Draymond Green doesn't fear the Oklahoma City Thunder.


"There's a certain seriousness that it takes to win in this league, and there's a certain fear you have to instill in teams in order to win," the Golden State Warriors forward and four-time champion said on his podcast earlier this season. "I just don't know if they're instilling that fear in teams."

Green isn't alone in that view. ESPN's Tim MacMahon reported this past week that "a lot of people around the Western Conference -- and I talked to coaches on other teams that will be in the playoff mix -- [feel] there is not this great fear of the Oklahoma City Thunder.

"They haven't done it. And until a team does it, there's going to be a whole bunch of doubt."

Of course, the same could have been said of the 2024 champion Boston Celtics, as doubters questioned whether Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown could win it. In 2023, Nikola Jokic wasn't deemed good enough to lead the Nuggets to the promised land.

And going back to 2015, Green's own Warriors teams faced criticism that an offense built around 3-pointers could raise the Larry O'Brien Trophy. The Thunder have been every bit as impressive as those championship teams, even before proving doubters wrong with a potential title run.

Opponents might not fear the Thunder. Here are 22 reasons they should.

1. The Thunder have outscored opponents by 12.7 points per game this season, which is on pace to break an NBA record that has stood for over 50 years. The current mark is 12.3 points per game by the 1971-72 Lakers, who famously won 33 games in a row.

2. While that margin of victory is a regular-season record, history suggests that level of dominance should translate to the playoffs. The previous top five teams in point differential -- the 1971-72 Lakers, 1970-71 Bucks, 1995-96 Bulls, 2016-17 Warriors, and 2023-24 Celtics -- all coasted to titles, with a combined 71-12 record in the postseason. None even faced a Game 7 en route to the championship.

3. The Thunder have played their way into such rarefied air because of three main factors: depth, star power and defense. Let's start with depth, because general manager Sam Presti has constructed a stacked roster. The Thunder have 11 players who are at least league average, according to estimated plus-minus. That's the most for any team, ahead of the Memphis Grizzlies' 10.

4. All that depth and all of Oklahoma City's blowout wins mean coach Mark Daigneault hasn't had to pile heavy workloads onto his best players. The only two Thunder players averaging more than 29 minutes per game are Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who ranks 33rd among qualified players in minutes per game, and Jalen Williams, who ranks 48th.

This encouraging trend also applies to the NBA-leading Cavaliers, whose minutes leader, Donovan Mitchell, ranks 71st in the league. And as both Oklahoma City and Cleveland have large leads for the No. 1 seeds (11 games for the Thunder in the West, 7.5 for Cleveland in the East), both should be able to keep their top guys fresh for the playoffs.

5. The Thunder's lead for the West's No. 1 seed is in fact historically large. With an 11-game lead three-quarters of the way through the season, the Thunder are projected to win the conference by 14 games, according to ESPN's Basketball Power Index (BPI).

That would tie for the largest gap between the No. 1 and 2 seeds in a conference since the NBA-ABA merger; this past year's Celtics were the East's top team by 14 games. Out of 12 previous post-merger teams that won their conference by double digits, 10 won the championship.

6. The difference between Oklahoma City and other teams that have flexed their depth to rack up regular-season wins, such as this year's Grizzlies, is that the Thunder pair their depth with better top-end talent. Gilgeous-Alexander leads the NBA with 32.6 points per game, and he's favored to become the first guard to win MVP since 2018.

7. Some critics -- notably Timberwolves coach Chris Finch, along with plenty of rival fans on social media -- accuse Gilgeous-Alexander of generating his points by foul baiting. But while Gilgeous-Alexander does lead the league in made free throws -- in part because he makes 90% of his attempts -- he also ranks second in scoring from field goals alone, just 0.1 points per game behind Milwaukee Bucks big man Giannis Antetokounmpo. And the Thunder as a team are tied for 28th in free throw attempts.

Instead, Gilgeous-Alexander distributes his points fairly evenly from all over the floor: 31% from the midrange, 25% at the rim, 25% from free throws and 20% from 3-point range. His throwback style is part of what makes him so hard to guard.

8. Gilgeous-Alexander's greatest offensive strength: Like golfer Rory McIlroy, racetrack legend Lightning McQueen and actor Adam, SGA is an elite driver. For the fifth season in a row, Gilgeous-Alexander leads the league in drives per game.

And he is not merely a volume driver; he's also incredibly efficient when he gets downhill. This season, the Thunder are averaging 1.20 points per possession when Gilgeous-Alexander drives and either shoots, commits a turnover or passes to a shooter. According to Second Spectrum, that mark ranks second among 68 players with at least 400 drives, behind only Phoenix Suns forward Kevin Durant.

Combine the quantity and quality of his forays to the rim, and it's clear why Gilgeous-Alexander's drives directly lead to four more points per game than any other player in the league.

9. In part because of his ability to slither around and slip past defenders, Gilgeous-Alexander is also an excellent isolation scorer. He leads the league in isolation possessions and scores 1.11 points per iso, which ranks in the 87th percentile among players with at least 100 such plays.

Gilgeous-Alexander's 1-on-1 scoring ability could prove especially important in the playoffs. Across the NBA over the past decade, isolation frequency has consistently increased by about a third in the postseason, according to an analysis of Second Spectrum data. Sometimes, in the most clutch moments against the best defenses, a contender just needs a star who can create a bucket for himself.

10. While Gilgeous-Alexander paces the offense -- aided primarily by contributions from Williams and the surging Aaron Wiggins -- the defense thrives because of a broader team effort. Oklahoma City is allowing just 106.0 points per 100 possessions -- 3.1 points below the second-place Orlando Magic.

For context, in the play-by-play era (since 1996-97), the average gap between the best and second-best defenses is just 0.8 points per 100 possessions; the largest gap before this season was 2.6 points. The Thunder are set to smash that record.

11. Here's another way to express the Thunder's defensive dominance. The worst offense this season belongs to the Washington Wizards, who are averaging 105.5 points per 100 possessions. Oklahoma City is effectively turning all its opponents into the Wizards.

12. Oklahoma City shuts down its opponents in myriad ways, but the most eye-opening might be how effectively it stymies opponent pick-and-rolls. In the modern NBA, this play is almost every team's bread and butter -- but the Thunder throw that into the trash.

The Thunder allow just 0.90 points per opponent pick. That's the second-best mark for any team in the 2020s, behind only the 2019-20 Bucks.

13. Oklahoma City forces the toughest shot diet in the league, according to Second Spectrum. To steal a football term, the Thunder also win the possession battle at a ridiculous rate. They lead the league in steals with 10.8 per game (the most for any team in the 21st century), in deflections, loose ball recoveries and charges, where they have 59 (no other team has more than 39).

14. The Thunder aren't turnover masters on defense alone. They also lead the league by committing the fewest turnovers on offense.

That combination means the Thunder force 5.9 more turnovers per game than they commit, which would obliterate the NBA record of 5.1 by the 1987-88 Nuggets. This season, only one other team is even a third of the way to the Thunder's turnover margin.

15. What happens when you win the turnover battle by a massive margin? You win the battle for points off turnovers by a massive margin, too.

The Thunder lead the league in translating takeaways to points on both ends: They score the most points off opponent turnovers (22.4 per game) and allow the fewest points off their own turnovers (12.9), giving them an extra 9.5 points per game. No other team has a margin even half that large.

16. With so many lockdown defenders on his roster -- Williams, Luguentz Dort, Cason Wallace and Alex Caruso on the perimeter; Chet Holmgren and Isaiah Hartenstein inside -- Daigneault has plenty of options through which he can cycle when opponents get hot. The Thunder haven't allowed a single 40-point scorer all season, and they've allowed only six players to reach 30. (Every other team has allowed at least 14 opposing 30-point scorers, and the league average is 24.)

17. All of these numbers are so impressive that it's almost easy to forget the Thunder boast them despite missing Holmgren, the reigning Rookie of the Year runner-up, for most of the season. Due to a broken pelvis and sprained ankle, Holmgren has played in just 18 of 61 games.

But when he's available, he makes Oklahoma City's already great defense even greater. Holmgren has held opponents to 40% shooting near the basket this season, which leads all players who have defended at least 100 shots.

18. When Holmgren is on the court, the Thunder are even more dominant than usual, with a plus-17.4 net rating that ranks second among all NBA rotation players. The only player ahead of Holmgren is Gilgeous-Alexander, at plus-17.5. And the rest of the top five in net rating is more Thunder teammates: Caruso in third place, Isaiah Joe in fourth and Kenrich Williams in fifth.

19. One new advantage for this version of the Thunder is an ability to beat teams with Holmgren on the bench. In the 2023-24 playoffs, OKC outscored opponents by 11.2 points per 100 possessions with Holmgren on the court, per Cleaning the Glass. But without a viable backup big man, the Thunder were outscored by 7.1 points per 100 possessions when Holmgren was off the court. That was the largest on/off gap on the roster and the sixth-largest among all players with at least 300 playoff minutes.

Hartenstein has solved that problem since signing with the Thunder in free agency. When he plays without Holmgren, the Thunder have a plus-12.9 net rating, right in line with their overall mark. Pending good health, Oklahoma City should be able to play every postseason minute with a solid center patrolling the paint.

20. Hartenstein fixes another issue that plagued the Thunder this past season, when a rotation full of perimeter players and the tall-but-slight Holmgren was frequently helpless on the boards. In the conference semifinals, the Thunder scored in 29 more "first-chance" opportunities than the Mavericks did -- but Dallas compensated with 29 more points off offensive rebounds.

But Hartenstein is a burly 7-footer and an excellent rebounder. The Thunder rank in the 62nd percentile for defensive rebounding with him in the game, per Cleaning the Glass -- not near the top of the league but sufficiently competent. Another weakness, solved.

21. Hartenstein's presence provides yet more lineup flexibility, and Daigneault has said he plans to use the rest of the regular season to experiment with double-big lineups featuring both Hartenstein and Holmgren. Those groups have looked somewhat awkward in the early going but fared well nonetheless, with a plus-8.8 net rating in a limited sample, per Cleaning the Glass, despite lousy luck on 3-pointers.

A two-bigs look might not end up as the team's primary lineup in the playoffs, but it should prove useful as a wrinkle against certain opponents, such as the supersized Mavericks or in a potential Finals clash against Cleveland.

22. Now we've come full circle: The Thunder have so many options because of the incredible depth surrounding Gilgeous-Alexander -- which should only grow in the seasons to come because the Thunder have both one of the NBA's youngest cores and the largest stash of draft picks in the league.

Depending on pick protections, Oklahoma City could end up with a league-high 33 draft picks over the next seven years. (Heck, just this upcoming June, the Thunder could realistically win the championship and land three top-20 picks!)

But those picks are important for the future. For now, as the 2024-25 season winds down, the Thunder have plenty to accomplish in the meantime -- a host of NBA records to chase and a playoff bracket full of opposing teams to frighten.