The Golden State Warriors Analysis

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Alice Hegan Rice famously stated that, “All the higher forms of life have evolved from some one's ideal of justice, liberty or beauty; and the belief that nothing is too good to be true”. However, the oft-used cliché states otherwise, if something seems too good to be true, it probably is. What if I were to tell you that our problem as a society isn’t these things being true, rather, that they were simply just too good? Bethelem Shoals and David Sirlin explore and inspect the two sides of this coin in The Golden State Warriors Are So Good They’re Ruining Basketball and Playing to Win respectively. Shoals examines the consequences of the dominance enjoyed by this year’s Golden State Warriors NBA team, heralding their aesthetic and efficiency …show more content…

He does so by exploring the clash between gamers’ instinctive desire to patch features of a game they deem unfair and what legitimately should be banned given firmly established criterion. He argues that contrary to the belief of most gamers, only a fraction of the features typically complained about truly merit patching. Initially separating games into basic categories based on their methods of distribution (some games are patched with varying levels of frequency to address balance issues while others are not), Sirlin observes that these different categories of games create different responses and reactions amongst their respective player baess, which alters the perception of what a patch signifcies to these players. He notes that while some games that are frequently patched elicit little to not reactions with their patches (as they’re expected), other game developers alter the behavior of the players as a result of their patches. He speculates that some players of games frequently patched for balance become complacent, and assume the optimal strategies they would otherwise be discovering will be ‘nerfed’ (weakened or removed altogether), eliminating incentive and motivation to innovate. He similarly notes that the behavior of game developers themselves may change based on their expectations …show more content…

Several antiquated changes that have since been overturned including such things as bans of dunking, zone defense, and others. Granted, some changes have stood the test of time, and have bettered the sport. Examples include the innovation of the shot clock, and the three point line. The same three point line in question exploited by the Warriors (and Spurs), has successfully been a part of the NBA for almost 30 years. Frankly, there shouldn’t be a way to ban a particular team, doing so would prevent the natural self-corrective mechanisms Sirlin describes with the character in Street Fighter soft banned. The very same mechanism that will create parity in the future is the one that created the Warriors to begin with. The Spurs and whatever team LeBron James has been on have ruled the landscape of the NBA for the past decade. LeBron James hasn’t missed an NBA Finals in over half of a decade. His teams usually featured two other mega-stars, a template broken by these Golden State Warriors. When LeBron James signed with the Miami Heat about 5 years ago, similar complaints about dominance emerged. Again, given time, the rest of the league figured out of how adjust accordingly. This principle isn’t exclusive to basketball, and in fact was first made famous by neo-classical economic theorist Adam Smith, who is best known for his theory

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