GAME THREAD: Warriors @ Hawks 4:00pm 1/31/2007

Custodian hit it on the head, lack of smart, hustle basketball is killing the Warriors. No defensive rebounding, jacking up 3s, lack of recovering on D; that's simply effort. Funny, the coach has changed but its the same problem. Pretty soon those players have to look in the mirror. Zone? It was a nice gimmick early on, but the other teams are exploiting it now because despite the common misperception, zoning makes you weaker, not stronger, on the boards because players have to find someone to block out.

Why do the Warriors play zone? Because their players cannot D up one on one. If they could, the zone would be gone.

I'm totally disheartened by these past two games. Losing while playing hard is okay, this is not.

 

<div class="quote_poster">philsmith75 Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">Custodian hit it on the head, lack of smart, hustle basketball is killing the Warriors. No defensive rebounding, jacking up 3s, lack of recovering on D; that's simply effort. Funny, the coach has changed but its the same problem. Pretty soon those players have to look in the mirror. Zone? It was a nice gimmick early on, but the other teams are exploiting it now because despite the common misperception, zoning makes you weaker, not stronger, on the boards because players have to find someone to block out.

Why do the Warriors play zone? Because their players cannot D up one on one. If they could, the zone would be gone.

I'm totally disheartened by these past two games. Losing while playing hard is okay, this is not.</div>

I've been waiting for a coach like Nelson to support my belief that it was not Montgomery's fault why we sucked the last two seasons. Monty played zone, Nelson played zone, obviously they know what they have defensively and it's not a good defensive team or a very big team or a very organized team. So maybe man to man defense or fighting for post position is out of the question. I think, It's really all on the players and the teams the GM chose to build and spend resources on. The last few moves Mullin made was to undo his mistakes rather than find the positions we needed to put around Baron Davis to make this team a winner. Now we're playing all small and it's just too tough to do more than just run it a few times in the first half, miss free throws, and end up jacking threes in the 4th. Even if we didn't have a franchise big man, it's no excuse why we don't make up for it with depth. I'm sure there's a few guys like Josh Powell or somebody up there that can put a body on somebody or rebound (and is cheap). How about a smart, old veteran that can still ball some?

It's like we basically ignored the main problem to begin with since building that 2004 team. We overpaid for mediocrity (yet again) and argued "current market value" which was a bunch of b.s. once that new cba came out. Rebounding and defense got worse and worse since that 2003 year when Dampier left and Clif Robinson was on his way out. It's still the same in essence since Mullin began building the 2004 team. We don't play smart, we don't have a solution to find better shots within the flow because we really have no flow, we can't take advantage of the foul line, and we don't really have any other variety of offense but to play the way we've always played. Last year, the Warriors executed better on out of bounds plays last year and we're saying that in 24 second shotclock we can't run one of those plays to get a better shot or better ball movement? God help us if we can't find anything in transition or shoot the three ball well.

This is a lazy team or a dumb team and I can't figure out which. Maybe both? I figure the GM is pretty dumb for doing what he did in 2004 since most of his moves right now are in response to those past mistakes. They are desperation moves or deals done to cover up his past mistakes and it's not helping us get better because in 2004 we got worse than 2003. The Gm didn't solve any of the problems that plagued the Warriors before he got here. So it's like the same crap continues because nobody solved any problems. We got a star player in Baron Davis, but his ass ain't going anywhere because the team is still poorly built and we wasted so much time with that Foyle, Dunleavy, Murphy fiasco. We were probably better off with a Dampier, Baron Davis or Claxton lineup than any combo of Baron Davis/Dfish with no inside presence in the paint.

It's just frustrating to have everything I feared in the offseason come true. The season ain't over, but man it's starting to look that way... Maybe the only positive thing is that in march we could start playing great ball when the games don't matter anymore because we're so many games behind 8th seed.

... and guess that's why I have such a negative opinion even on a win. I know it probably won't be enough w's to secure 8th seed unless it's a wire job and I hate those. A franchise like the Sonics haven't done jack since they made the playoffs one time and I don't want to be the Sonics. I want to build momentum somehow and keep going to the playoffs getting better every year...

anyway sorry if I'm making people feel sad or angry.

 

The deal with zone is you want a team that's pretty smart,stable,experianced as a unit. In the NBA,guys are dafted for being a 6-9 jumping jack,or a big shooter-scorer. NBA teams don't usually have the overachiever types who do nothing fancy but are rock steady on D,know the job. In college-that's typical,teams often have 3-4 guys who'd have no shot at the pros but make the zone work.

Here,a problem is that zone can mean nobody's entirely accountable. You get a situation where you "sorta" guard 2 guys...really guard none. Our zone has a tendancy to make a neat ring 10-12 ft from the hoop,with Andris hangin closer. If they get 2 or 3 guys inside the ring,Biedrins can't cover them all,and there's a lag as to who should leave his space and pack in to help. Add that the guy who drops back may be giving up 5" and 25 lb,and it's bad news. Meanwhile...on the perimeter we barely effect the kick out catch and shoot 3----yet don't have the rebounding power to punish teams taking long,low% shots...makes for a double whammy.

The Suns can play small because Marion plays big. Marion + Diaw get rebounds...plus the Suns are tops in FG%,3 pt %.

With our quick-athletic types we need to play man D mainly. With zone,a weak link CAN be protected--but only if you have a crew that really anticipates well,works togather...plus you have a strong second layer. Man D...your guy goes off and it's clear who's not up to the job. That,and you don't get that little lag from trying to figure where to be. Man D-the task is pretty clear. Most of our guys can play real decent man D. We seem unable to get a full zone unit on the floor we can bank on. Some guys-Pietrus,Ellis,Barnes are pretty solid in man-less effective in zone. Cabbages is pretty much a matador either way. He is not apt to play a lot though.

Having wasted options to have and use a full size PF/rebounder type,we have to make do. Probably we can rebound a bit better in man D. Not using Jax much at SF will also help-as Barnes + Pietrus board better.

Post season we have some options-if Nellie agrees to play a PF.

 

By the way...we had a game early vs Utah,we zoned with Biedrins-Murphy both in and both near the basket,they combined for near 30 boards. Utah's frnt 3,Boozer-Okur-AK scored a puny 4 pt each. We outrebounded the Jazz by a lot,got a solid W vs a hot team-----learned NOTHING from it.

 

<div class="quote_poster">HiRez Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">Yeah, this happens a lot this year. I have no idea why they don't utilize Andris on offense more. He shoots one of the highest FG% in the league, is not prone to picking up offensive fouls, and seems to be pretty good about staying off the fould line (if you want to call that good, but in his case it is). I think he has shown he could easily be a 20 ppg scorer if he was an offensive focal point. I guess it really goes back to the even more general problem with the Warriors and coaching staff: they fail to recognize advantages and keep exploiting them until they stop working.</div>

First, I blame Baron. After the last two games, I take everything he says with a grain of salt. The guy is not a true PG. He does make plays and is a talented PG, but he doesn't lead this team the right way. Earlier in the season, he was making plays to AB, but then didn't continue with what was working. Now that he's got his boyz AL and Jax, I suspect that's why he's not passing it more to AB again. It would be great if we can get Jason Kidd on this team instead of Baron. Now that's a guy who can still lead a team!

As for Nelson, he should be drawing up plays inside for AB. I dunno what he's doing about that as he doesn't rag on that aspect. Just like you. I dunno????!!!!????!!!

That said, here is the only thing I can think of. I agree 20 ppg from AB is possible, but maybe AB is worn down and the game before he was dealing with a tooth problem. AB is still too young and Nelson can't depend on him just yet. Again I dunno????!!!!????!!!!

 

<div class="quote_poster">custodianrules2 Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">I've been waiting for a coach like Nelson to support my belief that it was not Montgomery's fault why we sucked the last two seasons. Monty played zone, Nelson played zone, obviously they know what they have defensively and it's not a good defensive team or a very big team or a very organized team. So maybe man to man defense or fighting for post position is out of the question. I think, It's really all on the players and the teams the GM chose to build and spend resources on. The last few moves Mullin made was to undo his mistakes rather than find the positions we needed to put around Baron Davis to make this team a winner. Now we're playing all small and it's just too tough to do more than just run it a few times in the first half, miss free throws, and end up jacking threes in the 4th. Even if we didn't have a franchise big man, it's no excuse why we don't make up for it with depth. I'm sure there's a few guys like Josh Powell or somebody up there that can put a body on somebody or rebound (and is cheap). How about a smart, old veteran that can still ball some?</div>

CR2,

I suspect Monty played ball the way you understand the game. That's all right with him, but we didn't have the players that fit his style. Most of our players (including Mullin's way of thinking) fit the run and gun philosophy.

Sorry, but Don Nelson isn't going to debunk the thinking that Monty was not a good NBA coach. Guys like Jerry Sloan, Phil Jackson, Avery Johnson, Flip Saunders or Rick Carlisle do that. They all get their players to execute their sets better than Monty. Monty's sets in games looked more like dress rehersals than the actual show.

Now in getting Nelson, you're going to the extreme because he'll go small ball and smaller ball to counter the bigger teams. He'll do a lot of changes because of trying to get an edge on matchups. He will do radical things like Hack-a-Shaq in order to get scoring percentages.

The other huge concept with Nelson is the point forward position (think LeBron, Lamar Odom, Boris Diaw, Grant Hill, KG, Brent Barry). I think Scottie Pippen is the prototype. Along with the PG, he needs the point forward, a big man who can dribble, handle and pass the ball, in order to initiate his offense. Nelson believed he had that with Mike Dunleavy, but we all know that was a big failure. He may think he has that with AL, but Harrington hasn't really shown he could do that, so we don't have anyone who can trigger the offense besides Baron and Monta (Rooney looks to be a bit slow and better in half court sets). I suppose that's why several people want Yi Jianlian whom seems to fit that role.

On defense, I don't think Nelson enjoys going with the zone, but maybe he doesn't think he has the great defensive players or believes we'll get killed even worse inside. If I were him, I'd try different things like a 2-2-1 or 2-1-2 zone or switch up to a man-to-man because the zone is so weak. Our defense is like second in the league or something like that. That said, you gotta win to get the players to play defense. It seems Nelson just threw up his hands in the last game as well as others when we had Murfleavy.

Not to beat a dead horse, but Monty was just overwhelmed in the NBA. No point revisiting that.

 

<div class="quote_poster">jason voorhees Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">CR2,

I suspect Monty played ball the way you understand the game. That's all right with him, but we didn't have the players that fit his style. Most of our players (including Mullin's way of thinking) fit the run and gun philosophy.
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For the last time everyone I'm not a fan of Monty in the nba. This was about different coaches with different styles leaning on the extremes and they couldn't do jack with this roster which hadn't changed much to improve the areas they were weakest in. It's the same old crap, yet everyone got excited like things were changing this year.

Yeah, I do like a more balanced attack rather than just one sided slow ball with Monty and one sided fast ball with Nelson. There needs to be a middle ground even if we can't do either well. If we go too far to the extremes we may just continue along that path and then we'll really be in trouble if we can't compete in any other ways besides just to score. It's just too bad we tried to make a team fit together for this extreme style of play, and meanwhile it doesn't compete because they all do the same things rather than different things that post players do to affect the game. A team cannot compete that way so this year really wasn't meant to be the year.

Plus, only one guy can shoot the ball on offense, all 5 should have to play defense or else!

<div class="quote_poster">jason voorhees Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">
Sorry, but Don Nelson isn't going to debunk the thinking that Monty was not a good NBA coach. Guys like Jerry Sloan, Phil Jackson, Avery Johnson, Flip Saunders or Rick Carlisle do that. They all get their players to execute their sets better than Monty. Monty's sets in games looked more like dress rehersals than the actual show.
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This isn't about Monty being a good or bad coach, it's about the fact we take the same roster, we get all hopeful when we get a famous coach, we make all excuses about injuries, and say now that it fits because of Al Harrington/Sjax trade, and we're still not doing jack. We can argue how it'll take time for this team to mesh and I don't buy that either. It's a team that fits but they ain't competing the way bigger teams do and the way better smaller teams do. We're still in mediocrity. Plus, how far as Nelson got in the playoffs with his screwy lineups? He had the future two-time MVP on his club and yet they insisted on going small with Nash, Van Excel, Finley, Dirk, and some guy that's not a center.

I'm arguing that teams with real starting centers even if it's Dampier level and two backups that are energetic, Foyle type shotblockers will go further than us if they got the right star players and defensive dudes in the other four positions. We got no middle and that makes us a donut squad that's going to get stomped on until we miracuously land two franchise or three franchise players that are Mullin, Timbug, Richmond, Dirk, or Nash level.

I guess we're right on the right track with building towards what Don Nelson and Mullin want, but we're on the wrong train, IMO.

We need more balance and more depth to cover our lack of interior defense in the middle and poor rebounding. I'd do whatever it takes to get some decent guys that know how to play the big position and can physically handle it, but I don't want to give up our nearest star type players.

I don't know if the Pacers trade was the best we could have done and we probably wouldn't have even had to do this if Dunleavy wasn't so badly overpaid and same with Murphy. We did it because we're worried about salary tax and Nelson was super embarassed how he embraced Dun/Murphy as run n' gun PF and C. We might even have gotten something more for Murphy if we didn't make an undesirable contract for him. You know like sign and trade? Instead we got Harrington, who I am not fond of. He scores and does nothing else, really. His defense is about as poor as Murphy. Just ask the Atlanta and Pacers fans who saw his game and that's why he was mostly sixth man role or a guy to start trading.

<div class="quote_poster">jason voorhees Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">
On defense, I don't think Nelson enjoys going with the zone, but maybe he doesn't think he has the great defensive players or believes we'll get killed even worse inside. If I were him, I'd try different things like a 2-2-1 or 2-1-2 zone or switch up to a man-to-man because the zone is so weak. Our defense is like second in the league or something like that. That said, you gotta win to get the players to play defense. It seems Nelson just threw up his hands in the last game as well as others when we had Murfleavy.

Not to beat a dead horse, but Monty was just overwhelmed in the NBA. No point revisiting that.</div>

Again, I don't know why people assume that because I bring up Montgomery, that I like him. I'm saying his style of game would probably win if Mullin knew something about centers, which he didn't with the whole Foyle fiasco and not even studying what kind of players a rookie coach from college would want. Hint: guys like the Collins twins, Curtis Borchardt and such. Guys who have hands, know how to pass the ball, score a little, defend, etc. We got Foyle who is career backup and does little else. At least one of the Collins' starts and Borchardt was projected to be top 10 center in the league by some if he was healthy.

My problem with this organization is that I've just lost faith in the decision-making these guys do. It's like bad history waiting to repeat itself.

It's like how much longer do we have to wait for these fools to put things together for us fans, the potential customers?

I'm almost like f-it. Time to bring an expansion team over here because I'm tired of the only bay area basketball franchise statistically defying odds as the only team in the nba with the most consecutive playoff-less seasons. The freaking ownership must be retarded to let this happen. I mean for me there's just nothing to cheer about these days.

 

And it's really nothing against Nelson or Montgomery, it's all about the decision makers making bad hunches, ignoring problems, putting too much faith in guys with limited upside, and the other assortment and array of problems that cause this team to suck for every season since Cohan arrived as new owner.

Thank goodness there's other Warrior fans that feel the same way I do. I just want this franchise to do better soon.

I think we can do this by playing bigger and getting bigger players (a mix of young and older). And also playing smarter and get better shooters + defenders. Easier said than done, but we figure we could get a few of those guys over the years if we hadn't freaked away our budget to get decent contributors. I believe under Monty and Nelson we're dealing with a roster that can't win because it just does nothing outside of score, score, score. Maybe, it's like the 2002 roster where Musselman actually did a decent job with his players before losing his mind in 2003 in that 2 point 4th quarter overtime loss to Toronto.

I'm kidding about Muss. He's cool. It's just that it's funny how we take out our only center in the 4th quarter that scores us 2 points and the team just cannot score and get anything inside. At least stone-hands could actually finish that year if they fed him the ball to keep him motivated.

Good teams are all about their centers if they got everything else that's decent. Where's our budget for a center?

 

<div class="quote_poster">custodianrules2 Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">For the last time everyone I'm not a fan of Monty in the nba. This was about different coaches with different styles leaning on the extremes and they couldn't do jack with this roster which hadn't changed much to improve the areas they were weakest in. It's the same old crap, yet everyone got excited like things were changing this year.

Yeah, I do like a more balanced attack rather than just one sided slow ball with Monty and one sided fast ball with Nelson. There needs to be a middle ground even if we can't do either well. If we go too far to the extremes we may just continue along that path and then we'll really be in trouble if we can't compete in any other ways besides just to score. It's just too bad we tried to make a team fit together for this extreme style of play, and meanwhile it doesn't compete because they all do the same things rather than different things that post players do to affect the game. A team cannot compete that way so this year really wasn't meant to be the year.

Plus, only one guy can shoot the ball on offense, all 5 should have to play defense or else!</div>

I think Nelson wants 5 on 5 ball, but he also wants numbers on the transition and that's why he's so keen on having the point forward. You notice he has one guard crashing the basket because he doesn't have board strength. The problem is, aside from Baron and Monta, there isn't a good point forward or a guy up front to handle the rock and make plays. MP tried to do it tonight, but his ball handling isn't good enough. Even when JRich comes back, he doesn't have the handles to do it. I'm not sure about Jax either, so that leaves getting one via trade or the draft.

<div class="quote_poster">custodianrules2 Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">This isn't about Monty being a good or bad coach, it's about the fact we take the same roster, we get all hopeful when we get a famous coach, we make all excuses about injuries, and say now that it fits because of Al Harrington/Sjax trade, and we're still not doing jack. We can argue how it'll take time for this team to mesh and I don't buy that either. It's a team that fits but they ain't competing the way bigger teams do and the way better smaller teams do. We're still in mediocrity. Plus, how far as Nelson got in the playoffs with his screwy lineups? He had the future two-time MVP on his club and yet they insisted on going small with Nash, Van Excel, Finley, Dirk, and some guy that's not a center.

I'm arguing that teams with real starting centers even if it's Dampier level and two backups that are energetic, Foyle type shotblockers will go further than us if they got the right star players and defensive dudes in the other four positions. We got no middle and that makes us a donut squad that's going to get stomped on until we miracuously land two franchise or three franchise players that are Mullin, Timbug, Richmond, Dirk, or Nash level.

I guess we're right on the right track with building towards what Don Nelson and Mullin want, but we're on the wrong train, IMO.</div>

Well, I'm starting to think that Don Nelson's strength is in being a change agent. When Nelson was GM and coach of the Warriors and in Dallas, he was instrumental in bringing the team from being one of the worst to being contenders (Warriors) or championship contenders (Mavericks). Of course, he wore out his welcome just as he had elsewhere else and ended up being replaced by St. Jean and Bob Lanier and Avery Johnson in Dallas. Now Avery Johnson is the architect for bringing home the LOB trophy and ring.

You figure Nelson isn't going to be around past his three years and during that time if he can get help Mullin get us the pieces to get to the playoffs on a regular basis, then he has done his job. There is a sense of urgency for Nelson to reach the playoffs, but it may not be this year but the next.

After Nelson's three years, it will likely be Keith Smart or some other coach that will be trying to get us to the Finals.

<div class="quote_poster">custodianrules2 Wrote</div><div class="quote_post">We need more balance and more depth to cover our lack of interior defense in the middle and poor rebounding. I'd do whatever it takes to get some decent guys that know how to play the big position and can physically handle it, but I don't want to give up our nearest star type players.

I don't know if the Pacers trade was the best we could have done and we probably wouldn't have even had to do this if Dunleavy wasn't so badly overpaid and same with Murphy. We did it because we're worried about salary tax and Nelson was super embarassed how he embraced Dun/Murphy as run n' gun PF and C. We might even have gotten something more for Murphy if we didn't make an undesirable contract for him. You know like sign and trade? Instead we got Harrington, who I am not fond of. He scores and does nothing else, really. His defense is about as poor as Murphy. Just ask the Atlanta and Pacers fans who saw his game and that's why he was mostly sixth man role or a guy to start trading.

Again, I don't know why people assume that because I bring up Montgomery, that I like him. I'm saying his style of game would probably win if Mullin knew something about centers, which he didn't with the whole Foyle fiasco and not even studying what kind of players a rookie coach from college would want. Hint: guys like the Collins twins, Curtis Borchardt and such. Guys who have hands, know how to pass the ball, score a little, defend, etc. We got Foyle who is career backup and does little else. At least one of the Collins' starts and Borchardt was projected to be top 10 center in the league by some if he was healthy.

My problem with this organization is that I've just lost faith in the decision-making these guys do. It's like bad history waiting to repeat itself.

It's like how much longer do we have to wait for these fools to put things together for us fans, the potential customers?

I'm almost like f-it. Time to bring an expansion team over here because I'm tired of the only bay area basketball franchise statistically defying odds as the only team in the nba with the most consecutive playoff-less seasons. The freaking ownership must be retarded to let this happen. I mean for me there's just nothing to cheer about these days.</div>

Well, I don't think it's as bad as you think because we got rid of Murfleavy and their contracts. That was an even worse situation for rebuilding. Although it does appear now that we got the worse of the deal in regards to actual players that will help the team, I think we can get in a better position via trades during the off-season and the draft. We have some players that are tradeable and they all have decent contracts. The only exception is Foyle, but he will have one less year on his contract. After another two years, he'll be a fat expiring contract.

Thus, we should be in good shape (short of Mullin giving out an ill advised fat contract or making a bad deal) to be able to re-sign the key players in AB and Monta after next season.

For sure, there are three spots that we need to address. 1) We need a point forward to grab boards and help trigger the offense, 2) a big man to backup AB (maybe POB can do the job next season if not this season or we can trade for someone like Darko) and 3) a backup PG who has speed and quickness. Rooney just isn't getting the job done, but maybe Monta will still be able to play PG as Nelson thinks.