Golden State Warriors: 5 reasons they’ll repeat as NBA champions in 2018
4. Cavs and Spurs have limited flexibility
Empires rise and fall in the NBA more quickly than people realize, but looking at the landscape of the league, the two greatest threats to the Golden State Warriors right now — the Cleveland Cavaliers and San Antonio Spurs — have very limited flexibility in how they can close the gap.
For the Cavaliers, they simply need more 3-and-D players to be properly equipped to handle this Western juggernaut. However, they’re already up to $125.7 million in guaranteed money for next season, and that’s with Kyle Korver, Deron Williams, Derrick Williams and James Jones all being free agents this summer.
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That will make it nearly impossible for general manager David Griffin to round out a competent bench, let alone make room for a legitimate difference-maker in free agency — and that’s assuming Griffin is even back as GM.
The team’s role players aren’t likely to fetch a significant return on the trade market either.
Richard Jefferson is old. Channing Frye played a grand total of 11 minutes in the Finals. Iman Shumpert is an absolute catastrophe on the offensive end and his defense is nowhere near good enough to make up for it. Tristan Thompson might have value elsewhere, but not on that bloated $89 million salary that pays a king’s ransom for a guy who had one and a half good games in the Finals.
Cleveland’s best asset (that could actually be moved, since Kyrie Irving and LeBron James aren’t going anywhere) is Kevin Love, but even his value isn’t what it once was. Besides, how much could the Cavaliers really upgrade the third member of their Big Three when what they really need is a Big Four?
2017-18 NBA Title
— Jeff Sherman (@golfodds) June 13, 2017
Warriors 1/2
Cavaliers 3/1
Spurs 12/1
Celtics 15/1
Wizards 30/1
Clippers 30/1
Rockets 30/1
Thunder 60/1
Raptors 60/1
As for the Spurs, most San Antonio fans are still bitter we never got to see how the rest of the Western Conference Finals played out with a healthy Kawhi Leonard, but the truth is, even if they had stolen Game 1, they were still heavy underdogs in the series.
LaMarcus Aldridge‘s game has declined at an alarmingly rapid rate, the aging Tony Parker will be out until January with his quadriceps injury and in order to sign a star talent like Chris Paul this summer, the Spurs would have to completely gut their roster depth.
Pau Gasol could singlehandedly gum up the works just by opting into his $16.2 million player option (which is his best move), Patty Mills is an unrestricted free agent, Jonathon Simmons is a restricted free agent and as great as Kawhi Leonard is, he’s not beating this Warriors team by himself.
The Spurs and Cavaliers will be elite teams again next season, but barring some sort of dramatic, unforeseen roster changes, they’ll remain a tier below Golden State.