OKC: The Ironic Champion
American culture has devolved into a worrisome state. We live in a culture with an inelastic demand for short term content and gratification while being sold some idea of “happiness”. These factors contribute to a culture that’s increasingly solipsistic, one that’s all about the individual. This very focus has led to a widespread decrease in mental health and a decline in organized religion. Whether we like it or not, we all have a religious impulse built into us. The social media era in which we reside has shifted this impulse from actual organized religion to worshipping beauty, material goods, prestige, money, and the like.
The collective capitulation to these forms of worship has made most Americans strikingly similar people. Look no further than the content we consume to prove this point. Every new Netflix movie is all about action (or serial killers). It’s all art that’s focused on the audience being able to safely escape their reality, rather than confront them about the issues they face on a day-to-day basis. The stories we are subjected to all have the same characters with the same arc where we meet them at some point in time, an event happens to them, there’s a glorious realization, and then they are better for the event happening.
This isn’t to discount these types of straight-line arcs, but these arcs are nothing like the lived human experience. Life is actually about making the same mistake over and over again. Do I know I should eat healthier? Yes. Do I still eat ice cream if it ends up in the freezer? Also yes. Should I weight train multiple times a week? Yes. Do I, although I acknowledge this universal, undisputed truth? No. Kurt Vonnegut elaborates further in his address to Case Western Reserve, “We pretend to know what the good news is and bad news is… all we do is echo the feelings of those around us.” As humans, we’re constantly oscillating over some x-axis of happiness, not making wide jumps above and below that axis.
Succumbing to the merciless cycle of short form content paired with an appetite for escapist media has made philosopher Soren Kierkegaard’s theory of levelling come true in spades. Kierkegaard posited that as people became increasingly focused on themselves as an individual, they devolve into a cycle of over-reflection. As individuals reflect, they never end up settling on just one path to follow, instead reflecting over and over each time one path doesn’t go exactly according to plan. Growing frustrated, individuals then develop a latent envy towards those that have solidified existential commitments and passion in which they find success. The individuals who have found themselves without commitments now belong to the “public”, a group that lives in a world devoid of principles and riddled with ambiguity.
Flying right into the face of this very American phenomenon is the champion of the very American NBA, a league that has, more than any other professional sports league, marketed its individual stars more so than the teams they play for. Ironically, the newly-crowned champion of this league is one that’s players and staff alike parade how much they accomplished this feat as a team. Nearly everything Sam Presti, the team’s general manager, says about individuals and team philosophy runs opposite to what we’re fed on a daily basis.
One of my favorite Presti-isms comes from last year’s end of season press conference where he says, “You can’t bubble wrap players from adversity.” He later points out that any time you ask someone who has accomplished something great about how they did it, the first thing they always bring up is some sort of adversity they faced. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang echoed the same idea saying, “... I hope suffering happens to you.” Oppositely, American culture tries to make everyday life as comfortable as possible. New graduates prioritize work based on pay and benefits, rather than opportunity and passion. We sit on our phones “doom-scrolling” in favor of reading because the abyss of short-form content offers mindless escape, rather than a confrontational one.
Presti also emphasizes the need for principles saying, “The principles are still the way we’re operating. Those weren’t principles to get through a period of time. Those were principles to live by.” In a society where ambiguity and principles have never been up for debate, Presti realizes that great accomplishments are a result of great principles. He knows that principles don’t just get you through an easy time, but through the hard ones too. In life and in team building, the goal is sustainable success. You don’t want a skill set that’ll get you one job, you want a skill set that’ll allow you to grow into different roles over time. Presti says this in a different way, “When we do get back to the postseason, we want it to be an arrival not an appearance. Arrival meaning that we can return, we can be there, we can take some chance or bad fortune and not have it sink us completely.”
h/t @kingtisemedia on X
We get so hyper-focused in the career world on just getting a few dots on the resume in order to get the next thing. We prioritize appearances over arrivals. American culture, in a way, has created this haste. It’s hard to have principles in a job search out of college, but, as Presti says, “Shortcuts cut long runs short.” Everyone is getting jobs and you want to be on the same wavelength as your peers and not stick out. This haste, again, is a byproduct of the social media era we live in where your next outcome is only as good as the next outcome of a peer that you see on LinkedIn or Instagram. I’m not trying to pontificate here, as I fall victim to the same traps, but this is the reality in which we reside.
Presti most importantly emphasizes the need for a cohesive group. As I said earlier, we all have a religious impulse and the inclination for worship. The Thunder’s core strategy is to find a group of players that all agree on a collective goal. Thunder starter Chet Holmgren said it best postgame, “Everybody’s a winner until it’s inconvenient for them. Everybody’s a winner when they get to do what they want on the floor. Everybody’s a winner when it’s going good.” Presti found 15 guys that were content with their role, having faith that they were put there in order for the team to reach the best outcome. Any workplace has this same dynamic where a manager puts employees in roles that they hope drive the best outcomes for their teams. Nothing destroys this dynamic more than solipsistic ideology. The Thunder are the 2nd youngest team to ever win the NBA Finals and lacked this ideology. The first thing Presti said when interviewed immediately after the final buzzer was, “Age is a number. Sacrifice and maturity are characteristics.”
Another historically decorated sports executive that headed up one of the youngest teams to win a championship held the same beliefs. At his 2017 Yale commencement speech former Cubs general manager Theo Epstein said, “Some players, and some of us, go through our careers with our heads down, focused on our craft and our tasks, keeping to ourselves, worrying about our numbers or our grades, pursuing the next objective goal, building our resumes, projecting our individual interests. Other players and others amongst us go through our careers with our heads up, as a real part of a team, alert and aware of others, embracing difference, employing empathy, genuinely connecting, putting collective interest ahead of our own. It is a choice.”
Epstein later continues, “A player’s character matters, the heartbeat matters, fears and aspirations matter, the player’s impact on others matters, the tone he sets matters, the willingness to connect matters, breaking down cliques and overcoming stereotypes in the clubhouse matters, who you are, how you live among others, that all matters.”
More than anything, what Presti and Epstein teach us is that the way for the best individual outcomes aligns closely with the best group outcomes. The American zeitgeist towards individualism teaches us the exact opposite. The 2025 Oklahoma City Thunder will be remembered by the masses as the first Oklahoma City Thunder championship team, anchored by NBA MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. I’ll remember this OKC Thunder team as a group that taught us that what we’re always sold isn’t what’s best for us, but what’s best for those selling it. One day, when I’m hopefully watching the OKC Thunder dynasty 30 for 30 with my kids and they ask me what I remember about those teams, I won’t talk about the players, I’ll talk about their culture. I’ll remind them to be people that keep their head up, embrace difference, and have principles to live by. I’ll tell them they got there because of sacrifice for the collective good. Here’s to many more championships for people that deserve it, like Sam Presti.
