On June 4, 2023, the Phoenix Suns made a decision that would ultimately send the franchise back for years to come.
They traded for Bradley Beal.
In just two years, the “big three” of Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Beal have combined for just one playoff appearance — in which the Minnesota Timberwolves dismantled Phoenix in four — and a large price tag.
The NBA meta has changed once again— the era of the superteam is dead.
Now you have teams with maybe two superstars and a good cast of role players.
But it wasn’t always this way, in order to find out how the NBA got here, it’s important to look back. One key word that will come up the most when dissecting superteams of the past is sacrifice, something that the Suns simply couldn’t figure out.
2007-2012 Boston Celtics
There were attempts at forming super teams before the Celtics. Take Hakeem Olajuwon, Charles Barkley and Scottie Pippen in Houston, for example. But the era of super teams truly began in 2007.
Former Celtics general manager Danny Ainge swung a trade to give Paul Pierce a co-star, landing disgruntled Seattle Supersonics star Ray Allen. Boston acquired Allen from Seattle by sending Delonte West, Wally Szczerbiak, and the fifth overall pick — which would become Jeff Green— to Seattle.
Then Ainge made the deal of all deals, putting all his chips in one basket by trading for former league MVP Kevin Garnett. Boston sent Al Jefferson, Ryan Gomes, Sebastian Telfair, Gerald Green and Theo Ratliff to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Garnett’s services.
But in order to make this new big three work, each player had to make a sacrifice. Pierce and Garnett took a step back in scoring. Garnett focused more of his energy on defense, winning the 2008 Defensive Player of the Year Award and becoming the anchor of the Celtics’ defense for years to come. Before Boston, Allen was a rim slasher who often drove to the basket to score. With the Celtics, he relegated himself to a catch-and-shoot role.
The sacrifice paid off, as the Celtics improved their win total by 42 wins. The 2007 Big Three went 66-16 in their first season together, eventually going all the way to the finals, where they defeated the rival Los Angeles Lakers in six games.
This superteam would only go on to win one championship, but a ring is a ring. They were successful because it was the right fit. Pierce still carried the offensive load, but not nearly as much as he did in years past. Garnett and Allen focused more on their specific skill sets, culminating in banner No. 17 for Boston.
2010-2014 Miami Heat
Everyone knows how this super team started, but it’s fun to look back anyway.
On July 8, 2010, LeBron James made the decision to take his talents to South Beach, joining Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh in what was at the time the most talented super team in NBA history.
James promised the city of Miami not one, not two, not three … but more than seven championships for the Heat, and although it didn’t work out that way, the James-Wade-Bosh era was certainly a success.
But that wasn’t always the case.
The first year of Miami’s big three saw ups and downs. James and Wade didn’t know how to coexist on the court yet. Despite chemistry issues, the Heat managed to make it all the way to the NBA Finals, where they lost to the Dallas Mavericks.
Year two couldn’t have been any more different.
Wade took a step back to let James run the show, and the results spoke for themselves. Back-to-back MVPs for the King along with back-to-back championships for the Heatles, because the three stars figured out how to make it work.
The Heat made it to four straight finals with their big three, winning two in a row thanks to outstanding chemistry and a little help from Boston’s old friend Ray Allen in 2014.
Bosh went the same route Garnett took in Boston, but sacrificed even more for the good of the team. Going from the first option in Toronto to the third option in Miami, Bosh focused all his energy on defense, and on a roster that couldn’t showcase much outside of the big three, that defense was beastly. Miami doesn’t win two championships in the 2010s without Bosh making that sacrifice.
2013 Brooklyn Nets
This failed “superteam” isn’t at the fault of the players— it’s more on the franchise executives who thought this would work in the first place.
Six years after the original trade for Garnett, Boston’s front office saw the writing on the wall and realized their window for contention was almost up. Rather than letting franchise legends Pierce and Garnett finish out their playing days in Beantown, Danny Ainge decided it was time to move on.
Then the Nets came knocking, hoping to replicate the success of the ‘08 Celtics, Brooklyn decided to go all in on a starting five that would have dominated the NBA if it were assembled maybe eight years prior.
Boston sent Pierce, Garnett, and Jason Terry to Brooklyn in exchange for some role players and four first-round picks. Keep in mind, two of those picks would end up being Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
Those moves paired a 36-year-old Pierce and a 37-year-old Garnett with 32-year-old Joe Johnson, 29-year-old Deron Williams and a relatively young 25-year-old Brook Lopez.
This “superteam” failed not because anyone failed to sacrifice for the better of the team— it failed because none of the stars were “super” anymore. Pierce’s numbers took a significant decline, going from 18 points per game in his final year with the Celtics to 13 with Brooklyn. Same for Garnett, who went from a 15-point-per-game scorer to just 6.5 points a night.
This starting five had one season together, making the playoffs as a No. 6 seed with a 44-38 record. After staving off a young Raptors team in seven games, Brooklyn’s reward was facing the almighty Heatles in the second round. The old and battered Nets were no match for the Heat, and the team bowed out in five games.
After just one season together, the team fell apart and entered a rebuild phase with no draft capital. The Celtics took advantage and now Boston not only has a championship, but two franchise players for years to come.
2017-2019 Golden State Warriors
What do you get when you add a top-five player in the league to a 73-win NBA team? A dynasty.
The Golden State Warriors created arguably the greatest superteam of all time when they added Kevin Durant via free agency to a team that already featured Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and an elite supporting cast.
There was no need for anyone to adjust as the fit meshed perfectly. Outside of some locker room issues that eventually caused Durant to depart for Brooklyn, it was a seamless time in Golden State.
Three straight finals appearances and two championships later, it’s safe to say this pairing was a success.
2021-2023 Brooklyn Nets
It seems as though the Nets didn’t learn from their first go-around at a super team, because the team once again put all their chips into one basket just to have a peak in the conference semifinals.
Brooklyn recovered from the disaster of 2013, acquiring a decent cast of quality role players and creating a culture that was enticing to NBA free agents.
But that culture was immediately destroyed when the Nets decided to swing for the fences, acquiring Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, and eventually James Harden to create what was, on paper, the greatest big three of all time.
But Brooklyn allowed the players to run the show, which was detrimental to the team. Out was head coach Kenny Atkinson, who helped to create the Nets’ new culture, and in was former Warriors assistant Steve Nash.
Durant heavily pushed for the Nets to acquire an aging DeAndre Jordan, who subsequently took minutes away from rising center Jarrett Allen.
The trade for Harden sealed the deal for the Nets. It was title or bust.
Brooklyn did make a run in the postseason in 2021, eventually losing in the conference semifinals to the Milwaukee Bucks. The story may be different if Kevin Durant wore a smaller shoe size, but the reality is what it is: this team was an ultimate failure.
Drama between Irving and management caused Harden to demand a trade, and when things weren’t going their way, Durant and Irving eventually sought out greener pastures.
When the trio did play together, they were 13-3. They just never had the opportunity to play. Irving missed 123 games during his stay in Brooklyn, Durant missed 21, and Harden only played 80 games. Availability is the best ability.
2023-Present Phoenix Suns
And finally, back to Phoenix. Once the Suns traded for Beal, it was title or bust. But the reality of the situation was the Suns were closer to a title before they acquired Beal, or even Durant, for that matter.
The team had no point guard during the first year of the big three, and the offseason addition of Tyus Jones didn’t do much to rejuvenate the playmaking for Phoenix.
There was no sacrifice from Beal either in order to make the team work. Beal was the third option, but refused to play like one.
According to NBA insider Chris Haynes, Beal was upset when former Suns head coach Mike Budenholzer told the struggling guard to play more like Jrue Holiday.
“Don’t ever disrespect me like that,” Beal reportedly said. “Don’t ever tell me to play like another player.”
To candidly put it, that sounds like a player who’s not willing to sacrifice for the better of the team, it sounds like a player who doesn’t want to win.
The State of the Modern NBA
The main takeaway from this is that the superteam formula is no longer working in the NBA.
Just look at times like the Celtics and Denver Nuggets, who have recently won finals with two stars and an elite cast of role players. That’s the formula in the NBA today: no superteams and no big threes.
Times change, and so do the teams who still think putting three superstars together with no chemistry is going to work.
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