On April 18, 2022, Sam Presti held one of his epic end-of-season press conferences.
The Thunder had just finished 24-58 in Year 2 of its rebuild, but on the horizon, in two months’ time, was a draft that would propel the franchise’s future.
In that two-hour and 20,000-word Q&A session, Presti was asked if he felt any pressure to replicate the magic of the Thunder’s first rebuild. The one in which Presti drafted three future MVPs in consecutive years. Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden — a trio which made the NBA Finals at the ages of 23, 23 and 22.
“Skill is recognizing when you’ve been fortunate,” Presti said. “And I know we’ve been very fortunate … I don’t know how that happened. I think it was a lot of things that came together.”
Presti is the first to tell you how lucky the Thunder’s been, and of course that’s true. But as general manager, Presti parlayed that early luck into sustained success. The Thunder made four conference finals appearances in a six-year stretch from 2011-16.