Oct. 30 Utah Jazz @ Golden State Warriors 7:30 PM (PST) FSN Bay Area

It's depressing but this game went exactly according to the script. Nothing really unexpected. No Stephen Jackson (or Wright) and a very tough matchup for the W's under any circumstance. I'm not going to freak out about it. Bad freethrowing, bogus phantom foul calls on Biedrins, massive rebounding edge for Utah. Yep, sounds about right. They need to find a way to get Biedrins involved more offensively (although that would have been hard tonight with him on the bench), Monta needs to maintain his aggressiveness for more than short spurts, and Nellie needs to find a way to control Barnes' bad instincts, and get him off the floor when he starts trying to play hero. Belinelli should have been brought in way earlier. Once they went down by over 16 and nothing was obviously working, why not try something else?</p>

Anyway, remember how depressing it was to watch that first game loss to the Lakers last year. I can easily see them being 3-7 or 4-6 after 10 games, but it's not the end of the world. In theory they should get their happy feet back against a Brandless Clippers team.</p>

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>For anybody that watched this game, can somebody fill me in on what happened to Okur? I noticed on the box score that he played just 15 minutes tonight, so I'm assuming he got hurt. What happened, and how serious did it look?</div></p>

Okur was in foul trouble all night, which was a bad thing for the Warriors, because then Millsap came in.</p>

I'm adisappointed in the loss, but it was expected. Came home early from just to watch the game. Crazy thing is that I work in Alum Rock, so if I stayed at work, I would have been right at the center of the earthquake. Bad joke, but so I guess God is a Warriors fan.</p>

 

Hey, did you guys see Baron take that flop on Okur away from the play? What's up with that? Very lame thing to do. I don't know why he feels he needs to resort to such cheap tactics, I don't like it. Baron will get a huge amount of respect letting his game speak for him, stuff like that is only going to take that goodwill right back, especially when he says they're trying to attract new Warrior fans (he had a quote about this in the paper yesterday).</p>

 

Pretty much worse fears were in full display.</p>

Good stuff, the arena was electric at the start and the First Quarter was nice. Warriors had great energy at the start and got off 7-2 with fastbreaks and steals (could have even been bigger with a few finishes) then closed the quarter with a run to make it 30-28 even though the Jazz punished them inside and made maybe one jumper.</p>

After that it was ugly. Poor FTs, no rebounding, no interior defense, stand around jumpers, turnovers. Ugh. Troy Hudson needs to play less than D Fisher (At least he could hit a jumper even if he went 1 on 1). There was no defense, the Jazz would look for a cutter in the lane and just feed it in and easy dunk or lay up. Even if the Warriors challenged the shot, they fouled almost every time which only lead to FTs. Now Boozer is a big time scorer and he made some tough shots but Brewer, Kirilenko, Millsap all got easy buckets.</p>

Deron Williams? Only the 2nd best PG in the League, better than Chris Paul, Chauncey or Baron. Always in control, can finish in traffic and the ability to hit the tough jumpers with the shot clock running down or the open 3 when left alone. Just so good and makes his teammates better. When he went out, Warriors made a couple of runs because Jason Hart is not a good shooter and prone to TOs.</p>

Azubuike scored early on then disappeared; maybe Nellie did not like his D or rebounding. Puzzling.</p>

Baron was good, without him they get blown out by 40. Pietrus had some nice jumpers off the dribble, surprising, maybe he can play some, but he makes some really stupid fouls.</p>

Rebounding is awful. Guys tip the ball but cannot secure it. Harrington got a couple of tough rebounds but that was it. Without rebounds, Jazz get easy buckets inside and W's cannot run. I thought W's made up for that last year but hustling but there was little hustling shown last night.</p>

Monta played pretty good, he penetrated and scored and did not make a whole lot of TOs. Good to see but he's not a PG, he does not create for others.</p>

Belinelli, two sweet 3s to make it somewhat of a closer game midway through the 4th quarter, really promising.</p>

POB, the Warriors really need his size to rebound, come on bring it.</p>

Only one game, hopefully just a really bad match up against a tough, well disciplined team. My congrats to the Jazz.</p>

 

Do we all know this team or what? (actually it pretty darn predictable in terms of big ball vs. small ball matchups)</p>

I'm glad Air Monta sweetened up the game prediction a bit just so don't we have inevitable defeat stamped in our heads before the opening tip off. </p>

It was a nice fun game at the beginning, but we didn't exercise proper fundamental of free throw shooting. Plus, there's a reason why we put in a 6'8 or 6'9 240 something pounders as power forward because that's typically the position that can get to rebounds that shorter, lighter players cannot. This whole Pietrus as starting power forward was just as bad as Dunleavy at PF, Murphy at Center meanwhile we got seldom used Ike Diogu. A lot of people forget that Boozer and his backup Paul Milsap are still quite athletic and long enough to get rebounds that our athletic 6'5, 6'6 guys can't get to. I would have felt better if they put in Harrington, Lasme, Biedrins, or Wright at PF sooner even if it didn't solve the shooting and free throw shooting problem.</p>

I thought Biedrins did okay on rebounding despite turnovers and phantom foul calls. Biedrins got shafted on blocking fouls and it wasn't cool that his teammates were picking up a lot of dumb reach-in fouls as well. Among reach-in foul culprits were Pietrus or Baron just getting guys on the arm. I would also liked to have seen more POB and actually start using him.</p>

I couldn't stand Troy "Derek Fisher" Hudson. Hit a buzzer beater game winner and sit back down... uggg. His point guard game is so ugly, out of control, and his pass accuracy sucks worse than a telegraphed one-handed Monta Ellis pass. We don't have much point guard depth because nobody on our team is an actual point guard. Sjax and Belinelli exercise more control than both Ellis and Hudson combined. Awful awful awful.</p>

Yeah I pretty much agree with Philsmith and other's assessments. It was a mix of a bad break, bad basketball play on the Warriors part, and simply being outmatched by a bigger and better team. We saw it last year when Carlos Boozer just punished us and got several chances to score again when his team missed the shot and we couldn't rebound. And plus, we saw how games were decided by free throws and we just lost that battle.</p>

It's only one game, but I hope Nelson really explores his game plan in terms of matchups. Oh and one more thing: Get rid of Pietrus. Damn I can't stand that guy no longer! His game makes me want to puke sometimes. He had one of the better stat lines of the game especially on making his threes, but the team just does not look fluid when he is on the floor.</p>

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (HiRez)</div><div class='quotemain'></p>

Hey, did you guys see Baron take that flop on Okur away from the play? What's up with that? Very lame thing to do. I don't know why he feels he needs to resort to such cheap tactics, I don't like it. Baron will get a huge amount of respect letting his game speak for him, stuff like that is only going to take that goodwill right back, especially when he says they're trying to attract new Warrior fans (he had a quote about this in the paper yesterday).</p>

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Yes, I thought it was hilarious because it was a joke. Did you see him chuckle after he got up? He didn't get called for anything because it was so obvious. On the contrary, I thought it was nice to be able to see Baron have fun with the game, even in a losing effort. It was the first game of the season and no one is panicking or resorting to cheap tactics.</p>

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<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (custodianrules2)</div><div class='quotemain'></p>

I couldn't stand Troy "Derek Fisher" Hudson. Hit a buzzer beater game winner and sit back down... uggg. His point guard game is so ugly, out of control, and his pass accuracy sucks worse than a telegraphed one-handed Monta Ellis pass. We don't have much point guard depth because nobody on our team is an actual point guard. Sjax and Belinelli exercise more control than both Ellis and Hudson combined. Awful awful awful.</p>

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That is an unfair comparison to Fisher. First, Fisher was signed as a starting point guard. Hudson is a back-up. I'd hold off on your "awful awful awful" assessment until you see him in a few more games. His scouting report is that he's an effective back-up that's been hampered by injuries, limiting his effectiveness. If he can stay healthy, I think he can become a decent, not good, back-up to Baron.</p>

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He was healthy and still jacked up 7 elbow jumpers without even looking to pass.</p>

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (philsmith75)</div><div class='quotemain'></p>

He was healthy and still jacked up 7 elbow jumpers without even looking to pass.</p>

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First game in a blow out...moot observation.</p>

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Kensaku)</div><div class='quotemain'></p>

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (custodianrules2)</div><div class='quotemain'></p>

I couldn't stand Troy "Derek Fisher" Hudson. Hit a buzzer beater game winner and sit back down... uggg. His point guard game is so ugly, out of control, and his pass accuracy sucks worse than a telegraphed one-handed Monta Ellis pass. We don't have much point guard depth because nobody on our team is an actual point guard. Sjax and Belinelli exercise more control than both Ellis and Hudson combined. Awful awful awful.</p>

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That is an unfair comparison to Fisher. First, Fisher was signed as a starting point guard. Hudson is a back-up. I'd hold off on your "awful awful awful" assessment until you see him in a few more games. His scouting report is that he's an effective back-up that's been hampered by injuries, limiting his effectiveness. If he can stay healthy, I think he can become a decent, not good, back-up to Baron.</p>

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We're not talking about money though. I'm talking about in terms of game and the role we need when Baron is out. We need a point guard. So far I don't see any in either Ellis or Hudson with their one handed passes and shoot first mentality. The just don't have the game that we need to get everyone else involved. That's all I'm saying. They ruin the tempo quite a bit when they're not connecting or they are turning over the ball a lot. What I'm saying is if you want to compete in small ball, you have to move the ball first. You can't just jack up shots and then run back on defense. They gotta pass, cut, pass, and take good shots they can make. Not just lazy ass shots like the sub 40% Baron Davis and Fisher used to take without looking to get people involved frist. We need Baron Davis from last year and more guys that can get guys involved so they can pass the ball around and setup other people and look for their shots within the flow.</p>

From watching Ellis and Hudson, I can see two players who telegraph passes very badly or they just don't make plays that are there for others or they just don't make very accurate passes. This game has to come from the backup consistently or else why not just play a bigger shooting guard like Belinelli as point instead of Hudson?</p>

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