{"id":128549,"date":"2025-03-13T21:20:17","date_gmt":"2025-03-14T01:20:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=128549"},"modified":"2025-03-13T21:20:17","modified_gmt":"2025-03-14T01:20:17","slug":"thunder-brian-windhorst-championship-chances","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/13\/thunder-brian-windhorst-championship-chances\/","title":{"rendered":"Should the Thunder As Championship Contenders Be Taken More Seriously?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The\u00a0<\/span>Oklahoma City Thunder<\/span><\/a>\u00a0are on par with the\u00a0<\/span>Cleveland Cavaliers<\/span><\/a>\u00a0for the season’s most explosive and dominating basketball squad. They’re banshees on the defensive end, as\u00a0<\/span>JJ Redick<\/span><\/a>\u00a0recently coined to describe players who play tenaciously, suffocating, and aggressive basketball. They’re also high-flying on offense, primarily due to\u00a0<\/span>Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/span><\/a>‘s MVP-esque season. But at the roots, OKC is a sound, well-balanced, put-together roster with depth, size, scoring threats, and defensive specialists. Not to mention, they’re a handful of games above the second-placed team in the West and the second-best team in the league if we’re going by overall record. Still, remarkably so, and as ESPN senior NBA writer Brian Windhorst will tell you, the Thunder’s championship chances garner the most disrespect of all the top-tier teams in the league. Windhorst can’t get past it and has solid reasoning for his bafflement.<\/span><\/p>\n

Should the Thunder As Championship Contenders Be Taken More Seriously?<\/h2>\n

ESPN’s Brian Windhorst Remains Baffled By the Disrespect Shown to the Oklahoma City Thunder’s Championship Chances<\/h3>\n

While guest-appearing on\u00a0<\/span>First Take<\/span><\/em>\u00a0this week alongside Stephen A. Smith and Chris “Mad Dog” Russo, the Thunder were in the conversation about who the actual threats are to make it to the finals and win. Those on the show referenced the Cavaliers and Boston Celtics in the East and the Denver Nuggets,\u00a0<\/span>Los Angeles Lakers<\/span><\/a>, and the Thunder in the West. However, there appeared to be more confidence in the Celtics and Nuggets as opposed to the others, including the Thunder. To his amazement, Windhorst couldn’t believe this particular viewpoint, considering all that OKC has accomplished this season and the fashion in which they’re doing it. According to Windhorst (<\/span>Twitter link<\/span><\/a>), it isn’t just talk show personalities and NBA analysts who hold this view, but many within the league\u2014execs and players alike.<\/span><\/p>\n

“…There is an incredible amount of disrespect for this team…I hear it everyday. I hear it implicitly from other people I talk to in the league. I hear it implicitly from players out there who are like, ‘Yeah, yeah will be fine on the same side of the bracket as Oklahoma City.’ They just don’t respect them, and I go, why?”<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

“I hear it implicitly from other people I talk to in the league, I hear it implicitly from players out there who are like, ‘Yeah,yeah will be fine on the same side of the bracket as OKC.’ They just don’t respect them.”\ud83d\ude2c<\/p>\n

– Windhorst<\/p>\n

(h\/t @ClutchPoints<\/a>)<\/p>\n

pic.twitter.com\/8rqdYsZu7I<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) March 12, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n