National Basketball Association

How Warriors' trio became modern NBA’s most dominant force

Updated Jun. 17, 2022 3:07 p.m. ET

By Martin Rogers
FOX Sports Columnist

When the buzzer sounded and the Golden State Warriors were finally champions again, the franchise’s core trio momentarily went in different directions.

Steph Curry was lost in emotion, the gravity of four titles in eight years — and the turnaround needed to realize this one — bringing tears that couldn’t be stemmed.

Klay Thompson was off to the side with nothing but smiles and laughs, a comeback from a career-threatening injury complete, and another notch on the belt of a basketball journey that remains, somehow, often underrated.

And Draymond Green, whose hoops life has been built around a refusal to be silenced? Well, he went and found someone to talk to — catching young Boston Celtics forward Grant Williams and offering some words of solace and encouragement.

Three different reactions from three men with different personalities and lives, yet who have stuck as a collective unit long enough to create their own niche in NBA history.

There is a lot that goes into building a championship team in any given season, but starting with a trio that's been together forever and can still coexist without ego or conflict knocking things off course is as big an advantage as you’re going to find.

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"We built this thing from the ground up," Green told reporters after the Warriors clinched the title with a 103-90 Game 6 victory over the Celtics at TD Garden. "We all appreciate each other, and we understand what each of us bring to the table.

"It stretches far past what we have accomplished on the court. You’re talking bonds, those bonds will last forever. We’re linked and connected together. Forever."

They are indeed. Curry came in 2009, Thompson in 2011, and Green as an overlooked second-rounder a year after that. The years have ticked by. A breakup has never seriously looked likely.

In this series, it seemed that the Celtics had their number for a little while. The aftermath of Game 3, with momentum favoring the team in green and their rising head coach Ime Udoka, sparked talk that Boston was too young, too quick and too physical for Golden State. In theory, they were. But the Warriors found a way.

There are so many reasons behind Golden State’s success, and you can’t isolate one without highlighting the others.

The Warriors win because they have an excellent coach in Steve Kerr. And because the organization has prioritized success for years.

They won this year because Jordan Poole was a breakout star and because Andrew Wiggins showed every bit of the ability that made him a former No. 1 pick.

In 2017 and 2018, they won because Kevin Durant was arguably the best player in basketball.

All of those things are true. Take away any one of them and in any given year a title probably doesn’t happen. But take away the Curry-Thompson-Green crew and a championship doesn’t even become a consideration, and the Warriors certainly don’t become the modern NBA’s most dominant force.

With all this time passed, the Warriors win, in part, because their Big Three like each other. They sit next to each other on planes. They spend time with one another. They chat. They have enough shared interests to be able to converse, but they are different enough characters that they don’t rub the wrong way, and they don’t get sick of each other.

Everyone appreciates Thompson and his laid-back ways. Everyone understands that Green loves to talk and that his energy is highly necessary at key points. And Curry is Curry, a wizard who has redefined the game but who saw enough difficulty early in his career to never take success for granted.

It was never a triumvirate that professed itself able to do everything but instead was built to be a rock-solid platform that accommodates the gifts of others.

It didn’t need Durant this time, as many thought. Wiggins, hugely talented but with an unfulfilled career before joining the team, found things just to his liking. He dropped into a Warriors squad with just enough ego, but not too much. Just enough seriousness, just enough humor, just enough anger, and accountability when things were not working.

The core survived the gloomy years that just passed — and they were genuinely gloomy. Thompson was out for 941 days with devastating ACL and Achilles injuries. Green has been written off many times, most recently about a week ago following a tough start to the Finals.

Curry played through the team’s middle-of-the-road irrelevance of last season when it really felt the Warriors’ best days had gone. And he thrived this season amid some rather silly assertions that his career was missing something due to the lack of a Finals MVP award.

He’s got one now.

And the Warriors, once again, have got it all.

Martin Rogers is a columnist for FOX Sports and the author of the FOX Sports Insider Newsletter. You can subscribe to the newsletter here.