Nevius: Win or lose, these Warriors are fun to watch

When the Warriors reached the NBA Finals, there were two narratives.

First, if they won, it would cue up a national eyeroll. Of COURSE they beat the Cavaliers. They bought the championship when they won the Kevin Durant bake-off. Even LeBron James sounded outgunned, saying, “It’s probably the most firepower I’ve played in my career.” It wasn’t a playoff; it was a coronation.

And if they lost, well, that’s karma. The basketball gods don’t like it when you try to buy a trophy. Besides, we tried to tell you this cutesy-poo, dance-?party basketball wouldn’t work in crunch time. That’s when the games get gritty and real warriors like James take over. If they lost with all that talent? It would be one of the great pratfalls in basketball history.

The arguments will go on and on. Somewhere in a TV studio a couple of deep thinkers are arguing about whether Durant or James is the GOAT (greatest of all time).

I have a very strong opinion about all that.

I don’t care.

In all these years of watching sports, I’ve seen three teams that changed my perception of what a sport is, and what it could be.

In 1994 soccer’s World Cup was (partially) hosted by Stanford Stadium. The Brazilian national team was housed in Los Gatos and turned the whole town into a samba zone. There were parties at all hours.

And then they took the field. The ball appeared to be a small, speedy pet running along obediently next to the players’ feet. And the passing - OMG. They’d send a ball off to open space and you’d wonder what they were doing. And then magically a teammate would appear, gather the pass and make 11 moves on the way to the goal.

That was the year I got soccer.

In 1988 I went to the Winter Olympics in Calgary. Someone tipped me off - you have to see the Russian Red Army hockey team. For starters, they were insanely talented. But it was the way they cut up opponents with constant swirling motion and pass after pass that was breathtaking.

After the Olympics I talked to a member of the San Jose Sharks, who had been on the American team. He said when they looked at the video of their loss there was a period of something like seven minutes when they never touched the puck. Couldn’t even get a stick on it.

Until then, I thought hockey was a snooze.

And the third is this Warriors team. The moral implications of adding Durant?

Don’t care.

The debate about the MVP and the GOAT?

Not interested.

I just want to watch them play. There’s a theme that runs through those three teams. It is skill, it is generous passing and it is making the smart play.

But more than anything else, it is joy. Every one of those teams, from Brazil to Russia to Oracle Arena, play with light-hearted abandon.

Igor Larionov, the Russian star who later starred for the Sharks, was 5-10, 165 pounds. He made the kind of deft, mind-blowing moves with the puck that left defenders gasping. He was kind of the Steph Curry of the Red Army.

“To call it fun is much too simple,” he once said. “It is freedom.”

The Warriors have a dose of that. (Although about the time we start canonizing them, Draymond Green will kick someone in the crotch.)

But you recognize that the Warriors share the ball, get everyone involved and play smart.

The face of their team is Curry or Durant, but it could easily be Ian Clark. Out of Belmont College - and tell me you know where that is - he was undrafted and kicking around the D-League. Two teams, Denver and Utah, signed him and released him.

Warriors general manager Bob Myers was in a gym watching a scrimmage and he turned to the guy next to him and said, “That guy can shoot.”

They picked up Clark. Now he’s proven to be such a valuable substitute that there are already stories that he’ll be too expensive for the Warriors to re-sign. He’ll make more money somewhere else, but he won’t have as much fun. Clark is the wingman for Curry’s goofy sports skits. Clark plays catcher while Curry pretends to pitch a basketball or the goalie when Curry tries a corner kick.

But I also like that there’s an intellect at work, too. Coach Steve Kerr knew the Cavaliers would rely on two superstars, James and Kyrie Irving.

He says he “kept telling the guys, they’re going to get tired. When you get guys playing 45, 44 minutes, basically attacking one on one the whole game, you hope eventually it’s going to take its toll.”

Note the phrase “attacking one on one.” James and Irving are elite players, but they can’t do it all. Just looking in from outside, seeing James control everything - the ball, his minutes on the court and even what music is played in the dressing room - doesn’t sound like an enjoyable, sharing environment.

That would be the Warriors. To call it fun is too simple.

You can contact C.W. Nevius at cw.nevius@pressdemocrat.com. Twitter: @cwnevius.