Hamptons Five Back in NBA Championship Hunt
The Hamptons’ circle of influence is enormous. But one might ask, what is the connection between the Hamptons and this year’s NBA playoffs? Well, if you are a Golden State Warriors fan, you probably already know the answer.
The Golden State Warriors won the National Basketball Championship last year when they swept LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers. But to admire that feat and to believe the Warriors will be victorious again this year (they’re already up 1-0 in the series), we must give credit to a single event that actually took place in the Hamptons. This event gave birth to what has come to be known as the Hamptons Five.
To many people outside NBA fandom, the Hamptons Five may be confused for a musical group who sing songs from a bygone era. But this is not the case.
The Hamptons Five actually consists of five players on the Warriors roster. They are Stephen Curry, Draymond Green, Klay Thompson, Andre Iguodala and Kevin Durant.
Back in 2015 and 2016, the Warriors were a pretty good team. In fact, they won it all in 2015 and made it back to the Finals in 2016, eventually losing out to King James and the Cleveland Cavaliers. But at the end of that season, they lost Harrison Barnes, who was an integral part of the lineup.
Curry, Green, Thompson and Iguodala were part of that well-respected and talented Warriors team. But with the loss of Barnes, they realized they were missing a piece of the puzzle necessary to bring them another championship. And they knew Kevin Durant, known as KD, was the kind of elite player who could coagulate their team.
The Seattle Supersonics drafted KD in 2007—they subsequently relocated to Oklahoma City and became the Thunder—and he became an instant superstar. He stayed with the team all the way through the 2016 season when he decided to explore free agency. And by the summer of 2016, many teams wanted him.
It was at this time that KD decided to rent a vacation home in the Hamptons. His representatives would handle offers from various teams and bring them to him for consideration. But that process would not suit the Warriors. They wanted KD badly and they wanted him to know it.
As the private jet landed in New York, out steps Curry, Green, Thompson and Iguodala. Their mission was to track down KD in the Hamptons, show up at his front door and convince him to sign with the Warriors. And it worked.
Because of this Hamptons event in the summer of 2016, a Bay Area columnist by the name of Tim Kawakami coined the phrase Hamptons Five and it stuck.
In 2017, when the Golden State Warriors won the NBA Championship. Kevin Durant won the Most Valuable Player Award. But that isn’t the only relationship Durant has with the Hamptons. Coincidentally, he is represented by Roc Nation Sports, a sub-division of Roc Nation. And who founded this entertainment group? None other than our very own East Hampton homeowner Jay-Z!
Can the Hamptons Five and their surrounding cast members win it all again in 2019? We’ll find out soon enough. The Warriors host Game 2 against the Houston Rockets tonight at 10:30 p.m.
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