Erik Malinowski - Betaball

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An Imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

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Copyright 2017 by Erik Malinowski

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information, address Atria Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

First Atria Books hardcover edition October 2017

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Interior design by Dana Sloan

Jacket design by Greg Mollica

Jacket art by Brian Levy

Author photograph by Rebecca Duran

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN 978-1-5011-5819-3

ISBN 978-1-5011-5821-6 (ebook)

To Becca and Toms, my everyday MVPs

A s the ball left Stephen Currys hands, I was certain the shot was good.

The Golden State Warriors season had come down to this one history-shifting play, a long, somewhat frantic three-pointer with 33 seconds remaining in Game 7 of the NBA Finals. It was June 19, 2016, and over the past 236 days, the Warriors had played some of the most dominant basketball the world had ever witnessed. They started 24-0, then 36-2, 48-4, and 62-6. By seasons end, thanks to a four-game win streak heading into the playoffs, the Warriors had won 73 games against only nine losses, a mark no NBA team had pulled off in the leagues 67-year history.

To cap off that milestone with a championshipwhich theyd done just a year earlierseemed all but academic.

And through a regular season in which the Warriors didnt lose back-to-back games, Curry was the catalyst that kept the team humming. After winning the NBAs Most Valuable Player Award for the 201415 season, Curry was even more spectacular in his encore performance. He served up a 40-point, seven-assist, six-rebound breakout on opening night against New Orleans. After a 53-point conflagration in the Warriors third game, Curry was the leagues top scorer every day through to the schedules final game. Curry was an offensive dynamo who could not be slowed for months; he not only broke his own NBA record of 286 three-pointers in a season but obliterated the mark, swishing 402 such shots during the season. Curry also led the league in both steals and free-throw percentage for the second straight season, while also finishing eighth in assists. For much of the year, his Player Efficiency Ratingan analytical measure of a players overall effectivenesshovered above the all-time mark set by Wilt Chamberlain more than 50 years earlier. Alas, Currys PER merely ended up the eighth-best in NBA history.

As his stats further pushed the boundaries of reason, Curry witnessed his star status grow into that of a full-fledged supernova. When the Warriors came out for warm-ups two hours before a home game at Oracle Arena, more than a thousand fans would congregate around the periphery of the court, often jostling for position and craning their necks for just the right angle to witness Currys 20-minute warm-up, often an entire show unto itself. His two-handed dribbling drills under the basket. His effortless threes from the center-court logo, often nailed in rapid succession. All capped off by the customary three-point attempt from the side tunnel that leads down to the Warriors locker room. Its a 45-foot heave that he doesnt always convertCurry is only human, after allbut when the ball goes in, a crowd 90 minutes before any basketball game has never sounded more alive.

As much as the fans in Oakland would eat up Currys pregame ritual, fans on the road could be just as insatiable. With every ensuing win and Curry highlight, the Warriors became a traveling road show, like an All-Star baseball team barnstorming the country back in the 1930s. During the playoffs, ESPN dedicated a camera feed strictly to showing Currys midcourt warm-up heaves so it could then push the video link to subscribers of its mobile app. With all this attention, all the accolades and superlatives, there was a sense this was all building to... something. The Warriors, both individually and as a group, had made so much history in such a compact time that the season seemed destined to culminate in a memorable finish of some kindeither resounding triumph or unfathomable horror.

And it all came down to this shot from Curry, which looked on target as it angled toward the rim along its natural arc. Aside from a smattering of visiting fans here and there, most of the nearly 20,000 people inside Oracle Arena figured the shot would go through. You could excuse the assumption. They had been conditioned to believe this. Since Curry arrived in the Bay Area in the summer of 2009, hed shown glimpses of becoming this kind of player, someone who could decide championships with an unforgettable game, a marvelous quartereven a single, dead-aim shot from 25 feet out.

The story of how the Golden State Warriors found themselves one shot away from NBA immortality is one of meager beginnings, like so many compelling stories, but the thing about the Warriors is just how fast all this success came about. Five years ago, they were deep in the midst of one of the most prolonged stretches of suckitude any NBA team had ever endured, permanent residents beneath the NBAs subfloor. Entering the 201213 season, Golden State had made the playoffs once in the past 18 seasons. To put that in perspective, only one NBA team has ever suffered through a more sustained slump. From 197677 to 199091, the Los Angeles Clippers didnt make the playoffs at all15 straight years missing out on any chance for a title. Considering eight of 15 teams from the Western Conference make the postseason every April, the odds should be on a teams side a bit more often than that, no matter how ineptly they play.

Not so for the Warriors, who were owned by one of the most reviled men in all of the sport. From 1995 to 2010, fans in the Bay Area wished day and night for his removal from ownership. Once in a while, thered be a rumor or a whisper about some potential deal that might be in the works, but it never seemed to materialize, and many Warriors fans couldnt imagine when better days might be imminent. It seemed preposterous that this poorly run team with bottom-rung talent could possibly compete for anything worthwhile any time soon.