Oklahoma City Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is sometimes criticized for the tactics he uses to draw fouls, but former NBA star Gilbert Arenas seems to think the criticism is unwarranted.
In fact, Arenas believes there’s a history of OKC players being targeted by narratives. He spoke about it during an episode of his show and said he wished narratives could’ve come up enough during the second round of the 2026 NBA Playoffs to help the Los Angeles Lakers move on.
“What is y’all problems with OKC?” Arenas questioned. “You did it to Russ (Russell Westbrook), K.D. (Kevin Durant). You did it to K.D. You’re doing it to Shai. Hey, can we get a memo? Can I get a bulletin memo. Just say, ‘We don’t like OKC.’ … The narratives is destroying legacies over there. I don’t know what it is, man. I’ma just be honest with you.
“Why y’all couldn’t do this when the Lakers was playing? … Y’all should’ve been running this narratives so the Lakers could’ve moved on.”
Unfortunately for the Lakers, there may not be a narrative out there that would’ve been enough of a distraction to help the team get past the Thunder this season. The Lakers were swept in the second round by the MVP’s squad, and a majority of the games were decided by double digits.
The series victory allowed the Thunder to advance to the Western Conference Finals, where they had a date with the San Antonio Spurs. That series delivered, with the teams exchanging blows before the Spurs beat the Thunder on the road in Game 7 to end OKC’s season.
Gilgeous-Alexander actually had a bit of a shaky postseason by his standards from the second round on. In 11 games against the Lakers and Spurs, he averaged 25.4 points per game (several points below his season average) and was held to 43.0 percent shooting from the field and 30.2 percent shooting from deep.
Many people around the basketball world have given credit to the Lakers and head coach J.J. Redick for crafting a game plan to slow down Gilgeous-Alexander that the Spurs might’ve gotten inspiration from. This summer, the Thunder may need to come up with counters for the strategies that L.A. deployed in order to avoid running into the same problem next season.
But whether the narratives around Gilgeous-Alexander are fair or not, that isn’t going to negate the fact that he is a two-time MVP with an NBA title under his belt at the age of 27. He still has some brilliant years ahead of him in the NBA and figures to be a problem for the Western Conference for a long time.
