insider Warrior draft pick

<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">Golden State Warriors
Odds of winning the lottery: 1.4 percent
The Warriors landed an All-Star caliber point guard at the trade deadline in Baron Davis and they seem comfortable with the Adonal Foyle-Andris Biedrins combo in the middle. But for the past 12 months starting small forward Mike Dunleavy has slowly fallen out of favor with just about everyone in Golden State. Dunleavy still has some trade value left. Williams is a clear upgrade and Bogut is still a good option here (he's better than Foyle and further along than Biedrins). But it looks like Williams would be the guy.
Edge: Williams </div>
If Dunleavy has fallen out of favor with the Warriors organization the last guy I would want to draft is Willliams . Didn't this guy choke during the NCAA championship? I'm actually wary of Bogut rymes with Fuller? Whoa nasty flashback! Anyway this might be the year that it actually pay to not get the number 1 pick but, if the Warriors do get it I guess you got to bite the bvullet ang go with size.

 

Yeah, I'm not sure Chad Ford has his facts right. Dunleavy fallen out of favor? Maybe he's not as highly regarded as he was when he was drafted, but he certainly proved he wasn't a total bust. The Warriors could probably trade any of the top picks for a lot, considering that everyone is high on the top three picks. But, the chances are so low, it's not going to happen unless someone rigs the lottery. The lottery isn't until May 24 or so, anyway.

Fuller was the stiffest stiff ever who had absolutely no footspeed nor agility. Bogut isn't exactly the next Carl Lewis or anything, but he is mobile enough, and moreso than Fuller. Fuller was a true "traditional" C who only the Warriors really regarded highly, and who thrived against smaller players by using his size, post up game, and the fact that his team fed him at every opportunity. Bogut proved his measure in the Olympics and in his sophomore season. While I don't think Bogut is the next Duncan either, he's going to be a solid center for many years.

 

Yeah that excerpt sounds sketch, all right. When has Dunleavy fallen out of favor with everyone? While I'm sure there's some in the Warriors organization that have doubts about him, most of the players and the coaches appreciate what he does in terms of setting people up, pushing the break, and cycling the ball around.

Marvin Williams is all potential. But he could very well be Rodney White with elite athleticism and not know how to stay consistent or make others better.

Bogut is a lot more athletic than people give him credit for, so I don't think he's Fuller. He's also more well rounded than Fuller, making him a big power forward or a center at the next level. Bogut can shoot from the perimeter and even knock down three pointers, plus pass, handle the ball, and score with either hand. That's why he's a consensus #1 overall draft pick. Not very many flaws in his games and that's why some consider him too safe for his own good and they'll use "slow lateral movement" or "flat footedness" or "lacks killer instinct" as knocks against him. But I think he'll be decent to very good with the right team feeding him the ball and taking advantage of his outlet passes. Let's just say he's not going to suck in the open court as much as some players like Yao, who just aren't built for it. Murphy can run, he is just terrible shuffling his feet and he can't really jump. But Bogut has the advantage of way better footwork and more polish in his game.

 

Custodian brought up the scary thought of mine with the Williams - White comparison. White is the same height, was the same PF/SF, and was even called "the best player in the draft" by Jerry West (although the certainty of the compliment is shaky, because he ended up taking Shane Battier and Pau Gasol instead and was probably trying to bluff, just like when he was talking about Pietrus in 03). Both of them had great inside-outside games. Both are freshmen coming out. Williams had a better reputation going into college, and is more athletic, but it's still scary.

The entire draft reminds me a lot of the 2001 draft where this all occurred. But, luckily we didn't draft White and went with Richardson, and extremely luckily, Murphy fell past a ton of teams despite great workouts. That draft still paralells this one a lot, where there were few sure things, a few high school players declaring too early (Kwame, Diop, Chandler, Curry) and a lot of big men in general. (Thank god we didn't draft Michael Bradley.) What's my point about this whole nostalgic view? That we'd be fine with the 9th pick.

 

I agree with you Zhone we might end up with a darkhorse player with the 9th pick that will impact the Warriors right away or Mullin might trade the pick with a player for an established big man Zydrunas Ilgauskas anyone?

 

Zhone, was it you or Kwan that was saying a while back that the Logo wanted Jason Richardson in the 2001 draft? The thought of Pau Gasol + Jason Richardson sounds very scary if that did go through and St. Jean went for Eddie Griffin or Rodney White instead. Remember Eddie Griffin? So much hype! I don't know if Rodney White was hyped as much, but he was touted as the kind of player you want if you wanted nothing but scoring and athleticism.

Anyway, that Jerry West hyping up Rodney White definitely sounded like a bluff. I'm sure Charlotte is trying to do something of the same to get Chris Paul or Andrew Bogut in their stables because I'm not convinced Marvin Williams is their second guy to build a franchise around. If you get Chris Paul or find somebody to replace Primoz Brezec's lousy D, I think the Bobcats will jump by leaps and bounds. So it's all on New Orleans as to what they can do to deny Charlotte a potential franchise level point guard or a PF/C.

 

There is no secret that West wanted Richardson with 6th. We took him with 5th. Also, he wanted Dunleavy with 4th. We took him with 3rd. Again, he wanted Pietrus with 12th. we took him with 11th. So, technically, Memphis could have Richardson, Dunleavy and Pietrus line up...

 

So with Zhone comparing this year's draft to 2001 the question is: Who is this draft's Kwame Brown? I think it's Chris Taft. He'll go way higher than he should.

Tiago Splitter will be Pau Gasol.
Marvin Williams will probably be Rodney White.
Danny Granger = Joe Johnson
Nemanja Aleksandrov = Vladimir Radmanovic

Heh, kidding.

This draft definitely has more "franchise" point guards projected coming out in the first round than in previous years. Maybe this could be the "Todd Fuller draft" a.k.a the 1996 draft.

Marbury, Nash, well,uhhh, two franchise point guards! It's got two shooting guards Ray Allen and Kobe Bryant with lots of high impact tweeners like Marcus Camby, Shareef Abdur Rahim, Allen Iverson, Antoine Walker, Kerry Kittles, Peja Stojakavic with very few true centers.

Does this draft have a lot of tweeners? Kinda. Pray we don't get Todd Fuller!

 

<div class="quote_poster">Quoting Kwan1031:</div><div class="quote_post">There is no secret that West wanted Richardson with 6th. We took him with 5th. Also, he wanted Dunleavy with 4th. We took him with 3rd. Again, he wanted Pietrus with 12th. we took him with 11th. So, technically, Memphis could have Richardson, Dunleavy and Pietrus line up...</div> ...yet Memphis managed to make the playoffs within the last two seasons including this one.

If only Twardzick and his clowns hadn't made such a big mess, we'd probably be out of it sooner. I still think the key to any team is not their big men, it's their point guard. We never had a good point guard. Gilbert Arenas was the closest we've had.

 

Big Z is kind of slow and injury prone. Despite the shotblocking, he's more or less hands down type of defender that Murphy is. Fans would absolutely hate his lack of defense. Plus with age, he'll only break down more and slow down a team that likes to run.

I can see us doing something where we do like the old Nets (RJ, Kmart, Kittles, Kidd, Collins) and add an athletic powerful forward, but I think Stro isn't as good as Kmart is, obviously and Biedrins is pretty much block everything/dunk everything player with some impressive athleticism of his own and more size. Swift's got some okay handles and a nice 15-18 footer, but he just seems like another player that Monty will be screaming at on defense or on offensive sets and will end up benching for somebody that is more "aware". That's probably the biggest reason why guys like Dunleavy and Richardson are appreciated, because they are more aware of situations (obviously when don't try and force things) where the ball needs to be moved around. Our team is pretty awful when we're not sharing the ball and getting guys open.

The above lineup looks good on paper, but I don't know how well it would actually do.

 

DALEMBERT! Young, shot blocker, rebounder, can run. Thats who we need to add. I also like Swift, but i see more potential in Dalembert. I would like to keep Dunleavy tho, he seemed to gain alot of confidence with Baron here and I think he'll work on his game in the offseason, in addition to bulking up some.

Im NOT at all sold on Bogut, I think he's just Murphy without all the rebounds.

 

I thought our version of Dalembert was Andris Biedrins. I'm not sold on Andrew Bogut myself. He'll be a good player, but not a dominating big man.

 

Dalembert and Swift are a bit out of our range now unless we can arrange some sort of sign-and-trade. (Both are definitely going to be above the MLE). More likely candidates for the MLE are on the level of Antonio Daniels, Donyell Marshall, or Kerry Kittles - fringe starters or top reserves pretty much.

I don't think the FA market should affect how we draft, though. I would draft Bogut with the intention to trade, or whoever the other team wanted, as long as we got a solid player in return. If we couldn't move the pick I would probably still keep Bogut as insurance for Murphy or Foyle going down. Williams is a good risk, but only if we can secure something good for Dunleavy beforehand. Anyway, all of this is unlikely as the chances of getting a top 3 pick are so slim, I've got a better chance of making 10 half court shots in a row.

 

Donyell Marshall would certainly be an interesting and unlikely FA.

I wonder if there's any chance Denver wants this year's draft pick for Nene. I'm sure a couple of Pete Newell big man camps would do wonders for him and they can use our pick for Fran Vasquez or whoever they think can improve their roster. Nene's value probably isn't super great because he's not the great rebounder he could be or has the best footwork for his size/coordination.

 

What about Francisco Elson? More than the MLE because he's a big man?

 

Kwame Brown is the same draft year as Richardson so he is due for a qualifying offer of at least 7 mils this offseason. If nobody picks him up, the MLE might be a possibility, but there's probably a few teams out there that could use him at power forward and would be willing to pay 7 mils a year.

Wizards most likely might end up protecting their investment since Brown was sort of injured this year and didn't get to show his stuff, but with Gilbert Arenas' contract, Antwan Jamison's contract, and Larry Hughes to think about re-signing that's a lot of commitment, especially when you have two other centers under contract that produce a lot more consistently. Hughes will get a big pay day for sure. Wizards offseason might be interesting. If their market is good for basketball they won't lose money.

 

What about Cris Wilcox from the Clippers? He would make a great athletic center and he might be available.