A New Era In The NBA

The “Big 3” era brought us incredible memories: Lebron’s first title, the Heatles, the Hampton 5, without it we wouldn’t have Game 7, 2017. The rise of the super-team was something to behold. But as the sun fades on this era, we have come upon the dawn of something new: Dynamic Duos. All across the league, you can find teams with two noteworthy players, destined for greatness. This is what makes so great, and what makes this season one with more intrigue than we have seen since 2010. So much intrigue, that the oddsmakers in Vegas can not put one team ahead of another for title contention. You can give a solid case for 8-10 teams to come out of their conference and vie for a NBA Championship. From teams with superstars like Milwaukee with Giannis and a solid core around him, down to small market teams like Denver and Utah, both with stars like Jokic/Murray and Conley/Mitchell respectively. This new era leaves all basketball fans with a feeling of hope and optimism for their team, for we now truly have parity again in the NBA. 

For me, what makes the future of this league so promising is ownership and the youth movement. Let’s start with the owners, if we are allowed to call them that anymore (insert side eye emoji here). The league is starting to turn towards younger, more “in the now” ownership that has eyes on revolutionizing the game. I’m sure we all have seen the clips from the introduction press conference in LA, we all saw how hype Steve Ballmer was. While cringe, I love his enthusiasm for his players and the game as a whole. I feel as if he is going to be just the first shoe to drop in younger ownership who want to be more hands on with their club, a la Mark Cuban.

Let’s take just a second to talk about how young this league is trending. Teams like Denver, Sacramento, Atlanta, and others that either are in the middle of their rebuild or are coming out of it. Take a look at this image: 6 of these 10 teams will vie for a playoff spot, and teams like Chicago and Orlando are trending the right direction. I’m years past, we’ve seen teams who have a bunch of grizzled veterans and experienced role guys (basically every title team since 2012) but times are changing. One of the teams in the conference final this year was top 10 younger roster and I have a feeling that number will only grow next season (looking at you Denver Nuggets). And with Adam Silver being hesitant to bump the minimum age to be eligible for the draft, the kids coming out of college will only get younger.

This new era leaves all basketball fans with a feeling of hope and optimism for their team, for we now truly have parity again in the NBA.