A Deep Dive into the Most Disappointing NBA Franchises Over the Last Three Seasons: Which Teams Fell Short of Expectations? .giang

Three years in the NBA can be an absolute lifetime. Things change so quickly with player and coach movement, and a single decision can have a ripple effect that lasts for years.

Such things have led to a few disappointing seasons for a few teams.

Some franchises got too comfortable with past success. Of course, injuries have derailed a few squads and made the last few seasons very difficult. One team was also affected by an outside force that no one could plan for, but the club’s way of handling it led to its downfall.

Though varying factors led them to this point, here are the five most disappointing teams over the last three seasons.

Let’s be honest: Almost any three-year stretch can be deemed disappointing for the Los Angeles Clippers. To have only gotten to one Western Conference Final appearance out of the Kawhi Leonard and Paul George duo’s five-year run is an utter disappointment.

The tandem of Leonard and George was supposed to turn the Clippers into regular contenders, but that never manifested. Over the last three seasons, George played 31 games in 2021-22, 56 in 2022-23 and 74 in 2023-24 (the most in his Clipper tenure).

Leonard did not fare much better, missing the entire ’20-21 season with an ACL injury and playing 52 games in ’22-23. Last year, Leonard played 68 games but got hurt during the playoffs.

That sums up the last three—actually the last five—seasons of Clippers basketball.

This upcoming campaign will be an entirely different situation for the team. George left in free agency. The Clippers are moving to team governor Steve Ballmer’s new arena, the Intuit Dome, and have a new logo. Maybe that will be what finally changes their luck as a franchise.

After the Atlanta Hawks’ surprising run to the Eastern Conference Finals in 2020-21, they have been nothing but disappointing since.

The following season, the Hawks went a lackluster 43-39, finished eighth in the East and in the play-in tournament. Atlanta did make it into the playoffs but was eliminated in the first round by Miami in five games.

That team played with a level of apathy that often frustrated fans. Franchise cornerstone Trae Young was even quoted as saying: “It’s regular season. I’m not going to lie, it’s a lot more boring than the playoffs.”

After that conference finals trip, the front office’s big mistake was a lack of moves. The team’s president at the time, Travis Schlenk, told 92.9 The Game: “We made the decision last year to run the same group back and…we probably should have tried to upgrade as opposed to stay status quo.”

The Hawks did make a splashy trade in the 2022 offseason, sending a protected first-round pick, a pick swap in 2026 and two of their own unprotected first-round picks (2025, 2027) to San Antonio for Dejounte Murray. The thought was pairing Murray with Young would take some pressure off Young offensively and protect him defensively…narrator, this did not work.

The ensuing season, 2022-23, saw the Hawks replace Schlenk with Landry Fields, and fire coach Nate McMillan and bring in Quin Snyder. The team finished 41-41, worked its way through the play-in tournament and lost to Boston in the first round.

Last year, Atlanta lost Young for a large portion of the season, went 36-46 and got knocked out of the play-in tournament. To further cement its suboptimal luck, Atlanta got the first overall pick a year too late for Victor Wembanyama and a year too early for Cooper Flagg.

Over the last three seasons, it has been nothing but disappointment for the Hawks during a slide from conference finalist to the lottery while Young’s prime dwindles.

Each of the last three seasons, there has been a new reason for the Philadelphia 76ers to be hopeful, but it always ends in disappointment.

The 2021 Eastern Conference semifinals Game 7 debacle—when Ben Simmons passed up an open dunk—led to a trade request and holdout from the former star guard.

It was a dark cloud over Philly’s 2021-22 season, as team president Daryl Morey was in no rush to make a deal. But his strategy paid off as the Sixers acquired James Harden from Brooklyn in February 2022.

It was a coup at the trade deadline, teaming Harden with annual MVP candidate Joel Embiid. But as the Sixers were on their way to eliminating the Toronto Raptors in Game 6 of their first-round series, Embiid took an elbow to the face with just under four minutes left to play and his team leading by 29. There was no reason for the star big man to still be in the game.

It turned out, Embiid suffered an orbital fracture and mild concussion that forced him to miss the first two games of the next series against the Miami Heat. He returned for Game 3 but never looked like himself, as Philly was eliminated in six games.

The season from hell ended, and with an entire year of Harden, Embiid and Tyrese Maxey on tap, the following campaign looked promising. The regular season was just that, as they finished 54-28.

Then they swept the Brooklyn Nets in the first round. Philadelphia did not leave the series unscathed, though. Embiid missed Game 4 with a right knee sprain. That also caused him to miss Game 1 against the Boston Celtics.

However, Embiid returned for Game 2, and the Sixers eventually took a 3-2 series lead with Game 6 on their home court. They were on the verge of making the conference finals for the first time since 2001. Then Boston went on an 11-3 run in the final six minutes to force Game 7, in which the Sixers were again sent home.

That exit caused the team to fire coach Doc Rivers and replace him with Nick Nurse. Then Harden’s free agency resulted in his opting into his deal, making a trade demand and trying to force his way to the L.A. Clippers.

It was another contentious offseason that Philly fans were so used to. It got so bad that Harden, who forced his way to Philly to be reunited with Morey, called him a liar—twice!

Morey held firm again on his asking price all offseason, and the trade to L.A. did not materialize until November 1.

Philadelphia looked like a contender during the regular season thanks to Embiid’s play and the emergence of Maxey as a strong No. 2 option. Then—you guessed it—Embiid suffered a lateral meniscus injury that forced him to miss a large chunk of the season, and the team plummeted in the standings.

Embiid returned in time for the playoffs but was not fully healthy, and the Knicks eliminated Philly in the first round.

It is constant deja vu with the Embiid injuries and holdouts leading to trades. Each year, they are discussed as contenders, and each year, weird obstacles get put in the Sixers’ way to stop them from even getting out of the second round.

The Los Angeles Lakers were sitting on top of the NBA at the end of the 2020 season, winning a championship in the bubble. Since then, it has been a rough sledding.

Many of the Lakers’ problems stem from management making bad decision after bad decision. It started even before the three-year stretch we’re considering. Following that most recent title, L.A. traded key pieces like Danny Green to retool around LeBron James and Anthony Davis. The team got swept out of the playoffs that season.

The Lakers moved Kyle Kuzma and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope to Washington for Russell Westbrook ahead of 2021-22. That season was a disaster; Westbrook never found his role, James played only 56 games and Davis just 40. The Lakers missed the playoffs and scapegoated head coach Frank Vogel.

The following season, L.A. brought in first-time head coach Darvin Ham. Westbrook again did not find a clear role, and the Lakers suffered another season of James and Davis missing large chunks of games.

To the organization’s credit, it made a big in-season trade, bringing in D’Angelo Russell and Jared Vanderbilt for Westbrook in February 2023. The move solidified the Lakers’ spot in the play-in, leading to an improbable run to the Western Conference Finals, where Denver dispatched them in five games.

That should have been enough to knock the Lakers out of consideration for inclusion here. Still, the following season, 2023-24, saw the front office make no major additions; the team ended up in the play-in tournament again and was swept by the Nuggets in the first round.

This led to Ham being relieved of his duties as head coach. The Lakers fired two head coaches in three years and have been in the play-in regularly. Making a conference finals is good enough for some teams, but those teams do not have LeBron James on them.

The best way to describe the past three seasons of Brooklyn Nets basketball is a roller coaster on its downswing.

The 2021-22 season was expected to see a Nets run to the NBA Finals after they took the Milwaukee Bucks to seven games and were a Kevin Durant toe away from advancing.

But from the very beginning at training camp, things went south. The city of New York issued a mandate that would require all of Brooklyn’s players to be vaccinated to participate in home games. Kyrie Irving refused to do so and was not allowed to play at Barclays Center.

The Nets were left with Durant and Harden carrying the load until Durant got hurt and missed extended time. Then came Harden’s behind-the-scenes request to be traded to Philadelphia, as reported by ESPN. That hung over the Nets’ heads until the wish was granted at the trade ’22 deadline, bringing in Ben Simmons and Seth Curry.

Eventually, the vaccine mandate was lifted, and Irving returned to being a full-time player for Brooklyn. Just in time to get swept out of the first round by the Boston Celtics.

That was just one season.

Then, in the offseason, Durant issued an ultimatum to the team: Either fire head coach Steve Nash (who Durant picked when he was hired) and general manager Sean Marks or trade him.

Durant backed down and was a Net to start 2022-23 alongside Irving, Nash and Marks. Seven games into the season, the Nets fired Nash and hired Jacque Vaughn to take over as head coach.

Despite having a winning record, the Nets traded Irving to Dallas following his trade request. Then, the day before the trade deadline, in a shocking deal, sent Durant to Phoenix. Thus, the era of perhaps the most disappointing super trio in NBA history was over.

The following season-and-a-half were just a slide to the lottery. The Nets fired Vaughn midway through last season.

To recap, Brooklyn saw championship hopes dashed, endured multiple trade requests and demands, traded three superstars and fired two coaches during this span. Most of that happened in two years, but that is enough chaos to fuel a team for a decade.