DNHQ Rooting Guide: NBA Cup Knockouts. #1 LAL vs #4 PHX. #1 MIL vs #4 NYK. Plus open thread.
Our Warriors-centric guide to all the petty rivalries
#1 LAL vs #4 PHX
L.A. Lakers
Ex-Warriors
LAL had Juan Toscano-Anderson and Damian Jones, but traded them in a big mid-season reset.
Friends
None.
Unrequited Love
Parts of Dub Nation really wanted to acquire Jarred Vanderbilt (All-NBA Motor) and Rui Hachimura.
Warriors Villains
LeBron James. LeBron pioneered the age of players assembling as mercenary super squads at resource-rich franchises and then leaving when they’ve strip-mined everything for maximum short-term gain.
LeBron combines all-time genius level play and athleticism (explosiveness plus invulnerability) with petty crap. One sequence that sums it up: His 2018 Finals Game 1 regulation performance was one of the best games I’ve ever seen; he then follows that with a mental meltdown after J.R. Smith’s meltdown; then smashes a whiteboard in the locker room after and breaks his hand and ruins any chance of an upset; then shows up to the post-Finals press conference in a “oh you mean this?” hand cast so that people would ask him the story.Anthony Davis. AD pioneered the age of players having multiple years left on their contract forcing themselves off the team via PR tricks, sudden injury issues and generally abandoning their team and contract.
AD forced a trade to the Lakers by sieging the Pelicans well before his contract expired to team up with LeBron, though NOP took an amusingly long time to call his bluff. He recently won no fans in Dub Nation when the heavy favorite Lakers got a ref-colored win in the Play-In and he followed it with giddy trash talk.
Petty Rivalries
Austin Reaves worked his way up from the G-League, works hard on both ends, and has become possibly the worst sport-destroying foul-baiter on the planet. He must be stopped for the sake of impressionable children, the elderly, people looking in the direction of his games, marine habitats and basically all terrestrial lifeforms.
LAL picked Jalen Hood-Schifino at #17 right before GSW’s #19 Brandin Podziemski. You can either think this has no impact on GSW, or you can hope that JHS doesn’t end up being a superstar that didn’t quite fall to GSW.
Team Grudges
Most of Dub Nation wished ill on the Lakers franchise long before LeBron and AD showed up to strip-mine. Now that they’re together, it is a recipe for Dub Nation disgust. That doesn’t even bring in the recent ref-fueled playoff defeats in 2023 and 2021.
Phoenix Suns
Ex-Warriors
Damion Lee. Husband of Steph Curry’s sister. Honorary Warrior For Life!
Kevin Durant. Honorary Warrior, but not quite Honorary Warrior For Life in the last election. Generally positive feelings from many but not all fans in Dub Nation.
Friends
Robert Sarver was known as one of the cheapest and most unpleasant owners in the NBA. From a basketball perspective, this has been bad for PHX and good for everyone else playing against PHX. Unfortunately, he’s been replaced by a big spending new owner.
Warriors Villains
Grayson Allen rose to fame in college as a talent who couldn’t stop cheap shooting opponents. Then for two seasons he was a merely annoying foil until he hit big shots in the MEM-GSW Play-In overtime. Then he re-torpedoed his reputation with his wild flagrant foul taking out Alex Caruso for weeks.
Petty Rivalries
Devin Booker seems to have developed his Flop Force powers and gets a bit more annoying each year.
Eric Gordon was an important player for the James Harden Houston Rockets which almost took out the KD era Warriors.
Team Grudges
I don’t think there’s a rivalry yet, as PHX and GSW haven’t played in the playoffs. There is natural attention from PHX’s success and recent assembly of the Booker-KD-Beal Big Three.
Before that, PHX has been horrible from the 2010 last gasp of the Seven Seconds Or Less Suns through 2019. When you’re horrible, you get a zillion high draft picks and now they’ve drafted themselves into being a promising team. It also means there’s no way to develop a team rivalry since PHX has been irrelevant for so long and then has managed to crash out of the playoffs before GSW could face them.
#1 MIL vs #4 NYK
Milwaukee Bucks
Ex-Warriors
None, I think?
Friends
Giannis Antetokounmpo. He and Stephen Curry regularly pick each other first in All-Star games. Make googly eyes and godly plays together.
From Giannis’s Honorary Warrior For Life election (he fell short):
Dub Nation has been pining for this MVP to bolt Milwaukee and join the Warriors. We also have a soft spot for him for picking Stephen Curry first when he was All-Star captain, which Steph rewarded with this absurd alley-oop.
Giannis has also been openly humble about his MVP case, claiming not to care about it, in stark contrast to certain other bearded players who are obsessed with MVP. In fact, Giannis has been taking jabs at Harden and Harden has been taking bigger jabs back. Here’s the latest round from today:
James Harden addresses the comments Giannis made during the All-Star draft about assists: "I average more assists him than him, I think....I don't see what the joke is." Later: "But I wish I could just run and be 7 feet and just dunk." youtube.com/watch?v=tUCf4p…So the poll results were very friendly to the reigning MVP.
Poll. Dub Nation, imagine you see Giannis Antetokounmpo in a game with no practical implications for the Warriors. (So not against GSW, ignore draft picks, playoff seeding, etc.) Do you want him to do well or poorly?Well 73.4% / Poor 4.6% / Don’t care either way 20.2% / Don’t know who they are 1.7%.
Dub Nation has lots of affection for the Greek Freak, but he falls juuuust short of the 75% mark. He is hereby awarded Honorary Warrior.
Damian Lillard is popular in Dub Nation, even getting elected last year as a Honorary Warrior For Life. He’s been a rival to Steph for king long-distance shooter and he gets used as a prop to diminish Steph, but ultimately, as I wrote:
Dame was born in Oakland, is proud to represent it, and he returns often for charity functions. His amazing peak performances and Oakland connections gather admiration, and he was one of the pioneers with Stephen Curry of the long-range three-pointer.
Conveniently, his Blazers have gone 0-3 against the Dubs, losing in 2016, 2017 and 2019 so few bitter feelings have developed from Dub Nation, and Lillard has refrained from trash-talking the Warriors in the press despite it all.
In fact, he has led stunning upset playoff victories over the most annoying Warriors rivals: James Harden’s Houston Rockets (2014), Chris Paul’s and Blake Griffin’s LA Clippers (2016) and Russell Westbrook’s OKC Thunder (2019).
He’s irritated Dub Nation since then, most recently saying Steph wasn’t an MVP candidate because he himself had been dismissed, and then early in the season, he said Steph was getting harder looks because his team was injured and young. Which was kind of obvious, but in those early days of the season, there was a (idiotic) prevalent storyline that Steph Curry had been old and decrepit for years and only KD kept him relevant, so Dub Nation did not listen to that with friendly ears.
The whole summer trade to MIL was messy. Lillard had played the loyal soldier in POR until he asked for a trade. But not only that, but he tried to force a trade to Miami (which to be honest would have been a great destination). That led to POR spitefully and optimally holding out and finally getting some good returns while also putting Dame with a contender.
Unrequited Loves
Brook Lopez has been a longtime target of Dub Nation.
Warriors Villains
None?
Petty Rivalries
Jae Crowder was the Agitator for PHX and has snipped at GSW for years, carping about KD and more recently trash talking Draymond.
Cameron Payne was a role player for the KD OKC team that almost took out GSW in 2016.
Team Grudges
Not sure who hates the Bucks, as they didn’t win a playoff series from 2002 to 2018, disappointed in two straight playoffs, finally broke through, taking out the damned annoying Chris Paul Suns, and then fought valiantly despite injuries in the next couple of playoffs.
New York Knicks
Ex-Warriors
Donte DiVincenzo. Hard working, two-way role player. GSW couldn’t come close to matching this contract, which is good for GSW’s reputation for having players play for cheap and reviving their careers.
Friends
None
Unrequited Loves
Isaiah Hartenstein has been a longtime target of Dub Nation.
Warriors Villains
None?
Petty Rivalries
None
Team Grudges
Amazingly little to say about this historic franchise. Madison Square Garden was a great location for Steph Curry’s 54-point coming out party. It was also a great site for hearing Knick fans wail when GSW drafted Steph one spot ahead of the NYK pick.
Now, NYK rarely plays GSW and the game never has real playoff implications. NYK has been so irrelevant for so long that it is a blessing. If they ever harnessed their regional wealth and media influence, they could become a second power hub like the Lakers. As it is, they remain merely blah.
That Lakers bogus time out ending was so ridiculous. Unbelievable.
If anyone needs a quick basketball fix: Pop draining a buzzer beater
https://youtube.com/shorts/eh_Z608tqso?si=wO3WQz1cf1U2PMxI