It’s hard to say what perfection looks like, since, by all practical regards it doesn’t exist. In fact, it’s typically a poor aspirational, which is why perfect is the enemy of good. But in sports, perfection stands as the ultimate barometer. The perfect game, the perfect pass, the perfect race. As long as there are games and people to play them, people will chase the holy grail of an athletic performance without flaw.
Right now, by the most conventional measure, the Golden State Warriors are perfect. In other words, the NBA defending champions are 16-0, undefeated nearly 20% into the NBA regular season. That’s now one game longer than any other team in history, bettering the 15-0 mark set most recently by the 1993-94 Houston Rockets, a team that went on to win an NBA title. Beyond the statistical anomaly of it all, there are some remarkable things about this Warriors version of perfection. First, they’ve done it without their head coach Steve Kerr, who’s been out all year recovering from back surgery. That’s left fill-in Luke Walton, who’s all of 35 years old and has less head coaching experience than most suburban dads, in the driver’s seat all year. So far, it’s been a seamless transition. Which means either Walton’s a prodigy, or perhaps in today’s NBA, coaching isn’t all that important. At the very least, it’s affirms the idea of a “players league,” where talent needs to be loosely handled instead of strictly regulated.
Second, the Warriors are playing what most people call small ball, a relative anathema in a game of tall trees. While most teams historically value big men in the post, and often elsewhere, the Warriors play up-tempo, high-speed ball with smaller guys and lots of passing – the kind of thing you expect in college more than the NBA. And while teams have used this in the past, most always fell victim to poor defense or a playoff structure that favored isolation and big stars driving the lane. So the Warriors haven’t simply defied the odds – they’ve defied common practice as well. It’s like a crazy financial scheme. It always sounds good until everyone’s broke. Only in this case, it’s starting to look less Bernie Madoff and more Warren Buffet.
And lastly, Golden State isn’t simply winning by the seat of their pants, which is what inevitably happens when you string enough wins together. They’re blowing people out, by over 15 points a game on average. That’s like a varsity/JV scrimmage. It means there’s enough error for someone, or even ones, to have a bad night and still come out ahead. Try that in Cleveland, or dare I say Manhattan. It’s not like other teams are particularly close, which means 16-0 could easily be 17, 18, 19, and so on. The end is only up to your imagination.
Which begs the obvious question, how much is enough? And more to the point, how important is perfect? Right now, two NFL teams are 10-0 – New England and Carolina. Both understand they’re over half way to a 19-0 perfect year, 16 regular season games and three in the postseason. The Patriots almost did it in 2007, when a perfect year ended in a crushing defeat to the New York Giants in the 2008 Super Bowl. No NFL team has done it since the 1972 Miami Dolphins, who went then 17-0 in winning Super Bowl VII. Players from that team still pop champagne when the last undefeated squad finally loses their first game of the year, ensuring their perfection is a singular accomplishment. So it matters to them.
There’s never been an undefeated NBA team, of course, and certainly not one in baseball, where losing is half the fun. College football regularly crowns an undefeated national champion, a culmination of competitive imbalance and the huge number of teams that play. So it’s just a matter of probability. In the NBA, no one has even run the playoffs undefeated, with the 2001 Los Angeles Lakers setting the bar at 15-1 in route to a title. So basically, we know perfection, especially for Golden State, is effectively impossible, just like winning the lottery is impossible, or getting that giant stuffed animal at Coney Island is impossible. So what’s the point of caring so much about a 16-0 start, when we know they’re going to lose eventually anyway?
It’s because in sport, perhaps perfect isn’t truly the enemy of good, but rather its accomplice. While the Golden State Warriors chase 17-0 and beyond, we’re seeing human athleticism at its finest. It’s graceful, unselfish, precise, and fluid. And really fun to watch, which isn’t the case for a whole lot of early season NBA. Perfection in sport isn’t a result, but a process. In a results oriented business, it’s refreshing to be privy to that, even if it won’t last forever. So enjoy this current incarnate of perfection, a gift to any true sports fan. All records aside, even a 16-0 one, this kind of perfect looks really good.
Keith Strudler is the director of the Marist College Center for Sports Communication and an associate professor of communication. You can follow him on twitter at @KeithStrudler
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