If you recall my signature when I started here, I was a Mike D fan and felt that the others around him misused him. He's a solid NBA player, not very good for a No. 3 overall pick, but hey, its not his fault where he's selected. I'll be there tonight (2 rows off the floor) and watching to see if all this stuff I've been spouting about Monta, Steph and Biedrins is just hot air and ignorance or really true. I want to see: Curry stay in front of TJ Ford; Curry to go for 20 and 10; Monta to have 25; Lee to have 20 and 10; Dorell to outscore Granger; and Biedrins to somehow outscore and outrebound Hibbert. Go W's!!!
Did Udoh insult Keith Smart's mother or something? Why can he not get off the bench these last few games?? He had a couple good outings and has been Brandan's bench buddy ever since.
Hes been put in some odd spots but actually got several consecutive minutes of playing time tonight and did little. And although I have several complaints about Smart's awful rotations tonight alone, I'll give him props for one of his non-sensical substitutions working- putting BW in mid way into the 4th Q of a tight game. Hell of a game by Monta. Lee with another nice outing. Is it me or has Curry been shitty lately? He looked like Curry of late last season at times in the first half but outside of that hes been kind of invisible lately.
Keith Smart said he had a line of players he knew he had to guard players like Dunleavy/Granger when that player is at the 4. I am guessing Vlad may had been the first guy, but that did not work. Reggie Williams, definitely did not work, though I am not sure if that was when Dunleavy was at PF when Reggie guarded him. Finally at the end of the 3rd he came up with Brandan Wright. Then you had Wright on Dunleavy offensively that led to a few points. I am surprised in retrospect that Tyler Hansbrough did not play late in the game. They went a lot with Dunleavy/Foster for most of the 4th, after I thought Hansbrough and McRoberts played pretty well. I think Curry has been doing fine. I thought he was big helping on the rebounds in the second quarter. He's been passing the ball well and limiting his turnovers. This is something he's been doing at least the whole month. Not counting this game he's averaged 5.5 assists and 2.13 turnovers this month. He still came up with that big shot to go up 3. Too bad he responded by making that dumb and-1 foul. But that guy is clutch. I think one of the big things for him is that his foul trouble problems have been limiting his play, or perhaps there may be some other factor going in that. Either way he doesn't seem to be getting into much of a rhythm and he's been more of a passive player trying to fit in and make others better. He's not playing like a star, but he's not doing so bad either. I'm not so sure why Curry did not come in until there were less than 6 minutes in the game.
Well most of my predictions came true: Biedrins outplayed Hibbert (DNP!!, he outplayed Foster and McRoberts as well); Monta had 38 not 25; Lee went for 21 and 9 just missing 20 and 10; Dorell went for 21 but Granger had 33; and Curry stayed in front of TJ (DNP, Collison went by him but did not dominate); but Curry had 11 and 7, not 20 and 10. Andris had a couple of nice post hooks, even the misses were not bad. Monta was the man and played great. The caveat though is that the Pacers are not guard driven, Rush only took 7 shots, so Monta could take D off. When the other team has bigger guards, watch out. But Monta cannot play point either, he's a scorer. His ability to drive and hit the mid-range jumper along with the 3 now is unstoppable. Curry is just slow defensively to react. He stands upright, doesn't get low (well no one on the W's does) and people go by him really easily. He could not hit a jumper last night. I thought he had more than 7 assists. He got lucky at the end, last 2 mins, he made an awful behind the back pass on the perimeter right in front of me that would have gone out of bounds but Monta, who was not the intended receiver, saved it. Don't know why Steph makes those stupid passes. With Lee, Dorell and Monta going well, along with Andris, in the first half he did not have to score. Stupid foul on Collison with 18 secs. left too, why? up 3, let him go once he's by you. Smart made a great find with Brandon at the end of the game. He comes in with 28 secs left in the 3rd and I figure he gets 1 min. in the book. He stays in nearly the whole 4th and plays great. He looked very active and his buckets were nice moves at the rim. If he's healthy, you cannot let him leave for nothing. The bench was awful until the end. 1st half, 0 points. Reggie needs to go to the basket to draw some fouls. Acie Law cannot miss easy layups with no one around. Look at the +/- stats, Acie Law is -14 and Steph is +17 yet Acie gets 16 mins. Why? Steph needs to play with the 2nd unit more when they need scoring and Monta is out. Udoh needs to get a shot once in a while. Vlad was a non-factor. Problem with 2nd team is, without a post player, ball simply moves side to side with a pick and roll leading to a jumper. Too easy to defend; no FTs, leads to fastbreaks in transition. Watched Andris closely warming up before the 2nd half and he's got not only the left hook but also a decent right hand hook but he never shoots that. With some confidence, he could score much more. His D is still awful. He's supposedly the 7 ft and he's trying to block shots below the shoulder. Indiana? Granger is really good and they better never let him go. He bails them out with tough pull up jumpers and he knows how to draw shooting fouls. Hansbrough is decent as well. Mike D hit some big shots and is smooth. In the end, getting to see Monta hit a game winning shot at the buzzer from the 2nd row? Awesome.
I feel Biedrins is coming around and I don't feel his D is awful. He's an elite rebounder...are you guys getting sick of me saying that? Who else is better than Biedrins that is considered a true center who we can realistically get? No one. My main problem with last night's game is Keith Smart's substitutions. He's running his starters into the ground and then does a cumulative substitution and hopes for the best. He's gotta take out D. Wright earlier, IMO, with either Reggie or Vlad. So, at least those guys have a chance to play with some playmakers. Acie Law shouldn't be getting so much run, but if it's for the sake of giving Curry a blow, which may help his stamina in the long-run, then so be it. I'd like to see Law finish a little better around the rim. Actually, I'd like to see Jeremy Lin come back and take his spot, but him in the D-League is proving to be a very good thing for his development. Good for Brandan Wright and good for Keith Smart for going to him. I don't know if it's really because Lou's ankle was hurt, but either way, Brandan is clearly more skilled than Lou. Lou's hustle creates possessions though...so I don't mind him playing sparingly.
As much as we like to rag on how bad the Warriors play defense, both individually and as a team, and the stats back it up, we should also appreciate that they do from time to time do things right. Like last night's defense on the Pacers' inbound play. Two times they denied a lob at the basket. NBAPlaybook.com breaks it down: http://nbaplaybook.com/2011/01/20/the-warriors-protect-against-a-late-lob/
Hats off to Monta Ellis. He has been incredible these last few weeks. Yeah, he leaves some things to be desired on defense, but whenever we have trouble getting a bucket, he's been the guy to get us going. He plays at a similar level as his superstar counterparts, does not get the superstar treatment from the refs, and RARELY complains. I've just had a good time watching him play this season, and as a fan, I really appreciate his improved attitude. David Lee has been great too. I was a little concerned earlier in the season when he was clanking his mid-range j's, but these last couple weeks he has been money from 15 feet...he's also impressed me with his passing ability, and again, a great attitude...easy to root for. The team is playing with a new confidence, and it's been contagious...when we were down 10+ last night, I truly felt like we'd right in the mix at the end, and we were. A month or two ago, while Lee was out, once we got back 10 points it got ugly. We got some big stops at the end and avoided those self-destructive turnovers that kill us. Besides that airhead and-1 foul by Steph, they just looked very composed and comfortable in crunch time. Great clutch plays down the stretch by several players. A win like that always puts me in a good mood...lets hope it's not short-lived.
The Pacers were a good match for the W's because (1) their guards are not physically big and not scorers and (2) they did not have much of a post-up presence (Jeff Foster/McRoberts/Hansbrough [he got a couple of early post-ups]).
I give Smart 0 credit for subbing in BW at the end of the game. That's the only time I can recall that his strategy of "hmmm lets throw in some dude who never plays here in a crucial stretch of the game" ever worked. Hes done it in the past with Vlad, Carney, etc. and I always say to myself "wtf he doesn't play the guy the whole game and hes throwing him out there cold right now?" And it typically results in an instant -5 or -10 points and he subs the starters back in to get the deficit back late. Additionally I would not get my hopes up regarding BW. Lets see a couple games in a row of decent play before we start talking about re-signing the guy. And Doctor Kajita nailed another mind boggling substitution for me. He played the starters for 10+ minutes in the third before it was plainly obvious they were huffing and puffing. He took a timeout...and then put them all back in. They continued to take awful shots and get railed by Indy and about 45 seconds after the timeout he submitted and put in Vlad and Acie. Seriously, was he planning on playing the starting 5 the whole godamn quarter? This is, mind you the third quarter. The one before the last quarter of the game. And then when Curry came out with about a minute left before the end of the third he never got on the court until less than 6 minutes remained in the 4th. 7 minutes of game time plus the in-between quarter break. Philsmith, I completely agree with you about playing Curry with the second unit. I don't understand why we almost never see him out there with the second team. Especially when Monta comes out isn't it logical to have one of Monta or Curry out there for pretty much all of the 48 minutes? They're both excellent players, far and away the best playmakers on the team and offensive forces. Just having Curry's passing, facilitating, shooting ability should make the bench players look better. For some reason Smart thinks Acie Law and Reggie Williams are going to come in and create offense at an NBA level. I think it would benefit EVERYONE if you put Curry in with them while Monta rested and then when Steph needs rest they can still play with a great offensive talent (and Acie and Reggie can both run the point). Right now forcing Monta and Steph to be together so much is actually taking away from Steph's game. I say put him out there with the second unit and just tell him "here's the ball, go create something beautiful"...maybe I'm too Don Nelson-centric but he looked damn good doing it last year. I think it'd get him into a better rhythm, it would make our second unit scoring much better, we wouldn't go on these massive dry spells, and Monta would probably end up getting a lot more rest.
Well, 0 credit to Smart is a little extreme, but I hear you. He's done mind-boggling things all season so maybe he just struck gold this time. But, he's said countless times that what he expects out of his bench players is "to be ready at all times." So, it's nice that BW stepped up on that occasion. He's definitely itching to play, so it could have just been a combination of BW's desperation and Smart's insistence that players be ready when they're called upon. Yeah, subbing out an entire block of STARTING players for a block of bench players, who have been a disappointment this season, is not the best strategy. If Smart is insistent on putting his players in a position to succeed, he should combine his bench players with starting players or playing them at proper positions like Vlad playing the 3 along with a real PF and a real C (in this case, Lou can qualify as a real C playing next to say Udoh or Lee). Either way, he's running his starters into the ground and not putting his bench guys in the best position to be effective. Maybe this will change but anyway, I'm withholding judgment on Smart and his rotations until later into the season since as a whole they seem to be playing better (and winning games they should). There may be a method to his madness or it could just be madness. All I know is it's maddening to watch. Like sitting Curry for so long before subbing him in at the 6 min mark. Maybe this strategy will have benefits as the season goes along. I don't know and I'm certainly not trying to make excuses for Smart, but the season is indeed a long one. Hopefully it's just a high-class problem for now. Maybe Curry's efficiency while on the court is because of how he's used. Again, I don't know, but maybe Smart does.
The good coaches that I notice spread their starters (best players) out after the first big part of the first quarter so that there is enough scoring/leadership when you go to some substitutions. Jackson did it with Pippen and Jordan, making sure one of them was always out there, he did it with Shaq and Kobe, he's doing it with Kobe and Gasol now; Sloan did it with Stockton and Malone; even Spoelstra sees this with LeBron and Wade. Why then does Smart think that an Acie Law/Reggie Williams backcourt is going to get it done? Law made that 3 at the end of the 3rd but that was a half-court heave. Curry could make Reggie and Vlad better.
