A passage from Simone Weil’s 1940 essay “The Illiad, or The Poem of Force,” which discusses the blind poet Homer’s epic of the Trojan War, has always resonated with me: “The Iliad’s war progress is merely a never-ending game of seesaw.” The winner of the moment fails to recognize that victory is a fleeting state and believes himself to be unbeatable, even though he may have lost a few hours earlier.

The Golden State Warriors seemed invincible once. Now, far from it. Nobody saw this coming five years ago, when they looked like the most dominant NBA team possible, winning their third title in four years. But what every new basketball dynasty teaches us, over and over again, is that pride comes before the fall. Everyone goes out sad, eventually.

One of the NBA players who helped define this generation’s style the most was Klay Thompson. Even though Steph Curry brought in modernity and LeBron James was the best player, your thoughts always turned to Klay when it came to the players on your team who weren’t good enough. Why are they unable to match Klay’s size? Just as skilled in defense? Why are they unable to simply shoot and move off the ball like Klay, stop demanding the ball constantly, and stop feeling the need to prove themselves by engaging in ridiculous dribbling antics? He became an inevitable Hall of Famer because he was so skilled at playing a part.

But he tore his Achilles a few years back, managed a decent season, and has just not been the same guy. Sometimes he shows glimpses of his former self and lights it up, but time and injury have shaved off the extra precision that made him a force on the court. Now, Klay is just OK.

Athletes try to project calm as this happens to them. They’re focused on the process, taking it one day at a time, all that jazz. Klay, a serene presence for most of his career, has instead opted to rage against the dying of the light. After getting benched during the end of a close game against the Suns, he didn’t hold back with reporters: “Of course it frustrates me. You think I’m gonna just chill? I’m freaking competitive, man. At the end of the day, I’m one of the most competitive people to put this uniform on. I can say that with confidence, too. But whatever. I guess I didn’t bring it tonight. I deserved it.”

He is shifting between anger with himself and the creeping fear of what happens next, lamenting the slow end of his life as an elite competitor.

Then there is Draymond Green. If Klay is a perfect platonic ideal, Draymond is a pile of imperfections that cohere into a complete player. Too short, too hot-headed, not athletic enough, not a good shooter. But he has massive arms, a first-class basketball intellect, and a doggedness that made him an unnerving terror who devoured opponents’ offensive systems whole, night after night.

He’s got trouble controlling his testicle-smashing impulses, apparently. Or stomping people’s chests, as in the case of poor Domantas Sabonis:

Just a hot-headed guy with quick hands and very little shame. The qualities that make us great are so often our downfall, sooner or later:

Anyway, as the Warriors have fallen off, Draymond has exhibited the characteristics of a sore loser. First, he throttled the Timberwolves’ Rudy Gobert during a fracas, earning a four-game suspension from the league. Then, this week, he smacked Suns center Jusuf Nurkic in the dome. Lots of digital ink has been spilled seeking answers about Draymond, but he’s always been like this, I think, and it’s just spilling out as the end runs up on him.

The Warriors, who had lost sharpshooter Kevin Durant, used to act as though this stage of their development was over and they would always own the winnings. A few years ago, when Steph and Klay were hurt, the team was able to acquire some high draft picks. The team’s owner, VC billionaire Joe Lacob, predicted that the rebuild would be quick and effective and that it would benefit the team in the long run because it would put them on “two tracks”: the one they were on prior to the injuries (the Steph/Klay/Draymond core), and the new one where rising players like Jordan Poole and James Wiseman, the No. 2 overall draft pick, along with top picks Jonathan Kuminga and Moses Moody, would grow behind that front-runner to become the unstoppable New Warriors, who would raise many banners to officially open their new $1.4 billion Chase Center in San Francisco.

Unfortunately, the first track — and Draymond in particular – wasn’t too thrilled about being regarded as old news while they were still on the team, and the players they acquired were either fake-good (Poole) or actively bad (Wiseman). So, even after the team got one for the road in 2022, that dream… fell apart real quick. First, Draymond punched Poole in the face on camera during practice. Then came a slow start where they simply could not win on the road. They rounded into shape and were “pretty good” by season’s close, and made the second round of the Playoffs by disposing of a very young Sacramento Kings squad, only to fall to LeBron and the Lakers. Then they let their GM, Bob Myers, enter the open market upon contract expiration, hired one of the most hated players in franchise history to replace him, shipped off Poole (for an aging Chris Paul) and Wiseman (for role player Gary Payton II and some second-round picks), and spent all summer getting older, as we all did.

We are left to observe the wreckage — a great team with the league’s highest payroll ($211.8 million) going out sad. It feels unfamiliar and strange, even though it’s happened so many times before. The late Kobe Bryant Lakers teams were a pathetic excuse for Kobe to prove he was still willing to go out there and fire like a lunatic. Hakeem Olajuwon’s Rockets made a series of desperate moves that didn’t work out. Walt “Clyde” Frazier played for the Cavaliers as the Knicks sank into a swamp. The Bad Boy Pistons were sore losers after getting swept by the Bulls, then got worse for a few years before bottoming out. Greg Popovich’s Spurs almost avoided such a fate, right up until the moment Kawhi Leonard demanded a trade.

You ask, “But what about the Bulls?” It’s true that in 1998, Jordan’s Bulls did end their illustrious run. But unlike the Warriors, that team was dispersed due to the incompetence of general manager Jerry Krause and cheapskate owner Jerry Reinsdorf, not on-court malaise. An unworthy conclusion in its own right.

Not to mention, much as the Achaeans were slowly picked off for the insults they slung at the Gods during the sacking of Troy, the Bulls simply delayed their fates. Jordan, antsy in retirement and living without the Juice for the first time in his life, returned to the Washington Wizards and missed the playoffs twice before Mariah Carey sung him out of the league for good. Without Phil Jackson to massage his psyche, Dennis Rodman flailed around for a while and retired. Then he went to… North Korea. Scottie Pippen fell off hard, was involved in the worst NBA game of all time, and then his ex-wife got engaged to Michael Jordan’s son, something that I would not wish on my worst enemy.

The Warriors were the best basketball team of their time. They were a bright, well-oiled Bay Area team that was founded on a mountain of tech cash, miles ahead of their rivals, and the basketball league of the future. However, the future has passed, the technocrats have become more sinister and frightening, and the team members are aging one by one. It is now finished. Whether you choose to weep or not, remember this message: you are the next.