{"id":91073,"date":"2024-08-19T06:49:31","date_gmt":"2024-08-19T10:49:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=91073"},"modified":"2024-08-19T06:49:31","modified_gmt":"2024-08-19T10:49:31","slug":"could-westbrook-impact-title-race-in-his-return-to-oklahoma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/08\/19\/could-westbrook-impact-title-race-in-his-return-to-oklahoma\/","title":{"rendered":"Could Westbrook Impact Title Race In His Return To Oklahoma?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russell Westbrook<\/a> will begin the latest chapter of his illustrious 17-year career when the NBA season resumes in about two months. The nine-time All-Star agreed to a deal with the Denver Nuggets for two years, $6.8 million<\/a> on July 26. He had been waived by the Utah Jazz on July 20 after being traded<\/a> there by the Los Angeles Clippers. He is scheduled to face the team that drafted him in the Oklahoma City Thunder, a team he was on for 11 years. Westbrook could impact the title race on his return to Oklahoma.<\/p>\n

Could Westbrook Impact Title Race In His Return To Oklahoma?<\/h2>\n

The nine-time All-NBA recipient, now on the sixth team of his career, is in a unique situation even by his standards. Westbrook has played with multiple future Hall of Famers like LeBron James<\/a>, Kevin Durant<\/a>, James Harden<\/a>, and Kawhi Leonard<\/a>. Still, Nikola Joki\u0107<\/a> is the first MVP center he will play with. Sorry to Anthony Davis<\/a>, but despite his impressive r\u00e9sum\u00e9, he hasn’t won the award.<\/p>\n

Joki\u0107 and the Nuggets couldn’t defend their first-ever championship last season. They lost to the Minnesota Timberwolves 4-3 in the second round of the playoffs in an evenly contested series. Ultimately, what cost them against the Wolves was a lack of consistent scoring off the bench. The only team whose bench scored fewer points (14.8)<\/a> in the playoffs was the Lakers. The Nuggets hope that signing Westbrook will solve some of these issues.<\/p>\n

Westbrook had a renaissance of sorts<\/a> on the Clippers. After enduring a difficult tenure starting for the Lakers, he found a role off the bench for their city rivals. The 2016-17 MVP winner had the most efficient period of his career (.eFG of 50.1% over 89 games<\/a>) despite averaging the fewest points of his career.<\/p>\n

Westbrook has always been a player who thrives in chaos. At the height of his powers, he could influence a team’s trajectory for the season. Now, he can influence games. He could fill an important role off the bench for the Nuggets as a spark plug. They ranked 25th<\/a> in the league in bench points (29.4).<\/p>\n

Return to Oklahoma<\/h3>\n

The Thunder traded Westbrook back in 2019. That marked the end of a competitive era and signaled a new beginning for the franchise. That rebuild culminated in last year\u2019s 57-win team led by Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/a>. The Thunder became the youngest first seed in history. The team also swept a series 4-0 in the playoffs<\/a> for only the second time ever. Ultimately, they would lose a highly competitive, close series to the Mavericks. Following a productive offseason that saw them add Isaiah Hartenstein<\/a> and Alex Caruso<\/a>, the Thunder are favorites to come out of the West.<\/p>\n

Although the Westbrook trade is in the past and the future Hall of Fame point guard prepares to play for the Nuggets, his return to Bricktown remains a highly anticipated event. The welcome he receives is always enthusiastic and affectionate.<\/p>\n

However, his visit with the Nuggets brings some unusual circumstances. Oklahoma City will host its divisional rivals on March 4 and 5 for the last two games of the season series. The series will begin with the Nuggets hosting the first two games on October 24 and November 6 in the Mile High City.<\/p>\n

The March back-to-back games in Oklahoma City are crucial for both teams as they compete in what should be a tight Western Conference standings. The games will be challenging, with the first tipping off at noon and the second returning to the usual 7 PM local start time.<\/p>\n

Whenever these two teams meet, it’s must-watch TV, and every time Westbrook returns to Oklahoma City, it\u2019s a significant event. However, this unique back-to-back series between contenders could be pivotal in determining who secures the top seed in the West.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Russell Westbrook will begin the latest chapter of his illustrious 17-year career when the NBA season resumes in about two months. The nine-time All-Star agreed to a deal with the Denver Nuggets for two years, $6.8 million on July 26. He had been waived by the Utah Jazz on July 20 after being traded there […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5018,"featured_media":91176,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,20,62,22],"tags":[49445,49979,2037,240,993,444,168,69,38,3686,563,72,53,1489],"class_list":["post-91073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-nuggets","category-nba","category-thunder","tag-2024-25-nba-schedule","tag-2024-25-nba-season","tag-alex-caruso","tag-anthony-davis","tag-isaiah-hartenstein","tag-james-harden","tag-kawhi-leonard","tag-kevin-durant","tag-lebron-james","tag-nba-seeding","tag-nba-western-conference","tag-nikola-jokic","tag-russell-westbrook","tag-shai-gilgeous-alexander"],"modified_by":"Kenny Kluska","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5018"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}