When LeBron James infamously announced he would be joining the Heat in the summer of 2010, the NBA’s first “super team” was officially built, as Chris Bosh of the Raptors would join The Kings and Dwyane Wade in Miami.
It was the perfect storm of free agency, media opportunity, and group of superstar players willing to take less money to play together in the quest of an unbeatable team. After a difficult start to the 2010-11 season, which ended in a Finals loss to the Dallas Mavericks, the Heat won the title the next two years before losing in the championship again this past year.
In the wake of this possible collusion but unmatched success, other NBA teams began to follow the Heat’s model, trying to replicate what architect Pat Riley was able to build.
In 2012, the Los Angeles Lakers got involved in a four-team deal that ended up sending then-Orlando Magic center Dwight Howard to LA, teaming Howard–the league’s most dominant center–up with all-time shooting guard Kobe Bryant, future Hall-of-Famer Steve Nash, and the always-reliable Pau Gasol. On paper, it looked like an incredible team and probably the best in the West. But, in actuality, it was a near-disaster.
Los Angeles went just 45-37 that season, sneaking into the playoffs, before getting swept in the first round by the San Antonio Spurs, the ultimate non-super team. Howard became a free agent that summer and turned down significantly more money from the Lakers to sign with the Houston Rockets, shocking the basketball world and ending the wacky, unsuccessful super team experiment in Hollywood.
In Houston, Howard was a part of another star squad with James Harden and Chandler Parsons, but that group couldn’t advance past the first round of the postseason either. Parsons moved on to division rival Dallas Mavericks a few months later.
The Heat were the only super team to experience much success at all, but they were broken up this summer when LeBron announced he was going back to Cleveland to join his home state Cavaliers with Kyrie Irving, and after a trade, Kevin Love as well. Problem is, Cleveland is just 22-20 so far this season and is the fifth-best team in the relatively weak Eastern Conference.
In the other conference, the Lakers have been stripped of most of their talent and are stuck in the West’s cellar while the Rockets have been pretty good, but are just tied for fourth with Dallas. The current leaders of the East and West? The Atlanta Hawks (34-8) and Golden State Warriors (33-6). What?
Do the Hawks and Warriors have really good players? For sure. But are those teams, along with the Trail Blazers (31-11, No. 2 in West), Grizzlies (29-12, No. 3 in West), Wizards (29-13, No. 2 in East), Raptors (27-14, No. 3 in East) and multiple others, built solely from free agent superstars who plotted to play with each by circumventing the salary cap? Nope. Those teams, mostly, are composed of original draft picks or players acquired in small-scale trades or signings.
The Hawks’ best players are Jeff Teague (ATL’s 2009 draft pick), Al Horford (ATL’s 2007 pick), Paul Millsap (signed for two years, $19 million) and Kyle Korver (traded to ATL for Kirk Hinrich). Of those players are any on max contracts or are players picked up in blockbuster sign-and-trades? Nope.
Now let’s look at the Warriors. Stephen Curry was Golden State’s first-rounder in 2009, Klay Thompson was their 2011 first-rounder, Harrison Barnes was the 2012 first-rounder and so on. Andrew Bogut, David Lee and Andre Iguodala did all come to the Warriors via free agency or trade but those three are complementary players at best on Steve Kerr’s team and are clearly not the players they used to be earlier in their careers.
If you look at the roster composition of Portland, Memphis, Washington, Toronto and a bunch of the other good teams in the NBA, you’d find the same trend and it’s obvious that the whole “super team” notion of the past few years is nothing but a label and an ineffective one at that. Unless the Cavaliers can somehow transform themselves into a legitimate contender, all of the decent choices as the 2014-15 NBA Champion will be teams constructed through the draft (the defending champion Spurs are the best example of this), smart trades and shrewd free agent signings that don’t break the bank.
Maybe to win in the NBA, it helps to have superstars. But to say it’s a superstar league might be a little much, especially if this season and this season’s best teams have anything to do with that. For a league with exorbitant salaries, mismanaged front offices and egocentric big names, it appears as if doing things the old-fashioned way is the easiest way to build a good basketball team. Who knew?
