Introduction
Bob Myers, a former executive at Wasserman Media Group and player agent, has already secured a place among the NBA legends. On April 24, 2012, he was named the general manager of the Golden State Warriors (NBA, n.d.). At this moment, the Warriors failed to get into playoffs five times in a row, starting their miserable streak in 2007/2008. Moreover, they only made one playoff appearance between the 1994/1995 and 2011/2012 seasons (Basketball Reference, 2022). Myers turned the situation around and assembled one of the greatest dynasties in U.S. sports history. Under his management, the Warriors won three NBA titles (2015, 2017, 2018) and broke the legendary Chicago Bulls record by posting 73 regular season wins in 2015/2016 (NBA, n.d.). However, Myers’ mastery truly shined when he avoided the emotional pitfall of impatience after the horrible 2019/2020 season; on this occasion, he demonstrated a remarkable authentic voice similar to that of John Coltrane’s.
Creative Task: Recovery from Fall
After three NBA titles and five consecutive appearances in Finals, Golden State collapsed in the 2019/2020 season. Due to the severe injuries of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson, the Warriors finished the regular season with an abysmal 15-50 record, the worst in the NBA (McCauley, 2020). In 2020/2021, the record got better, but the Warriors still missed the playoffs. A dynasty built and sustained by Myers suddenly faced a perspective of end.
However, Myers did not lose composure in the face of difficult circumstances. According to Greene (2012), the choice of a creative task must be realistic, and a leader cannot be worried about what others might think about them. In this regard, Myers fully adhered to these principles, as he set a creative task of gradual recovery and started to work on it without caring too much about disgruntled fans. For instance, Myers could have given in to public pressure and arranged a trade of a star player in the hope of immediate improvements. Instead, he signed a few minimum deals to reinforce the roster and kept the payroll under $400 million, as promised to the team owner (Letourneau, 2021). This approach is similar to Mark Zuckerberg’s philosophy, who said that building a mission and building a business go hand in hand (DK, 2020). Overall, Bob Myers set a creative task of rebuilding the Warriors without radical changes that could have endangered the team’s culture and finances.
Creative Strategy: Altering Perspective
Ordinary people are susceptible to forming a conventional mind — a mental distortion that forces them to follow the narrow grooves and make generalizations. On the contrary, creative people look at matters from several perspectives, often revealing what is hidden in plain sight (Greene, 2012). Regarding Golden State, a less creative general manager could have thought that team leaders — Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green, have passed their peaks. Therefore, it is necessary to start a full-scale rebuilding and trade them before they lose their value. Such a decision would be a classic case of looking at the “what” instead of the “how” (Greene, 2012). However, Bob Myers used a creative strategy of altering perspective on the situation and considered how to overhaul the team without taking radical steps.
Under Myers’ management, Golden State Warriors developed a culture of discipline, professionalism, and teamwork. Myers illustrated it with the example of Andre Iguodala, who gave up his position in the starting line-up but performed brilliantly in the 2015 playoffs and won the Finals’ MVP title (Thomas, 2019). True to this culture, Myers successfully altered his perspective and developed an effective strategy for recovery. Instead of hunting for big yet unreliable stars like James Harden and Russell Westbrook, he signed Otto Porter Jr, Nemanja Bjelica, and Andre Iguodala for minimum deals (Letourneau, 2021). These players successfully fulfilled their intended roles, as the Warriors posted a respectful 53-29 record in the current regular season.
Creative Breakthrough: Letting Go
Attempts to accomplish a creative task can be exhausting; sometimes, the best way to achieve progress is to let go for a while instead of carving a path through the obstacles. For example, Albert Einstein spent ten years in fruitless thinking on the problem of general relativity, but a solution came to him the night after he decided to give up (Greene, 2012). In the Golden State case, the mentality of the all-conquering dynasty could have become a major stumbling block. As Klay Thompson said: “we are now a type of the team where it’s championship or bust” (Poole, 2021). However, Bob Myers did not let five years of constant wins get in the way of careful rebuilding. Myers openly stated: “I don’t love [championship or bust] even if we were healthy and great” (Martin, 2022). The willingness to let the championship hopes go to secure the team’s future was one of the reasons why the Warriors avoided hasty deals and almost returned to contender status.
Emotional Pitfall: Impatience
After the disastrous 2019/2020 season, Bob Myers had to think hard about how to save the crumbling team. One can argue that Myers was on the verge of falling into a pitfall of impatience. Creative solutions require continual intensity and vigor, whereas impatience leads to the repetition of ideas as a shortcut (Greene, 2012). Myers could have catered to the fans and used a shortcut of signing a star in the hope of immediate revival, similarly to the Los Angeles Lakers front office.
However, the advantage of functional and emotional excellence helped Myers avoid a pitfall. According to Willyerd et al. (2016), functional excellence means having a set of honed professional skills, and emotional excellence covers such vital feature as empathy. Myers possesses both attributes — in the words of Warriors head coach Steve Kerr, “one of the best parts of my job is just working with Bob” (Letourneau, 2021). Overall, Myers used his negotiating skills and good chemistry with Kerr to reinforce the roster with needed yet cheap players and improve the team’s performance.
Cross-Comparative Analysis
Impatience is one of the worst enemies of creativity since it ignites a desire to speed up the process and leads to the loss of authenticity. The success of creators without an authentic voice does not last long since the audiences are hard to fool. Greene (2012) provided an example of John Coltrane (1926-1967), the famous American jazz saxophonist and composer who spent over ten years learning various playing techniques and styles. Through his hard work, Coltrane developed a unique, authentic voice loved by the public.
In this regard, Bob Myers’ path to mastery was quite similar. According to Myers, “people want to connect to somebody who is authentic” (Thomas, 2019). Since 2012, he has been working hard to create a culture of authenticity, discipline, and teamwork in a previously weak organization. His efforts led to the creation of a legendary dynasty, and when the Warriors faced problems, Myers’ creative approach quickly set them on the path of recovery.
Conclusion
After years of success, Golden State Warriors found themselves in a difficult position. However, Bob Myers used his authentic voice and professional excellence to solve the creative task of recovery successfully. Myers altered a typical perspective of team rebuilding after a weak season, temporarily let the championship hopes go, and avoided the emotional pitfall of impatience. Overall, his actions in times of crisis can be considered an example of creativity in the sports business.
References
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DK. (2020). Entrepreneurs who changed history. DK Publishing.
Greene, R. (2012). Mastery. Viking.
Letourneau, C. (2021). How Warriors’ Bob Myers silenced doubters by assembling another title contender. San Francisco Chronicle. Web.
Martin, A. (2022). Is ‘championship or bust’ still Dubs’ mentality? Myers weighs in.NBC Sports. Web.
McCauley, J. (2020). After a forgettable season, Warriors ready to move forward. Federal News Network. Web.
NBA. (n.d.). Bob Myers. Web.
Poole, M. (2021). Klay eyes return with ‘championship or bust’ mentality.NBC Sports. Web.
Thomas, G. (2019). Golden State Warriors GM Bob Myers on culture, leadership, and authenticity. Forbes. Web.
Willyerd, K., Mistick, B., & Grenny, J. (2016). Stretch: How to future-proof yourself for tomorrow’s workplace. Wiley.