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Par Guillaume Kagni | Journaliste sportif
With 4 rings to his name, in 3 different franchises, LeBron James has one of the best records in the history of the sport. But he could have had more, particularly in 2018, if JR Smith hadn’t made his legendary mistake against the Warriors. Nick Young looks back at this lunar action.
Once again, a new NBA champion will be crowned this season. Since the Warriors in 2017 and 2018, not a single team has managed to retain the Larry O’Brien trophy, proving that it’s now very difficult to keep a rotating roster. Sometimes all it takes is one departure to unhinge the machine, as demonstrated by Jordan Poole at Golden State or Bruce Brown at the Nuggets.
In fact, you’d almost forget that, from 2015 to 2018, the Finals didn’t move an inch. For 4 consecutive years, Stephen Curry and his teammates took on LeBron James and the Cavaliers. They came away with 3 rings over the period, compared to just one for the King, but what a ring it was! Trailing 3-1 in the 2016 Finals, the Cavs had made history by overcoming that deficit.
Nick Young looks back at the 2018 Finals and JR Smith
In fact, they might even have shared the crowns had it not been for JR Smith’s huge blunder in 2018. As a reminder, with Cleveland trailing by a point with just seconds remaining in Game 1, the guard didn’t drive to the basket to grab an offensive rebound, but rather purposely wasted time thinking his team was leading. Nick Young, who was with the Warriors, remembers this suspended moment.
I was totally lost. JR was so confident in what he was doing that I thought the Cavaliers were leading. I knew we were winning, but he could have gone straight up on his rebound. Instead, he took the ball out again, so I thought I’d read the scoreboard wrong. We clearly avoided the worst, even if, for us, the real Finals were the series against the Rockets.
We were wary because LeBron could have changed the series. He could have scored 50 points a game. In fact, he put up 51 in Game 1. The guy dribbled past me at the top of the key and dunked so easily on JaVale McGee. I felt so bad.
LeBron James wasn’t the same beast in the playoffs, so the Warriors were forced to be wary of him. But according to Nick Young, at Golden State, the real series for the title in 2018 was that conference final against James Harden and Chris Paul’s Rockets. Once that stage was over, Steve Kerr and his men were just afraid that the King would average 50 points and be unplayable. Fortunately, fate sent them JR Smith to help them out.
