Playoff Scars.
Playoff Scars, 2025 Contenders
Amongst groups with successful information, solely the Detroit Pistons and Houston Rockets, who haven’t been within the playoffs since 2019 and 2020, respectively, possess fewer Playoff Scars than the Thunder or Cavaliers.
The Celtics, in the meantime, have much more postseason wounds than they’ve proven right here. Boston’s Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown and Al Horford have every appeared in additional playoff video games than Oklahoma Metropolis’s whole beginning lineup mixed. Solely Tony Parker and Kobe Bryant appeared in additional playoff video games than Tatum and Brown at their ages. With six convention finals appearances up to now eight seasons and a pair of NBA Finals showings over the earlier three years, Boston is among the many most battle-tested ever.
OKC pales compared to each different champion this century, save for the 2008 Celtics and 2020 Los Angeles Lakers, every of whom had their turnaround aided by the additions of two Corridor of Famers.
Check out the Playoff Scars (once more: a workforce’s variety of playoff video games and collection wins in its earlier 4 seasons) for each champion since 2003, when the NBA expanded to 4 best-of-seven rounds …
Playoff Scars, NBA Champions (since 2003)
By this measure the Celtics ought to be overwhelming favorites to repeat as NBA champions. They’ve developed as many Playoff Scars over the past 4 seasons as any champion of the previous 20 years, save for the 2006-07 San Antonio Spurs and 2017-18 Golden State Warriors, a pair of dynastic groups.
The 2014-15 Warriors are our baseline for a rising juggernaut that broke by means of to a championship earlier than anybody thought they have been prepared. They have been led by Stephen Curry, a 26-year-old MVP. They featured Klay Thompson and Draymond Inexperienced, a pair of 24-year-old future Corridor of Famers, who on the time had one All-Star look between them. By “Strength in Numbers,” they gained 67 video games.
The Thunder boast Gilgeous-Alexander, their 26-year-old MVP favourite. Rising stars Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams, who’ve one All-Star look between them thus far, are on the verge of their twenty third and twenty fourth birthdays, respectively. They’re deep, and they’re on tempo to do the 2015 Warriors one win higher.
Sixty-eight wins would put these Thunder in rarefied air, among the many seven most profitable common seasons in historical past. The six earlier groups to do all of it required extra Playoff Scars to perform the feat.
Playoff Scars, G.O.A.T groups
Oklahoma Metropolis can hold its hat on this, proof that these Thunder are already engaging in one thing that their (lack of) Playoff Scars steered they might not. That they are often this good with out the good thing about playoff expertise could also be all of the proof we want that they’re ready for what’s to return.
Willpower: Reality. Playoff Scars. The Thunder lack them. BUT! However! However … they might not want them.
