NBA Duos From The 2010s That Split Too Soon

Some NBA duos have given us the best memories and have seen incredible success. Some duos departed in peace, and some in dramatic fashion. Here’s a look at some memorable dominant basketball duos that many miss seeing together.

LeBron James & Kyrie Irving

LeBron James and Kyrie Irving were an unguardable combination. The duo made NBA history together with arguably the most impressive championship victory of all time.

In 2016, James and Irving overcame a 3-1 deficit against the 73-9 Golden State Warriors in the NBA Finals as members of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Many were ready to write the Cavs off as the superteam led by Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, and Draymond Green was showing to be too much. However, in Game Five, both The King and Irving would score 41 points en route to victory, followed by two more wins for the title.

Perhaps the single highlight of their three-year run was the famous block from James on Andre Iguodala, followed by Kyrie Irving’s clutch three-pointer to take the lead with under a minute left in Game Seven of the 2016 NBA Finals. Irving would request a trade to the Boston Celtics in 2017, but after three straight Finals appearances in their short run, many wish to see the two potentially finish what they could have been.

Kevin Durant & Russell Westbrook

The duo of Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook in Oklahoma City provided many memories, not just for Thunder fans but fans across the country for eight seasons from 2008 to 2016.

In 2012, still young, OKC would make it to the NBA Finals. However, the young group of talent on the Thunder was not enough to overcome the powerhouse Miami Heat trio of James, Wade, and Chris Bosh. Even after James Harden was traded to the Houston Rockets, the two would regularly appear in the NBA All-Star Game, where they would also display their elite chemistry.

Durant won NBA MVP in the 2013-14 season, and Westbrook was the back-to-back All-Star Game MVP in 2015 and 2016. In the pair’s last season together in Oklahoma City, they were in a position to reach the NBA Finals with more experience and skill, as they led the 73-9 Golden State Warriors three games to one in the 2016 Western Conference Finals. Unfortunately for the Thunder, the job couldn’t be finished, and Durant would end up leaving to sign with Golden State in free agency.

In their first seasons apart, Russ would win league MVP in 2017, and KD would win back-to-back championships and Finals MVPs in 2017 and 2018 with the Warriors. The two have seen some success since parting ways, and given how close they were to the NBA Finals in their final year, history could have been made for the Thunder at some point if they stayed together.

James Harden & Chris Paul

When the Houston Rockets acquired Chris Paul from the Los Angeles Clippers in the 2017 offseason, the anticipation was to make him and James Harden a duo that could lead the team to championship status. The Beard and the Point God seemed like they co-existed well on the court.

In their first season together, Harden would finally capture KIA NBA MVP honors after a historic season, and the Houston Rockets were the top seed in the West - even over the KD-Steph-Klay-Draymond Warriors, who they took to seven games in the 2018 Western Conference Finals. Despite the Rockets missing 27 straight threes, they only lost to Golden State by nine points - but the biggest difference-maker was the unavailability of CP3.

Many believe if Paul had been playing and not sidelined due to injury, the series’ outcome would have been different. A season later, the Rockets would once again suffer a disappointing playoff defeat to the Warriors, and Paul was traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder for Russell Westbrook in the 2019 offseason.

Tension seemed evident between the two at points throughout their two-year run, but the success they saw on the court puts wonders as to what they could have accomplished with more time and a better co-existence.

LeBron James & Dwyane Wade

Here is a pair on this list that didn’t actually end on bad terms (unlike the previous three). As most know, James and Wade are close friends off the court and on the court. In their prime forms, the superstars accomplished a lot together side-by-side for four years in Miami.

After a very disappointing NBA Finals loss to Dirk Nowitzki and the Dallas Mavericks in 2011, the Heat, led by James and Wade, would respond by winning back-to-back titles in 2012 and 2013. James is widely regarded as a top-two player in NBA history (at the least), and his best years were arguably those with the Miami Heat.

The King would win back-to-back regular season MVPs, titles, and Finals MVPs in the middle of his four-year tenure in Miami. This was the start of a long period of time where no one other than him was being recognized as the best player in the world. Wade would be a regular All-Star selection, and Miami reached the NBA Finals all four seasons during the two’s time together.

The impressive list of those they defeated throughout their playoff runs includes the Pierce-Garnett-Allen-Rondo Celtics twice, the fire-power Indiana Pacers (top seed in 2013) twice, Derrick Rose in his MVP season, the San Antonio Spurs, and more.

James leaving to return to the Cleveland Cavaliers in 2014 certainly was not looked down upon like his decision to leave four years prior, but maybe he and Wade had one more title run in them.

Paul George & Russell Westbrook

In 2017, Westbrook’s historic MVP season showed a lot of things. We learned Durant wasn’t the only superstar on the Thunder all that time, but more importantly, the season showed that while OKC still made the playoffs, Russ needed help. The Thunder did just that by trading for Paul George from the Indiana Pacers that offseason.

The new duo would finally allow aid for Westbrook, and George continued to display his elite defensive skills. In the first round of the 2018 NBA Playoffs, however, Oklahoma City would be eliminated by the Utah Jazz in six games in a disappointing fashion. What stands out about game six is how it felt like Westbrook was back to carrying the Thunder on his back. Russ had a phenomenal performance, with 46 points, 10 rebounds, and five assists, but his running mate George only scored five points the entire game.

The season after would be arguably the best of George’s career (including his days with the Indiana Pacers), as he would be a finalist for both league MVP and Defensive Player of the Year and was named to the 2019 All-NBA First Team. Once again, however, the Thunder would be disappointed with another first-round elimination, this time in five games. George having a career year and another year to work it out with Westbrook proved to be working well until it mattered most. However, Damian Lillard’s famous series-clinching buzzer beater from downtown in Game Five in Portland turned out to be the final blow for the experiment in OKC.

George and Westbrook seemed like they were on the same page, and the two’s time together certainly reflected that. Once PG13 was traded to the Los Angeles Clippers to be paired with Kawhi Leonard in the 2019 offseason, Westbrook was traded to the Houston Rockets to be reunited with James Harden shortly after.

In the 2021 NBA Playoffs, George stepped up and took over for a Clippers team in the playoffs that had just lost Leonard to a major injury and was able to tone down a lot of the negative noise surrounding his postseason play. His historic playoff run in 2021 was arguably his best. If Thunder Westbrook was playing with that version of Playoff P, back-to-back first-round exits on a short, underachieving run would not have been the story in Oklahoma City from 2017 to 2019.