Wake the Warriors up in October

I think we all appreciate LeBron James’ attempts to make Golden State relevant this summer by allegedly including Kevin Durant on his Amazon wish list. With the Warriors the only team not being discussed as part of the NBA’s traveling free agent piefights, Durant’s lunatic inclusion in James’ acquisition process, even if only by impassioned text messages, was a thoughtful contribution, and we should thank him for that.
 
But that is where this probably ends, and the No-Fun-Champs will continue to slog through their uninspiring offseason trying to find cheap bench alternatives to the cheap bench alternatives they tried a year ago.
 
In other words, the joys of Nick Young ran their wacky course pretty quickly, and now the Warriors are – ick – cost-conscious about unglamorous roster positions.
 
This, of course, will change next year and the year after, when Klay Thompson and then Draymond Green become free agents. At that point we will be as sick of their names as we currently are of James and Kawhi Leonard and Paul George, and we will want to claw our ears off and eyes out just for the blessed hum of stasis.
 
But for now . . . Kevin Durant to Los Angeles to play with LeBron James because he isn’t sufficiently fulfilled in Oakland with two championships, two Finals MVP trophies and all the post-career opportunities offered entire Stanford graduation classes, nahhh. That’s not cutting it, narrative-wise.
 
Put another way, the Warriors are stuck at a time when the NBA sells its annual offseason money burn as a bigger deal than the draft and summer league combined. The system that the Warriors have exploited to their benefit have now left them debating whether a mid-level exception valued at $5.2 million is worth $21 million to them.
 
And where’s the fun in that?
 
The Warriors are in on no big names because they have their own set of big names, including the evidently evil yet clearly desirable Durant. Him going to the Lakers might help us solve the question of whether his demonization is solely a matter of him joining Stephen Curry or whether it would grow in intensity if he went to join up with LeBron James.
 
I mean, when basketball doesn’t fuel your fire, and when money doesn’t do it either, the only frontier left is dime-store psychology. It’s a growth industry, and when it isn’t James’ frantic empire-building or Leonard’s almost pathological need to remain none of our business, it may as well be “Just what is it about Kevin Durant’s free agency that made him more detestable than anyone else’s? Are we as a nation only opposed to his freedom to choose?” Him going to the Lakers would help answer that.
 
Which is why, of course, it won’t happen. So we deal with it, and Golden State’s momentary irrelevance in the marketplace. The NBA is someone else’s problem until October, and the release of the new schedule is the best news the Bay Area can hope for before then.
 
Although for me, I’d be delighted to know what G-League team will roll the dice with Nick Young. Now THAT would be the definition of living on the edge.