Honorary Warrior For Life, Bob Myers?

end of an era

The master list of Honorary Warriors For Life lists everyone already polled.

Introducing Honorary Warriors For Life

The concept is simple. You get to vote on the question “Is X an Honorary Warrior For Life?”

What does that phrase mean? I once tried to define it, and people found it more fun to bring in their own definitions, so it is now back to being kept vague, like “Most Valuable Player” or “Greatest Of All Time” or “sandwich” or “chair”.

You can vote at the poll at the end of the article or at Twitter, or in the comments. Comment votes count as 10 normal poll votes.

The Nominee: Bob Myers

Duby gave a nice overview of Bob’s contributions.

and ended with

One way or another though, Myers departure signals the end of an era. It was a remarkable phase that probably could not have happened if not for his involvement. And for that, Myers is going to go down amongst the all-time greats. I don’t know if Eric Apricot is going to run a poll on this or not, but to me, Myers is without a doubt a Warrior for life.

It already feels different. But the memories are all the sweeter because of it.

I am sure every fan can find multiple decisions made in the Bob Myers era that they disagree with. (I just realized last draft that the Warriors drafted my last choice for the previous three drafts).

However, I believe the front office and coaching staff need to be evaluated on the overall body of work and the results. Every GM and coach has to make hundreds of decisions and will make many many mistakes just like a shooter will miss shots, and it is a mistake to fixate on a small number of them. It would be like being mad at Steph for missing a three at the end of the 2019 Finals and calling that a fireable offense. And frankly, as fans we see very little of what goes on on the practice court and the locker room and on trade calls, so it’s too easy to oversimplify hard decisions.

Ultimately, Bob Myers oversaw the most successful five year run in NBA history and four titles in eight years is right near the top of NBA dynasties. He used his extensive people skills and the respect he earned to mediate the wild personality conflicts in the KD era team, which was the best NBA team in history and also was one or two major injuries away from a dominant three-peat, despite the internal drama and turmoil.

So, good job Bob.

Recent news broke that Bob Myers will likely be joining ESPN as a commentator, so we may have to revisit this vote in a year after he’s had a chance to make people mad.

Your Vote

Vote in the embedded Substack poll below, or in the comments. Comment votes count as 10 normal poll votes.

*** To have your comment vote count, you must put #YES or #NO somewhere in the body of your comment, exactly once, and add a few words of explanation.