Who? Besides the Thunder, I don't really see anyone close in terms of young franchise talent to build around. The Sixers? Pacers? Kings? The Sixers want to blow it up. The Pacers still can't score and the Kings are a joke.
There are a lot of franchise's with young talented players to build around. Indiana, Portland, Houston, LAC, Denver, Minnesota, Chicago, Cleveland...
Doesn't really matter either way. I don't see any team beating Miami or OKC in the near future.
I agree with the above statement for the most part. In 2 or 3 when KG and Paul are gone Lebron and Durant will still be in their prime, and they are head and shoulders above other elite players. There is a point when Wade reaches 32 33 years old Lebron will have to carry too much of the load, but we'll see. Even so our foursome can be lumped in the same category as many other foursomes in the league in 2,3 years time. Lots of parity.
2,3 years time
Gay, DeRozan, Lowry, Bargnani
Holiday, Young, Turner, Bynum
Rose, Noah, Deng, Gibson
Irving, Waiters, Thompson, high draft pick
Monroe, Drummond, Knight, high draft pick
George, Hibbert, Granger, Hill
Jennings, Ellis, Ilyasova, Sanders
Smith, Hortford, Teague, ?
Curry, Thompson, Lee, Barnes, maybe Bogut
Paul, Griffin, Jordan, Bledsoe
Cousins, Robinson, Evans, Thornton
Harden, Parsons, Lin, Asik
Conley, Gasol, Davis, Arthur
Davis, Gordon, Anderson, Vasquez
Lawson, Faried, Gallinari, McGee
Love, Rubio, Pekovic, Shved
Aldridge, Lillard, Batum, Matthews
Favors, Kanter, Hayword, Jefferson or Millsap
So that's more than half the league that for the most part can claim they "like" their core 4 young players for a couple years down the road. Ours isn't really any more special especially knowing we don't know how Rondo and Sully will come back after major surgeries, and the unknown ceiling still of Bradley. That doesn't include high draft picks that could make teams like Orlando, Washington, Charlotte, ect join the discussion.
Our best shots IMO of being a contender down the road after after Paul and KG is have a very deep team built like Denver which obviously not many teams can do, or with our cap space hope a player like Carmelo comes here as his team gets older, and be our go to guy. We are very unlikely to get a franchise player in the draft.