Stiles Points: Enjoy the Ride This Thunder Season With Expectations

The Oklahoma City Thunder are projected to win the NBA Finals, but it isn’t as pressurized as many would believe in a typical contending scenario.

Dec 8, 2023; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA; Oklahoma City Thunder forward Chet Holmgren (7), and guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (2) celebrate after Chet Holmgren scores a basket against the Golden State Warriors during the second half at Paycom Center. Mandatory Credit: Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images / Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images

The Oklahoma City Thunder are projected to win the Western Conference anyway you slice it. The Vegas odds, media prognosticators and even former players sing praise in unison for the Thunder. 

While their rightful place in preview and prediction season is at the top of the West, vying for an NBA Title with the favorites and reigning champion Boston Celtics, the road to fulfill that dream still has many obstacles. 

The first being the depth in talent, parity has been the most popular world in the NBA ecosystem over the last five years and it has never rang true the way it does this year. 

Legitimately four teams would consider anything less than a final four appearance a disappointment in the West, with a few more dark horses to throw in there. The East is much of the same with pressure mounting in New York, Philadelphia and Milwaukee to join or surpass Boston at the top. 

Coupled with the quality competition comes the Thunder’s inexperience. While all you have heard in Bricktown has been “this team is young,” for a half decade, it’s still true. The Thunder have the least combined NBA minutes of any roster around the association, to cash on the contending  checks we are all writing for them, they’d have to yet again be an anomaly. 

That’s been no problem for the Thunder in the past, both seasons in which Jalen Williams, Chet Holmgren and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander have shared a roster together (for Holmgren, only playing in one) Oklahoma City has bucked trends. They’d have to do it a third time to hoist the Larry O’Brien Trophy. 

History tells us, in your second ever postseason push - which it would be for Williams and Holmgren - you aren’t destined to win your first ring. You have to be forged in the fire of heartache, face ridicules narratives, or at least be questioned. 

If the Thunder come up shy of taking home their first title in franchise history this isn’t a failure by any stretch of the imagination because to win that ring their hopes rest of two players who wouldn’t legally take a sip of alcohol two years ago. 

However, it’s also not impossible. If any group was going to prove to render norms useless it’s the one that won 57 games a year ago with only one player taller than 6-foot-9. 

Expectations often lead to pressure, and there is a time and place for that. But it’s also important to look around and smell the roses at times. This season has high stakes because it’s a rare chance to go win a title, you only have so many cracks at it, but baring us suffering the same fate as the dinosaurs, the Thunder will be in the same spot a year from now - picked as the favorites to win the West and the title with more experience under the belt. 

So for now, just enjoy the 2024-25 NBA season, which could end with the first NBA Championship banner being lifted into the rafters of the Paycom Center.   

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