A day after clinching the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference — and homecourt throughout the entire postseason for that matter — Warriors president of basketball operations Bob Myers joined the Fitz and Brooks show on Thursday.
Fitz was egging on his friend Myers to loosen up the humbleness and take credit for building one of the more successful basketball teams the NBA has ever seen. Golden State became the first team to win 65 games in three straight seasons.
Myers wouldn’t go that far, but he did admit it was satisfying to see some of the media narratives die as the season played out
“At this time of year you take stock of how kind of the narratives shifts,” Myers said. “As the season began it was we couldn’t protect the rim. It turns out that wasn’t really true. We blocked a lot of shots and we had the best defense, or top two in the league. That our bench was weak and not deep enough? And it turns out, the guys we signed rounded into form, and if anything, they’ve been a strength not a weakness, which I think a lot of people thought.
“We’re human beings. We hear those things, too. And we wonder when we make decisions in the offseason whether they are going to be right or wrong. And until you really get to this place, and actually through the playoffs is the real answer as to what kind of team you built. Some of it is fortuitous. I’m not going to sit here and say we’re smarter than everyone else. You have to get lucky.”
Fitz jumps in, “No, today is the day you say that Bob! Say that Bob. Say that we are smarter than everybody else. Just come out and say that today.”
“(Laughter), No, I’m not doing that,” Myers said. “I’m going to leave that for other people. Joking aside, I’ve known Bob a long time, I know you a little bit Rod. We try and put together a really good group of people that really don’t care who gets the credit. And that includes our players. You talk about (Kevin) Durant, a team that is selfish and arrogant and envious they don’t fly to the Hamptons and sit across from Kevin Durant. It doesn’t even get to that moment. It’s fractured where one guy goes and another guy doesn’t. Or none of them go, that’s probably more like the norm in professional sports. We had just lost a week before that. So you try and build and organization where nobody cares about anything but winning.”