A good preseason is good for the soul

Welcome to SB Nation Reacts, a survey of fans across the NBA. Each week, we send out questions to the most plugged-in Golden State Warriors fans and fans across the country. Sign up here to join Reacts.

The Golden State Warriors had one of the most fascinating offseasons in the NBA — not because of what they did, but because of what they didn’t do.

For the final months of the 2020-21 season, and the first few months of the offseason, discourse abounded about whether or not the Dubs would trade their future assets (mainly 2020 first-round pick James Wiseman and their two lottery picks in the then-upcoming 2021 NBA Draft) for a star that would help maximize the current championship window around a core of Steph Curry, Draymond Green, and Klay Thompson.

Would they be willing to mortgage the future for the present? Were they actually interested in Ben Simmons? Could they really pry Bradley Beal — or better yet, Damian Lillard — away from the teams they’d spent their whole career on?

At the end of the day the Warriors stood pat. We may never know if this was due to a desire to build a future around Wiseman, Jonathan Kuminga, and Moses Moody, or to a lack of a quality offer ever making its way to Bob Myers’ table.

All we know is that it was controversial. Many liked Golden State’s attempt at prioritizing both the present and the future, while many others felt they were failing to go all-in, which amounted to wasting one of the precious few years remaining of Curry being an elite force.

But one thing has made itself clear this preseason: while the Warriors may not have gone fully all-in on the present, this season looks brighter than many gave it credit for.

Golden State has opened the preseason an undefeated 4-0, punctuating the strong start with a Tuesday win over the prohibitive Western Conference favorites, the Los Angeles Lakers — who were playing with their star trio of LeBron James, Anthony Davis, and Russell Westbrook, even as the Warriors rested Curry and Green.

And with that, optimism is growing in Dub Nation.

According to the latest SB Nation Reacts results, 71% of polled Warriors fans are feeling better about the Warriors now than they were during the summer.

The Warriors are in the upper tier of increased optimism, but it is a league-wide trend. Across the NBA, polled fans chose “better” as their most common response for how they felt about their team now vs. during the offseason. However, “the same” was a nearly as common response, while very few fans reported feeling worse.

Ultimately, nothing matters until the regular season games begin on Tuesday. But speaking of basketball games that matter, the WNBA Finals are in full swing, and fans are torn on who is the favorite. The polled fans chose the Phoenix Mercury to win the title over the Chicago Sky, but only by the slimmest of margins.

Those results were taken before the series began. The best-of-five series is tied at a game apiece, and I highly recommend you all tune in; it’s been tremendous basketball so far, and it features a lot of your favorite NBA players’ favorite players.

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