Written by Matt Zemek at Bloguin
The 2015-2016 San Antonio Spurs could be likened to the 1996 Seattle Sonics. Viewed through one basic lens, that comparison is obvious and entirely legitimate. Yet, on another fundamental level, that comparison doesn’t hold.
Here’s why the Spurs can be compared to the 1996 Sonics:
When the 1996 Chicago Bulls laid waste to the rest of the NBA and became the first team to hit the 70-win barrier, the Sonics became one of the quietest 64-win teams in history. Few teams enjoyed the pronounced success of the 1996 Seattle ballclub and yet became so comparatively un-remembered in the larger scope of NBA history.
Champions are remembered the most, and had the Sonics existed in a different year or time, they might have been lauded in a manner befitting their greatness. Yet, they flourished in the year when a fresh-legged version of Michael Jordan (after his baseball tour) and a reborn Dennis Rodman made the Bulls into a wrecking ball. The best team of its era, led by the sport’s best player — quite possibly the NBA’s best player of all time — dwarfed Seattle during the season and in the NBA Finals. Phil Jackson, the most successful NBA coach of all time (maybe not the best, but no one has more rings than the Zen Master), guided Jordan and Rodman and Scottie Pippen to the mountaintop.
The Sonics? They didn’t get swept. They put up a brave fight after stumbling in a Finals spotlight they weren’t accustomed to. Yet, their 64 wins lived in the shadows of the Bulls’ 72 victories, and the rock-star identity of a legitimate NBA dynasty at its peak.
The 2015-2016 San Antonio Spurs could be to the Golden State Warriors what the 1995-1996 Sonics were to the Chicago Bulls.
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