OKLAHOMA CITY – The Thunder have won four games in a row and have won six of their past seven.
Oklahoma City beat Dallas Thursday night by 15 points, beat Memphis the game before the All-Star break by 16 points and won their two games before that easily and by more than 10 points.
So, get it out of your head that Reggie Jackson was holding this team back. He was a problem, a lockerroom virus and a malcontent. ESPN's Royce Young wrote about it today. Check it out here, but Jackson wasn't keeping this team from winning.
That was already happening and is about to happen in prolific fashion.
Jackson's stand-offish behavior started before the season began and continued throughout the first part of the season. But he still played well, despite falling out of favor with coach Scott Brooks, as the trade deadline approached. Jackson averaged 7.9 points per game in his last nine outings and shot 51.8 percent from the floor during that span.
And the Thunder were winning.
The truth is, with or without Jackson, the Thunder were beginning to, are, and will be among the league's elite teams, because of Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant and in spite of players who are no longer factors on this team.
Thursday, Durant and Westbrook sent off lockerrroom favorite Kendrick Perkins with praise. General manager Sam Presti did the same. No one had much to say about Jackson because Jackson did most of the talking himself, tweeting out, "Crying tears of joy," when he found out he had gotten traded. Not exactly the kind of thing you put out for the world to see.
You see, at the moment Jackson declared he wanted to be a starter and then didn't become one, he became an outcast in the in the Thunder lockerroom. Already on the other side of the room from Durant and Westbrook, Jackson further alienated himself with his comments about not being surprised he wasn't playing and his consistently poor body language.
But the virus that Jackson was, and who knows how much Jackson affected Perry Jones and Jeremy Lamb, two others who have fallen out of the rotation, it could never affect Durant and Westbrook.
Maybe in another season, it could have. But not this year, when the Thunder have had to do everything on the fly, from creating lineups to dealing with injuries. Durant and Westbrook, and Perkins to some extent, are the leaders on this team.
Durant spoke to that Thursday night, saying he needed to make sure the new additions to the team felt welcomed. He also said everyone in the room wanted to be part of the team except for one player.
Westbrook did the same. First, he wished Perkins well and then he said goodbye to Jackson, saying, no one can force anyone to stay.
Jackson knew he would never ascend past Westbrook or Durant. The problem was he knew it and he let it affect his play. Meanwhile, Durant and Westbrook didn't let it affect theirs. Not recently as they have been back and mostly healthy while leading the Thunder past the Suns for the No, 8 spot in the playoff race. It's almost as if they saw the Jackson song and dance with management as another reason to play better.
And the two won't let Jackson's virus plague them the rest of the way, either. Remember, this OKC team was already winning, and now they have even more reason to. There's a real, not imagined, grudge to hold for Durant and Westbrook. It's not just trying to make up for a lost season in the standings. It's not just trying to prove they are better because they're healthy.
It's trying to prove to Jackson leaving this team was a mistake.
They were doing that before. It will be come a priority now. Jackson wasn't holding this team back, but his departure could push the team forward.
Follow Andrew Gilman on Twitter: @andrewgilmanOK
MORE FROM FOX SPORTS SOUTHWEST:
- Ranking NFL quarterback salaries
- College football's highest paid coaches in 2014
- Oldest player on every NBA team
- Highest paid player of each NBA team
