The Big Lead

DeMarcus Cousins Injury Doesn't Change Warriors' Winning Script

By Brian Giuffra

None
facebooktwitter

The roof is crumbling in Golden State. The Warriors blew a 31-point lead against the Clippers. DeMarcus Cousins is injured and likely out the rest of the playoffs. Kevin Durant seems destined to leave in free agency this offseason. All of which can only mean one thing: The Warriors are winning their third straight NBA Championship.

What, you thought this was a sign of an apocalypse in the bay? Hell no. This team, with or without Cousins, is still the most talented in the NBA by a wide margin, and while the Giannis Antetokounmpo and the Bucks have been a fun secondary storyline this season, the ending to this movie is a foregone conclusion. The Dubs are winning it all, just like we all predicted back in October. Sorry to ruin the ending.

Consider, for a second, last year. The Rockets were the best team in the NBA. They were the talk of the league. They had home-court advantage in the Western Conference finals. They had a 3-2 lead against the Warriors. They had the league MVP, James Harden. It was the perfect recipe for the upset. Then Chris Paul got hurt the Warriors cruised to their second straight NBA title and third in four years.

You think losing Boogie to a what is feared to be a torn quad is going to change that same outcome from repeating itself? Haven’t you ever seen Star Wars? This is the same trilogy. And the force always wins. 

Cousins wasn’t on the Warriors last year. Cousins wasn’t on this team for much of the season while he recovered from a torn Achilles. When he came back, there were moments when his defense (or lack of effort on that end of the court) actually hurt the Warriors. Is he a dynamic player who will still get a max contract this offseason from another team? Yeah. But he wasn’t a difference maker for the Warriors when he was on the court and he won’t be a difference maker for them now that he’s off the court.

The Warriors’ show runs through Steph Curry and Kevin Durant. Their success is dictated by that duo’s play. Klay Thompson and Draymond Green are great supporting actors. But they’re like Adam Scott and Richard Jenkins in Step Brothers. The movie isn’t the same without them, but Will Ferrelland John C. Reilly are the stars.

This isn’t the surprise ending you’d expect from a M. Night Shyamalan movie, but it is how the script will play out. We may not know all of the storylines or surprise heroes yet, but the end result is the same. Warriors by 1,000,000.