A BRIEF HISTORY OF... THE GOLDEN STATE WARRIORS

With the NBA returning tonight, let's take a look at the history of the reigning champions, the Golden State Warriors.

Starting Up: The Warriors' roots date back to the founding of the league in 1946. They're one of just three charter members of the Basketball Association of America (BAA, renamed the National Basketball Association two-and-a-half years later) to still be active along with the Boston Celtics and New York Knicks. The team was founded in Philadelphia, and the name Warriors was a nod to an old team from the Philly area in the 20s.

In 1962, the team was moved to California after being purchased by Bay Area TV and radio producer Franklin Mieuli. The Warriors settled in San Francisco for its first decade in the Golden State, but were moved once again to the other side of the bridge in Oakland in 1971. It was a natural transition, since they had been playing an increased number of games at then-new Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Arena beginning in 1966, communing back and forth between both major Bay Area cities.

Rather than rebrand the team as the Oakland Warriors, the team was renamed the Golden State Warriors so as to take ownership of both San Fran and Oak Town. As a result, the Warriors are the only pro team in the four major sports to not include the name of its state, city, or geographical area in its full title. The Warriors have played at the Oakland Coliseum ever since they permanently moved to Oakland (the arena was renamed many times over the years and has been known as the Oracle Arena since 2006).

Greatest Runs

Hot Out of the Gate (1946-1948): The Warriors have the distinction of winning the first-ever NBA (then BAA) championship in 1947, defeating the Chicago Stags four games to one. They made it back to the Finals the following year (by extension, becoming the first team in NBA/BAA history to go to back-to-back Finals), but lost to the original Baltimore Bullets in six games.

In these first two seasons where they were coached by their general manager Edward Gottlieb (he gave up coaching duties in 1955, but remained the team's GM for the rest of their stay in Philadelphia), the Warriors won 62 games in the regular season (the most among the three still-existing charter teams, and fourth-best in the league overall). They had a 14-9 record in the first two playoffs, the most playoff games and wins in the league.

A Championship And An Icon (1955-1964): The Warriors won one final championship in Philadelphia in 1956, beating the Fort Wayne Pistons in five games. But the big news (literally and figuratively) was the drafting of Wilt Chamberlain in 1959. Chamberlain wrecked everybody's shit, and the Warriors made the playoffs in four of his five full seasons with the team.

From the 1955-56 season to Chamberlain's last full season with the team in 1963-64 (to go along with a cross-country move), the Warriors won 374 games, third-most in the NBA and second only to the St. Louis Hawks in the West. They also made it to within a series of the Finals five times to go along with two Finals appearances.

Great in the 70s (1971-1977): Led by Rick Barry in this era (well, for most of the time, anyway), the Warriors won 295 games (third-best in the NBA, second only to the Los Angeles Lakers in the West) and made the playoffs five times (tied with the Chicago Bulls for the second-most in the NBA and most in the West). The Warriors won at least one playoff series four times, made it to the Western Conference Finals three times, and won their first championship in nearly twenty years (and their first since moving to California) in 1975, defeating a Washington Bullets team with twelve more wins on them in a four-game sweep.

Run TMC (1988-1991): While not as successful as other eras listed here, this time in Warriors history is notable for sheer entertainment value. Led by the trio of Tim Hardaway, Mitch Richmond and Chris Mullin (TMC, geddit?), these Warriors were notable for being potent scorers and playing at a break-neck pace. They were among the fastest teams in the NBA in terms of number of possessions per game, with their only competition in that department being the historically fast Denver Nuggets teams of the 80s and early 90s. The Warriors made the playoffs twice, but never got out of the second round. And Run TMC had a short stay, with the team breaking them up after the 1990-91 season. But they sure were fun while they lasted.

The Shootingist Team in the West (And NBA) (2012-Present): After years of futility, the Warriors returned to playoff form thanks to some impecable shooting. Led by Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson (known as the Splash Brothers), the team became the most dangerous long-range team in the history of the game, knocking down threes at a frankly-insane pace. Not only that, but the team also possessed a killer defense which ranked near the top of the league year-to-year.

Mark Jackson gets credit for setting the team up like this, but Steve Kerr perfected this system. The 2014-15 Warriors destroyed the NBA with the second-best offense and number one defense in the league. They won 67 games, the most in team history and one of only 11 teams ever to win at least 67, en route to the number one seed in the always-dominant West.

They carried their dominance over to the playoffs, where they made the Finals for the first time in 40 years in just 15 games. And aside from some goofiness in games two and three of the Finals, completely dominated all the Cleveland Cavaliers not named LeBron James to win their fourth-ever championship. The 2014-15 Warriors have already assended to the pantheon of awesome teams in the history of the NBA, and the future of basketball in the Bay Area looks bright.

Leanest Years

A Middling Team in a Middling Era (1948-1955): The good times at the start of their existence didn't last very long. The Warriors, in the seven seasons following their Finals appearance in 1948, had one winning season. Of the nine teams that were around for at least six of the seasons in this era, only the Hawks and Bullets had worse winning percentages than the Warriors.

Even with their shoddy records, the Warriors still made the playoffs every season until 1952 (in that point in time, the playoff teams would be the top four teams in each division regardless of record, so it was a lot easier to get to the postseason back then). However, the Warriors won just one playoff GAME and never advanced past their first series.

And eventually they weren't good enough to get swept in a best-of-three. By 1953, the Warriors were a shell of themselves, falling to a 12-57 record, with a franchise-worst 17.4 winning percentage. The team steadily improved in the following two seasons, but remained really bad until they returned to championship glory in 1956.

Crap in the 80s (1978-1986): By the end of the 70s, most of the Warriors' best players from the championship team, such as Rick Barry, Jamaal Wilkes, Jeff Mullins and Phil Smith, either retired or were traded away. The team didn't exactly replace them with equally good players for the most part. While their 40.4 winning percentage in this stretch wasn't good, it wasn't even in the bottom five in the NBA (the Bulls, Cavaliers, Pacers, Clippers and Jazz all had worse records than the Warriors).

Where the stark bleakness really comes through is in the playoff appearances. Namely, that the Warriors didn't go to the playoffs once in eight seasons (their playoff-less streak actually went to nine, since they didn't qualify for the postseason in 1978 either). The Clippers were the only other team besides the Warriors to not go to the playoffs at least once in this period. You should never be comparable to the 80s Clippers ever.

The Warriors averaged 33 wins in these eight seasons, with their best mark being a 45-37 mark in 1981-82. Considering that the average number of wins for playoff teams in this stretch was 48 (47 in the Western Conference), and you shouldn't be shocked that the Warriors didn't go to the dance once.

Interminably Bad (1994-2010): Holy God, what a miserable time in team history. Before I get into the reasons for this, here are the straight facts— the Warriors from the 1994-95 season to the 2009-10 season won a scant 37.3% of their games. Only the Los Angeles Clippers had a lower winning percentage in those 16 seasons.

Unsurprisingly, the Warriors' single-season win-loss records were pretty grim as well. They lost 60+ games four times in five seasons, including a putrid 17-65 mark in 2000-01, they're worst record in a season of at least 80 games. The Warriors' four 60+ loss seasons was tied with the Clippers for second-most in the NBA.

And the Clippers still made the playoffs twice as many times as the Warriors in that same stretch, twice to the Warrior's one. 26 of the NBA's 30 teams played in all 16 seasons in this stretch— even counting the Warriors and Clippers, the average number of playoff appearances for those 26 teams in this stretch was nine. 11 teams went to the playoffs at least 10 times. Most qualified for the postseason at least 7 times. Again, the Warriors only made the playoffs ONCE in a league that sends more than half of its teams to the playoffs each season.

The reason for all this ineptitude lay at the top of the organization. Chris Cohan, founder and former head of Sonic Communications, was the Warriors' primary owner from 1994 to 2010— aka, the entire time I'm talking about in this section. Cohan, when he wasn't busy suing seemingly anyone who may or may not have said something halfway disparaging about him, helped foster a culture of backstabbing, mistrust and most of all, incompetence.

The Warriors of this era were notorious for their bad drafting, penny pinching, and pettiness. These traits were given corporal form in Robert Rowell who, like Cohan, was in the organization for the entirety of this era. Rowell worked his way up to the title of team president, despite seemingly having no understanding of how to run a basketball team, and possessing the tact of a spoiled child. Any good moves the Warriors made, rare as they were, were undone in the most spectacularly awful ways imaginable. Mostly, Rowell spent his time as president hording power and destroying anyone who posed any kind of threat to him, real or imagined, as if he was Al Paccino as directed by Roland Emmerich.

Cohan either green lit all of this boorish failure himself, or simply allowed it to happen out of apathy. It depended on the day. The only thing Cohan was good at in his time as owner was incurring the wrath of every Warriors fan in existence. This was infamously given life at the 2000 All Star Game, which was held at the Warriors' Oracle Arena. Cohan walked out onto the court with his eight-year-old son to present Michael Jordan with an award, and the crowd mercilessly booed him. He was standing next to a young child and one of the most transcendent players in sports history, and the hatred his hometown fans felt for him still managed to seep through.

And after 16 excruciating years of owning the Warriors, in which he gave Donald Sterling and James Dolan a run for their money as worst owners in the NBA, if not all of sports, Cohan sold the team to current owners Joe Lacob and Peter Guber in 2010. Rowell was soon ousted as well, with as much dignity as someone like him deserved, which is to say, none. That the Warriors won a championship less than a decade later is no coincidence. They didn't have dueling incompetents at the top to get in their way.

Names You Should Know

Paul Arizin: An early star for the Warriors and NBA. Arizin played ten non-consecutive seasons (he missed two-straight seasons while serving with the Marines during the Korean War) and made the All-Star Game in every season he played.

Among the most potent scorers in the early NBA, Arizin led the league in points per game twice and retired second all-time in both points (16,266) and points per game (22.8, which is still fourth-best in Warriors history). Arizin was also a pretty efficient shooter for his day, as he was one of just seven players from 1946 to 1962 to have a true shooting percentage above 50% with at least 7,000 field goal attempts.

Arizin was named First-Team All-NBA three times, and was also named one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History for the NBA's 50th anniversary in 1996. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1978.

Neil Johnston: One of the first dominant centers in the game's history, Johnston led the NBA in scoring in three-straight seasons. Johnston and Paul Arizin formed one of the most dangerous scoring twosome in the early NBA, with Johnston mauling opponents while Arizin sank in jump shots.

Johnston led the NBA in field goal percentage three times in five seasons and averaged 11.3 rebounds per game for his career, third-most in history at the time of his retirement and still fourth-best in Warriors history. Named First-Team All-NBA four times, Johnston also made six All-Star Games in his eight seasons. He was posthumously inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1990.

Tom Gola: While Arizin and Johnston above were noted for their scoring, Gola was more of a defensive stopper (not to say Arizin and Johnston didn't play defense, just that Gola was the most notable defensive-minded player on the team). Gola made three of his five All-Star Games as a Warrior, and was named to his lone All-NBA team in 1958 (he was on the Second Team). Gola also has the distinction of being the first long-time Warriors player to be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame, going in in 1976 (while having a fine pro career, he was most notable for having an amazing career at La Salle).

Wilt Chamberlain: Wilt! Perhaps the greatest player in basketball history, Chamberlain's stats are frankly absurd. For context, Chamberlain was one of only two seven footers in the NBA in his first season in 1959-60, so he could dominate more easily.

Still, get these numbers— in his Warriors career alone, he led the NBA in scoring every single year and led in rebounding in four-straight. He averaged (AVERAGED!) 41.5 points per game and 25.1 rebounds per game as a Warrior (shockingly, both are franchise highs).

Five of the top six scoring seasons in history were done by Chamberlain, and he is the only player in history to average more than 40 points a game in a season (He did it twice! He averaged 44.8 points in 1962-63, and that was a step down from the previous season where he averaged 50.4! Christ Almighty!) He is the only player in history to average more than 20 points and 20 rebounds per game. Oh, and scored 100 goddamn points in a single game that one time.

And keep in mind, this was all before the installation of the three-point line. This was also after the NBA desperately tried to curb his dominance by changing numerous rules. He made the All-Star Game in every season but one for 13 total appearances, five as a Warrior. He made ten All-NBA teams (seven on the First Team). And just in his Warriors career, he was named Rookie of the Year and MVP in the same season (he won three more as a member of the 76ers). He was named one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History, went into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1979, and had his number 13 jersey retired by the Warriors. Simply put, Wilt fucking ruled.

Nate Thurmond: Initially a power forward, Thurmond switched to center after Wilt Chamberlain was traded. While having to fill some enormous shoes, Thurmond was an awesome player in his own right. While not as proficient a scorer as Chamberlain (as if anyone was), he still averaged 17.6 points in his decade-plus with the Warriors.

But rebounding was where he really cut his teeth, averaging a clean 15 a game for his career. He is one of only five players in history to average at least 15 points and 15 rebounds for his career, and is the most recent player to do so. A seven-time All-Star (all with the Warriors) and named one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History, Thurmond was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1985. His number 42 jersey was also retired by the team.

Rick Barry: One of the more proficient scorers of his era, Barry, at just 22, coming off a Rookie of the Year season, and in only his second NBA season, scored 35.6 points per game en route to the Warriors going to the 1967 Finals (they lost to the Wilt Chamberlain-led 76ers). After that bit of amazingness, and pissed that he wasn't being paid enough (in his mind), Barry jumped to the upstart ABA in protest, which helped legitimize that league (he was legally barred from playing in the ABA's inaugural season, but played in the following four seasons).

Returning to the NBA and the Warriors for the 1972-73, Barry picked up right where he left off by scoring like a mother bear. He was the key player in the Warriors' 1975 championship season, scoring 28.2 points per games in the playoffs and winning Finals MVP. He's the most potent scorers in team history after Chamberlain, made 12 All-Star Games between the NBA and ABA, and was All-NBA First Team six times. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1987 and was named one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History. His number 24 jersey was retired by the team.

Jeff Mullins: Playing most of his career with the Warriors, Mullins was another proficient scorer on the team. He was the team's leading scorer in four of the five seasons where Barry was either in the ABA or sitting at home waiting to play in the ABA, averaging 21.2 points per game during this stretch. Once Barry came back to the team Mullins began to take a step back, having gotten older and such. He still had a couple of good scoring years left in him, but he was, rightfully, not the first option anymore. But he still had a fine career, having made three All-Star Games.

Al Attles: Sweet Christmas! Attles had mostly been a role player on the Warriors for much of the 60s, but was named player-coach in 1969. He would hold the title of coach even after his playing career ended, coaching the Warriors on and off until 1983. The Warriors went to the playoffs six times under Attles, winning the 1975 NBA Championship while going to the Western Conference Finals in 1973, 1975 and 1976. He holds the team records for most wins with 557, most playoff victories with 31, most games coached with 1,075, and most playoff games coached with 61. And, if the above picture isn't an indication, he was perhaps the funkiest coach in NBA history.

Purvis Short: A good player at a pretty nondescript time for the Warriors, Short was a good shooter and scorer. Short scored 19.4 points per game in his nine seasons with the Warriors, averaging over 20 in four-straight seasons, including two-straight 25+ point years. While he never was named to All-Star Game, and aside from scoring wasn't particularly impressive, Short was still one of the better players in this era for the team.

Larry Smith: A light scorer, Smith was still a valuable power forward for his rebounding capabilities. He is one of just seven Warriors with at least 100 games with the team to average more than 10 rebounds a game. He would average more than 11 in four of his first seven seasons in the league, and in his nine seasons with the Warriors he was one of 11 players to average double-digit rebounds. Finally, he led all players with 13.7 rebounds per game in the 1987 playoffs. In short, Larry Smith, while not a particularly versatile player, was really, really good at rebounding.

Chris Mullin: Among the best shooters in the game's history. Mullin had a field goal percentage above .500 eight times in his 13 seasons with the Warriors, and his career .594 true shooting percentage ranks 25th best in history. More shooting goodness— Mullin was an accomplished free throw shooter, ranking 28th all-time with a .866 free throw percentage. He made five-straight  All-Star Games and four All-NBA teams. His number 17 jersey was retired by the team and he was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011.

Don Nelson: The winningest coach in NBA history. Nelson had two stints as Warriors coach, first from 1988 to 1995 and again from 2006 to 2010. In his first stay in the Bay Area, he presided over the Run TMC Warriors, leading them to four playoff appearances. In his second go around with the Warriors, he led them to one of the biggest upsets in NBA playoff history when the eight-seeded Warriors beat the reigning Western Conference Champion Dallas Mavericks in six games.

All in all, despite frequently clashing with ownership, players, ownership and players, and pretty much everyone else who didn't want to do everything his way, Nelson won 422 games with the Warriors, second-most in team history. One of his three Coach of the Year Awards came while coaching the Warriors. And as mentioned earlier, his career 1,335 wins are the most in history. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2012.

Tim Hardaway: Another member of Run TMC, Hardaway is among the best point guards in team history. His 9.3 assists per game as a Warrior is the top mark in team history, and he averaged double-digit assists two seasons in a row. He was also a good scorer, averaging nearly 20 points a game as a Warrior. And he managed to remain an effective player even after a knee injury wiped out his entire 1993-94 season. Three of his five All-Star Game appearances and two of his five All-NBA Team selections were as a Warrior.

Latrell Sprewell: He averaged 20.1 points per game as a Warrior, was a feisty ball hawk, and made three of his four All-Star Game appearances and his only All-NBA selection as a Warrior, but the most notable things about Latrell Sprewell are his off-court shenanigans.

His greatest hits as a Warrior involved, well, hits. Or the threat of physical violence at least. He once attacked a teammate with a two-by-four, and infamously, choked his coach P.J. Carlesimo which effectively ended his tenure with the team.

After his retirement, and this is directly from the last paragraph in the intro to his Wikipedia article: "...he has made headlines for grounding his million dollar yacht, having two of his homes foreclosed upon, and being prohibited from seeing his children." So yeah, not the best look for someone in the public eye, to say the least. But he was memorable, for better and worse.

Jason Richardson: A dynamic and exciting player, Richardson came up at perhaps the franchise's lowest moment, and he eased the pain of watching a truly wretched team by being awesome. He was an exquiste dunker, which you can see from the photo above and from this video. Recently retired, Kevin Draper of Deadspin wrote up a very nice retrospective of what Richardson meant to a certain cloth of Warriors fans, and its frankly better than anything I could write about him.

Five Current Guys You Should Know

Stephen Curry: Basketball is in this man's blood— his old man is Dell Curry, a great player in his own right. But man, the way Stephen Curry plays, he makes his dad and pretty much everyone else look like total scrubs. He's already the greatest shooter in the history of the NBA, and he's only got six seasons under his belt. He broke the record for most three pointers made in a single season with 272 in 2012-13. Then he broke his own damn record two seasons later with 286!

He's currently has the third-best three point shooting percentage in history with .440. Here's some more shooting from the master— he has a career free throw shooting percentage of .900 (coincidentally, the same as former Warriors great Rick Barry), a field goal percentage of .471, and a true shooting percentage .602. God damn!

He has two All-Star Games and an MVP under his belt, in addition to all of the above insanity. He pretty much just has to just exist for another couple years to go into the Basketball Hall of Fame someday.

Klay Thompson: The second half of the Splash Brothers with Steph Curry, and coincidentally also the son of a former NBA player, Mychal Thompson in this case. Klay Thompson... plays a lot differently than his dad. While not the three point shooter Curry is, Thompson still holds a .400+ career 3P%. The Warriors are one of the scariest teams to face precisely because Curry and Thomas are so overwhelmingly offensively. Thompson made his first All-Star Game last season, so he's certainly not riding Curry's coattails.

Andrew Bogut: The number one pick in the 2006 NBA Draft, Bogut's not much of a scorer. Where he cuts his teeth is defensively. He's averaged 1.6 blocks per game for his career, and averaged two or more three seasons in a row, leading the league with 2.6 in 2010-11. Bogut's more of a prototypical center, playing when the Warriors discard their usual small-ball lineup. When they do play small-ball, their center is usually...

Draymond Green: While 6'7'' is short for a usual center, when Green plays there the Warriors win. A lot. Green broke out last season, averaging 11.7 points and 8.2 assists, while playing a career-high 31.9 minutes per game (he hadn't played as often while Mark Jackson was the coach). Green gives the Warriors an edge, and is notorious shit talker. Winning a championship will probably make him even more willing to chirp, and he wasn't exactly bashful last season.

Steve Kerr: He played on five championship teams in his career, and he added a sixth ring this past season as a coach. Kerr is the first rookie coach to coach an entire season and to win a championship since 1947, aka the first season the NBA existed. He also holds the record for wins by a rookie coach with 67.

Needless to say, Kerr inherited a crazy-talented roster, but to his credit, he kept the system the same while benching certain players (David Lee, for example) and playing others instead (Draymond Green, as another). He also made the prudent choice of hiring an experienced group of assistant coaches to help out while Kerr learned on the job.

So if nothing else, Kerr isn't a moron an approached this situation as best as a first-timer could possibly have. And it worked, since they just won the whole damn thing. And in a bit of irony, the best three-point shooter in the game today is being coached by the guy who has the best career three-point percentage in history (Kerr had a nutty .454 3P%).