Sports Bucket List by Rob Fleder Steven Hoffman

Author:Rob Fleder, Steven Hoffman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-10-20T16:00:00+00:00

THE THUNDER IN OKC

WHERE: Chesapeake Energy Arena, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

WHEN: November to May

The Thunder and their vocal supporters in OKC will have to lean hard on Westbrook since his former costar set out for points west.

Greg Nelson/Getty Images

WHY: THE THUNDERING HERD OF OKLAHOMA CITY FANS have earned their team’s arena a reputation as the loudest house in the NBA. Earplugs are beside the point, because when the fans in OKC show their Thunder a little love, you don’t just hear it, you feel it. And it’s not just noise. It’s devotion.

There are many reasons for this special relationship, which began even before the team was especially good: the Thunder is the only pro game in town, so the fans’ passion doesn’t have to be shared, particularly once football season ends. And though the franchise seems as native to OKC as the owner, Clay Bennett, it was only 2008 when the team was adopted—some say snatched—from Seattle and moved to Oklahoma, where a loving fan base and a spiffed-up new arena were waiting.

The Thunder were terrible at first, a shambles of a franchise, but had an appealing Rookie of the Year in Kevin Durant, a star whose palpable decency suited his new home to a T. They also had a brilliant young GM in Sam Presti, who, starting with Russell Westbrook, built a team around KD that had character equal to its talent. Presto! It all happened fast: a division title in 2011, then a conference championship and perennial postseason play. It was as if the SuperSonics never existed, as if the Thunder were a natural-born child of OKC. It was the perfect rebuilding and rebranding of an NBA team—a job that will obviously need redoing now that Durant has taken his talents to Golden State. But it’s hard to believe that the fans of OKC will lose faith in the Thunder. After all, they’ve seen their team transformed before.

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