Roye does remember one season as more difficult than most. In 2000-01, the Warriors started out 15-33 — which might not sound all that amazing, except they had won all of 19 games the previous season and were now on pace for 26 victories. They proceeded to win just twice over the final 10 weeks of the season. Roye acknowledged that the monotony of defeat sometimes wore on him.

“This has always been such a great job, and it’s the N.B.A., you know?” he said. “But sure, there were probably a couple of weeks where you were like, ‘We have how many games left?’”

Even when the broadcasters were stuck in the abyss — Fitzgerald recalled one game in 2004 when the Warriors set a record by scoring only 2 points in the fourth quarter of an overtime loss to the Toronto Raptors — the team’s extended stretch of playoff-free basketball was not without its charms.

“I liked it when we were crummy, because we got to talk on TV more,” Barnett said.

The broadcasts back then had fewer sponsors, Barnett said, which meant games were less cluttered by advertising. For example, Barnett viewed the few seconds between free throws as fertile ground to share some insight. (Barnett likes to talk.) But now Fitzgerald, his on-air partner, is almost always reading some type of promotion between free throws, and Barnett has to clam up.

“We never used to have that,” Barnett said.

Barnett, 73, had an 11-year playing career before he retired from the N.B.A. in 1977. He endured his share of tough seasons. He was a second-year guard on the San Diego Rockets when they went 15-67. He later played for the New Orleans Jazz, who were 5-42 when they traded him to the Knicks.