The Warriors’ Leandro Barbosa played an integral in Game 1 of the NBA Finals. Did he earn himself a new contract in Golden State?
The Golden State Warriors had an all-time great season, finishing with the best record in NBA history in the regular season (73-9).
The Warriors also find themselves, once again, in the NBA Finals facing off against a familiar foe, the LeBron James led Cleveland Cavaliers. The stage was set for the championship rematch with two multiple time MVP’s in Stephen Curry and LeBron James set to try to lead their respective teams to win it all and become NBA champions.
For Curry and the Warriors, the defending champions, the road to get out of the Western Conference Finals was a long and arduous one that took them all seven games to advance over the Oklahoma City Thunder. The Warriors climbed their way out of a 3-1 series deficit and proceeded to win three straight against the Thunder as they barreled their way back into the NBA championship.
For LeBron and his Cavs, it was about finally bringing a title to Cleveland and getting sweet revenge against the Warriors, whom had beaten the Cavaliers for the championship last season. The Cavaliers steamrolled their way into the NBA finals with a 12-2 postseason record (including two sweeps) heading into the finals.
Game 1 came as a shock to the NBA world not because of who won, but because of who lead the victorious team to victory. The Golden State Warriors took care of business at home with an impressive 104-89 win that gave them a 1-0 advantage to start out the series. Reigning MVP, Curry, and his three point shooting counterpart, Klay Thompson, were of little to no significance to the outcome of the game. It was instead the play of the backups like Shaun Livingston who scored a team high 20 points in the lopsided victory.
Another crucial backup who helped fuel the Warriors to victory was backup shooting guard, Leandro Barbosa. Barbosa was perfect from the field making all five of his attempted shots, including a three pointer, and ended the night with 11 points, some of which came in big moments.
Tough! https://t.co/gvEcDxKdOc
— NBA TV (@NBATV) June 3, 2016
With all the excitement surrounding the NBA Finals it is almost too easy to forget that free agency is approaching, fast, for all teams, including both of the teams in the NBA finals. The Warriors are fairly fortunate this off season with few players with expiring contracts. One of those players is Barbosa. Barbosa is not some kind of star player who is constantly in the spotlight like Curry, but Barbosa is a proven veteran backup who helped the Warriors take the first game of this championship series.
Barbosa averaged 6.4 points per game in his twelfth year in the league, but as shown last night, is still a key part in the “all time great” Warriors team. One of the greatest strengths of the Warriors is how all players are apart of their success, they are such a deep team that sometimes players like Livingston and Barbosa get overlooked. That does not lessen their importance to the team that they showed in Game 1 and it would be smart for the Warriors to resign Barbosa.
Warriors fans do not have the same fear in this off season that, for example, an Oklahoma City Thunders fan has with the potential of losing their star player, Kevin Durant. However Warriors fans should still be on the lookout for whether their team resigns Barbosa, who was a part of this “greatest season ever”.