Written by Legacy. When a franchise has been as sad to watch as the Golden State Warriors have been for the past few years, you know there is always room for improvement. For the Dubs, there are five key things that they should do this offseason in order to stop being the laughingstock in the NBA. 5. Get rid of Corey Maggette The Warriors signed Corey Maggette to a five year, $50 million contract that continues to haunt them today and will continue to haunt them for the next few seasons. From what I've read, trading Maggette is what the Warriors will attempt to do first this offseason. With the money that Corey is being paid, he should be able to do much more. Other than scoring and getting to the line, Maggette does not do much. He is not a good leader, takes questionable shots, and does not try to play defense. Golden State should trade him for a guy like Shane Battier, a guy who is a good leader, better basketball player, and a player who actually plays on both sides of the floor. 4. Fire Don Nelson It's obvious that the run-n-gun system will not win you a championship. It might be fun to watch, but it will not get you far. Not only is that a reason to fire Nellie, but he is also not a good coach for a young group of guys like the Warriors present. If Nelson passes Lenny Wilkens for the all-time wins record this season, there might be a bigger chance that he will quit. Nelson needs to be fired as soon as the record is broken. He has had too much conflict with several players and has lost his passion for coaching, which is no secret if you watch him on the sidelines and in interviews. 3. Trade either Curry or Ellis No matter what some people may think, Stephen Curry and Monta Ellis cannot work together. When one of them is out or on the bench and the other is in the game, the team plays better. Ellis is the better scorer, and Curry is the better passer. I don't see any of them as franchise players who you can build a championship team around. Like Ellis said before the season and Nelson said during the season, Curry and Ellis do not work well with each other, and one of them needs to be traded soon before the conflict increases. 2. Draft John Wall Golden State has a legitimate shot at the No. 1 pick in this upcoming NBA draft. The unanimous No. 1 pick is John Wall. If the Warriors get the first pick, they must draft Wall. He has the potential to be a superstar in the league and will be a great player to build around. Scouts are saying they have not seen someone this special since LeBron James was drafted in 2003. Curry or Ellis will have to play second fiddle to Wall. If the Warriors don't get the first pick, they should target Evan Turner. 1. Chris Cohan selling the team to Larry Ellison The day that Warrior fans have been waiting numerous years for should come soon. Reports indicate that Larry Ellison is showing a lot of interest in buying the Warriors. Cohan isn't read to sell the team yet, but if the attendance continues to decrease, he should sell the team sooner. So stop going to games and keep Cohan's wallet empty. One playoff appearance in over a decade is embarrassing. I'll leave this article with an Ellison quote: “I'm addicted to winning. The more you win, the more you want to win.” http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...en-state-warriors-should-make-this-off-season
Where did you read that? btw I agree with all of your points, though I don't know much about the draft.
This is like a dream wish list of moves. It's a weird way to write it though because the only one that I could put at over a 25% chance of happening is trading Ellis or Curry, and even that's not a high probability. (Only an 15.6% chance we'll land #1. Maggette, Nelson, then Ellison are the most likely to least likely moves and I'd put odds at less than 5% right now). So even the 3rd worst record, chances are much higher that we could end up with a lower draft pick. And that's where the difficulty comes into drafting and figuring out what to do with that pick, and that's where the analysis of what we should do starts to become complicated, yet interesting.
Easy to say. Tough to do. 5. Get rid of Corey Maggette I'd try to include him a deal for Monta Ellis. BTW, I think Ellis will become an all-star once he's off this team . 4. Fire Don Nelson It's possible the Warriors buy Don Nelson out after he gets the wins record and he goes and starts a sandpaper company with the motto, "We got the most abrasive sandpaper ever." 3. Trade either Curry or Ellis No way we trade Curry, but Ellis is appealing to other teams. This is the most likely to occur. Did I tell you that Ellis will become an all-star once he's off this team? 2. Draft John Wall We've got the third worst record and the top two picks are studs . Besides, I have a hard time picturing Larry Riley at the draft lottery and seeing him win it all. I would claim Minnesota's coach Kurt Rambis was purposely tanking with his starting Darko Milicic and Ryan Hollins in the front court. 1. Chris Cohan selling the team to Larry Ellison Unless something happens to make Cohan stop saying, "Not a penny under $400 million," it will be a tough grind. I think Ellison has a better chance of buying the Sacramento Kings now.
I don't think Wall + Curry is a good backcourt either though, it's still undersized and they both need to be PGs, so if you take Wall now you have to trade Ellis AND Curry. Turner is the perfect guy to match with Curry in a backcourt and I wouldn't be surprised to see Turner go #1 over Wall.
If the Warriors land #1: The questions become, 1) Can you get the most out of Wall next to Curry and/or Ellis? if no, 2) What is Wall worth on the market? 3) Is Curry someone that you can build a winner around? 4) What is Curry worth on the trade market? 5) What is Ellis Worth? We know what we have in Curry, and he's a fan favorite. I think the answers are 1) No 2) No clue 3) Yes 4) Still unclear, but definitely More than Ellis 5) Depends on how he closes out the season when he comes back. Can he scale back and produce efficiently again? What player would Wall's trade value be equal to? Is he worth an all-star (not a superstar) in an off position (2 or 3). Could you package someone like Magette and Wall to a team that's a point guard away. Obviously, someone like Brandon Roy is worth WAY more than Wall. I guess it all depends on the Tourney. If Wall leads Kentucky to a NCAA Championship and shines, then is a guy like Roy a possibility if packaged with the right player? Who do you think Wall is worth on the open market (whether he's on the Warriors or picked by some other team)
Wall as a draft pick holds a lot of value. The '93 #1 pick was worth 4 first round picks (the Webber trade). Kenyon Martin, before his massive injuries, was worth 3 first round draft picks in a sign-and-trade. Wall as player shouldn't disappoint either: he compares favorably to Derrick Rose, being a similar player but with better skills and a better freshman year in college. It's hard to get a good picture of his worth: you're right that he would never get traded for Brandon Roy, but in a sense he's worth more than Brandon Roy. You'd basically be giving up a sure-fire cornerstone to trade him though, and no combination of picks and players would really fit. But if you really wanted to trade him, you could get a young all-star plus a few first round draft picks or equivalent in a heartbeat. Or you could do what a few people on this board have suggested, trade down for the #2 pick, future draft picks, and/or more. I always think of Bill Simmon's articles about NBA trade value, where he poses the theoretical question, if you were a GM, would you trade my guy for your guy straight up. I don't always come to the same conclusions as him, but in my list, I'd put Wall up there in the top 10 right now without hesitation. Heck, the top 5-6 players in this draft would make probably make my "top 40 trade value" guys. #2 would hit about 15-ish and #3 would hit about 20-25, juggling around the players in there. Also ran into this random article while looking up Wall's stats which kind of puts the situation more pessimistically perhaps (noting that alot lottery of teams, like us, have a point guard and would have to figure out how to make their teams work to hit him in): http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writers/frank_hughes/03/08/john.wall/ Still, there's plenty of teams that Wall would be an instant upgrade, both in the lottery and outside of it.
I agree with Kenny "The Jet" Smith in the video link below. We should try and identify our four core players -- Curry, Randolph, Biedrins and Brandan Wright (?) and try to improve our team through trades, drafts and free agency. I had Monta Ellis in the above list before, but Curry has made him expendable. It's not that I do not like Monta anymore, but we need defense in our backcourt and both Curry and Ellis become a liability. We should try to get a young stud like Chris Bosh in trade using Ellis and/or our draft pick (lotto protected). The trouble with our core is we still do not know what Randolph and Wright can do. However, we have learned what Morrow, Azubuike, Turiaf, Watson and others can do. The only exception to that is Raja Bell. I would give Tolliver, Williams and Hunter a chance to show us what they can do on a better team. http://sports.yahoo.com/video/playe...RYTjK8vLYF#nba/Y_Sports_NBA_Coverage/18582391 That said, we have to get rid of Warriors crappy ownership, management and head coach first, but that's near impossible to do.
