The Thunder may have gotten knocked out in the first round of the 2020 NBA Playoffs, but coming off of a summer in which the team traded away both Russell Westbrook and Paul George, the perception was that the Thunder qualifying for the postseason an overachievement.
In the end, that perception more or less mirrored reality, as the Thunder’s general manager Sam Presti finished second in NBA Executive of the Year voting, the league announced on Thursday.
Presti, who totaled 41 points in the league’s weighted voting system, finished second to the Clippers’ Lawrence Frank, who totaled 61 points. Presti narrowly edged out the Heat’s Pat Riley (39 points), who rounded out the top three.
The award was voted on by 29 team basketball executives, 14 of whom gave Frank their first-place vote. Presti and Riley each received four first-place votes with six others receiving one first-place vote each.
It should be noted that the votes were based on games played through March 11, when played was suspended due to the coronavirus. The Thunder were 40-24 at that point and ended up going 4-4 in their Orlando seeding games to officially end the season at 44-28.
No matter how you feel about Presti and the Thunder, the 2019-20 team, which finished the regular season as the Western Conference’s fifth seed, overachieved in a dramatic way. Presti being paid the respect of his fellow executives is another reminder of that fact.