No. The Warriors are not going to the POs this year. No 8th seed. It's pretty much a done deal. They looked pretty good against the Bobcats, only to squander an 8 point lead in the final minutes to melt down and lose, badly. Cheap and-1 fouls over and over. Missed freethrows. Turnovers. Frankly, the Bobcats are better than the Warriors. That's pretty sad. They put the whoopin on GS, with actual vets that knew how to win in crunch time. And their record is better. For all the flash and promise that Ellis/Curry/Wright/Lee/Beans may show to the fans, honestly the cats are better. That's a tough pill to swallow. Augustin/Jackson/Wallace/Diaw/Brown > Curry/Ellis/Wright/Lee/Beans Would you trade our starting five for theirs? I would have said no. Now I'll say yes. I'd rather have the bobcats squad at this point, than the GS squad. Frankly I say blow it up. Trade them all. Who cares? Go for it. Try something new. I still like Curry but everyone else can go. Even he can go if it gets us a starting five that can win games. Because right now, GS has no shot at 8th seed. They are soft. And lazy with the ball. They have no toughness. No one who can finish inside. No grit. When the Bobcats starting five > your starting five, then it's time to hit the panic button.
I missed the game. So I can't say much. I know that when they played at the Bobcats they almost blew the game at the end as well. In fact the Warriors in general are very poor at closing out most quarters and also games. I don't see much problem from the starting lineup besides defense. They are producing quality numbers - same number of points for W's as Bobcats' starters (plus double digit rebounding from Lee and Beans). I would take the Bobcats' bench over the Warriors'. Henderson, Najera, Mohammad, Livingston, D Brown > Vlad, Reggie Williams, Law, Udoh. I'd probably take their coach over the Warriors' coach too. Yeah, no playoffs was what would be expected. I just don't understand why the Warriors management have sat on their hands regarding their bench. Everyone could see that was going to be their weakness, and then of course there is the substitution patterns that are questionable, but I think any coach's rotations can be questioned at any point, but it may be the case a little too much with Smart. Not that I hate Smart, but I think the Warriors may be able to do better in that area. I think the main thing we'd like to see is improvement and progress. I just think too much is put on these starters. They are going to crack at some point, and it's usually when it matters most at the end of quarters and games.
Sad but true. They're a well coached team and even despite gigantic flaws they'll make a lot of the right plays at the right times. Meanwhile David Lee doesn't even fucking TRY to play defense, just goes for a foul instead and gives up a dunk in the process. That was truly PATHETIC. I mean Beans has been guilty of horrid weak fouls under the hoop but at least it looks like hes trying to play defense, hes just too much of a moron to either play the defense or not foul. What a pathetic game. You're absolutely right though, "playoffs = nope" is pretty much what I was thinking all night. We've squandered our big home stand and barely scraped by a number of poor teams at home. Its just not happening.
I saw bits and pieces of the game and couldn't watch OT tonight because I "knew" what was coming. Those continuos bad plays and mistakes makes me wonder sometime about the makeup of this team. But I wouldn't trade this team for the Bobs. They're a mature team except for Augustin. They are what you see is what you get and what you get is a borderline playoff team like the team we had with Baron and Jax in 2007. With Ellis/Curry/Lee, the best we can hope to be is the second coming of the Phoenix Suns or today's New York Knicks. With a couple more pieces, we should be able to achieve that and regular playoff appearances. But we have to keep those really horrible mistakes down. I would think better coaching would improve that, but I admit some players can't be helped.
Don't fell so bad, the blazers have tons of injuries and the GM has the pressure to keep a winning season. N.E.P= Northeast Portland, Oregon.
Unforunately the Warriors are losing without the excuse of having any major injuries. Yeah, Curry and Biedrins have some lingering injuries and I'm sure the other guys have nicks and pain, but nothing compared to the Blazers or other teams. We're losing purely on lack of talent, with no interior nor exterior stoppers. Not to mention the last three losses have been at home. The start of the season was somewhat promising which is what makes this recent stretch of losing worse, like our hopes were raised slightly just for a bigger fall. There's not even many things to look forward to in this year's offseason, other than some expiring contracts finally coming off the books, but even those may be useless in light of a revised CBA, which is likely to lower the cap gradually. Plus, this year's expected draft class is on the weak side as well, so losing/tanking this year doesn't amount to much.
Did you guys see the Warriors' Weekly show before the pregame. There was an interview with Fitz and David Lee. When asked about his defense, he said, basically, "You can only play up to your athletic limitations. I'm not the most athletic. You can watch tape of Bill Russell blocking shots all day. But no amount of skill can make up for athletic limitations. When you're in the paint with Dwight Howard, all of that goes out the window. He's going to dunk on you and send you three rows into the stands." Seriously? This guy has already given up, even before tip off? The sad part about this ignorance and mental-weakness by David Lee, is that the exact opposite is true! I mean, yes, if you are severely undersized at your position, you are going to have difficulty. But assuming you are a general decent size for your position, like Lee is, it all comes down to will, desire, consistency, perseverance. Look at the UFC, if you will. Size and strength and athleticism matter, but not nearly as much as technique and mental-toughness. Todd Duffe -- a guy who looks like the Incredible Hulk-- got laid flat by Mike Russow, a fat, goofy looking guy with man boobs who is 10 years older than Duffee. Of course the NBA is different, but the idea is the same. Would Jordan ever say, "oh, I can only do so much on defense, if I'm outmatched physically, I just need to accept it and get out of the way and let the guy dunk?" I mean, this is Horseshit. If someone can find the Warriors Weekly video, post it please. We need a new squad. Blow it up and get some defense and toughness. This is embarrassing.
The Warriors narrowly beat the Bobcats in Charlotte and now they narrowly lost to them at home. Both games it sounds like the Warriors had sizable leads going to the final minutes but quickly lost them. Does this mean we are worse than the Bobcats? If anything I think this team is just about as good as them. But they have been playing better basketball since the coaching change it seems. I don't think this means the team needs to be blown up. That's a bit drastic. When a team does not have a mega superstar it needs production from the bench. Look at teams like the Pistons and Kings when they were good. I believe they consistently had some solid bench production during those seasons. Even in today's NBA, you can look at Portland who doesn't have many stars at all, but they win thanks to very good depth. The Jazz have a lot of players who can play too. With the Warriors it seems like you just have to hope the starters score 100 points or they will not win, or they need to outscore the other team's starters by 20+ points. Each of these things happening in the last three wins for this team. This team's 6th man is Radmanovic. The team's 7th man is Acie Law. I think that tells everything. There is no Bobby Jackson, if you will, on this team's bench. There is no Rudy Fernandez. And at the rate the starters are playing, I can only expect greater fatigue later in the season and much worse basketball and losses than this one. The one thing Nelly could do is find players who will produce. I was hoping he'd be around somewhat to help in that capacity, but I guess not. We decided to go after players like Lin instead.
This losing stretch is killer because the Warriors were close to being a .500 team. I think they won four in-a-row and were four games out about a week ago. I'm not sure about the Warriors lacking talent to get to the playoff level since they have an all-star in Monta Ellis (he should be selected this year) and former one in David Lee. Maybe you can say they don't mesh well together, but I don't think the team has played enough together to say that. I agree that the Warriors need interior defense, but they also need another player, preferably a big body who can go inside and score as well as get to the line. If he can clog the middle and play defense, then so much the better. For example, if we had Amare instead of David Lee, then we would be a lot better to accomplish this and have an inside outside game and someone to go to when the shots aren't falling from outside. A DeMarcus Cousins in the draft would have done this, too. More importantly, they have to take care of the ball better on offense. The Warriors had that sequence against the Bobcats where they got three offensive boards and weren't able to convert because of an errant pass. Or they had a chance to take the winning shot, but never were able to get it off. I'm not sure if its the coaching or players still not playing well with each other. It could be they were tired, but it looked like both teams had sloppy plays and a coach could call a full time out for that. Another sloppy play was Reggie not going to the rack when he had a lane and tried for an extra pass and turnover. These kinds of mistakes keep happening. This is a new team we have, so we have to be patient until they get familiar with each other. I guess you can put some of it on Smart's rotations, too. It's part coaching and part lack of continuity. The trade deadline is less than a month away, so addressing some of our needs could get us someone who can help. Until then, the Warriors have to start putting wins together again. Being eight games down in the loss column to .500 looks insurmountable, so they have to really focus on playing the game and hopefully winning one game at-a-time. The heat must be ratcheted up really high right now for Keith Smart and Larry Riley has to get us some help.
The Warriors give up more assists than any other team in the league. They are dead last, 30th, at 25.0 apg against. The reason why they make opposing guards look like Oscar Robertson is because they get diced up repeatedly on the perimeter. Guards get into the lane with ease. When that happens, of course assists will pile up. Defense gets sucked in, guys get open. Guys get easy penetration, other guys help, and leave guys open. It's just a broken record for GS. Get one stop, but not two. The ball swings a third time, and suddenly there's a WIDE open pass for another layup. Also, because of the way GS plays defense, they get no love for officials. When you're soft all game, gambling for steals instead of bodying up, then you're not going to get any leash in crunch time. A touch foul will get called much more often. When you're Houston, or LA, and you body up all game, you get the leash. This is not a really new team, btw. Curry/Ellis/Beans have been together. Wright and Lee are new, yes. And the bench is somewhat new. But it's over 1/2 season. We weren't saying that being "new" was a problem when they started out 8-2. They looked like they had been playing since highschool. REason being, their schedule was soft (like they are). Now, at home, they look like they have made very little growth. I must admit, I expected more by now. I don't even see .500 at this point, let alone PO, which is frankly impossible now IMO. Blow it up. Keep Curry. Start over. Maybe we can get lucky and rebuild like OKC, lol. I dunno. I guess I understand if you didn't watch the game last night, you might have a different view. But if you actually watch all the games, things become pretty evident. It's not looking good right now.
Like I mentioned above defense will always be an issue with Curry, Monta and Lee as your main guys. Monta seems like the obvious candidate to go IMO since hes got very high value, hes inherently problem causing because hes so small for his position and plays such poor defense, he plays a position that is relatively easy to fill (especially compared to PG and PF). Curry has his issues but hes only 22 and when you consider that he's actually doing well. Nash took a while to be a great player, look at Felton in NY starting to do well, Billups took a while to become a great PG, etc. Lee is also a flawed player but I think he's be better with a big, defensive minded C and a coach that installs a team defense system. We've seen in recent weeks how he can be a 18/10 machine, spread the floor a bit with the jumper, even get role players like DW and Beans easy shots, etc. Get him a front court mate who plays defense, clogs the lane, can catch and finish, etc. and get a coach who can show him how to play team defense. And yeah its definitely an issue that Lee has given up on defense. I think a coach who shows him that if you play team defense you can succeed would help a lot. The facts are that Lee can't guard the Dwights, Amares, Blake Griffins, etc. but a team defense and a team gameplan helps a lot. And someone get him some tape of Kurt Thomas- a guy similarly sized, about 6'9 probably 15 lbs. heavier than Lee though, and probably even less athletic than DLee but hes a great defender despite being a below the rim guy. Look at Chuck Hayes (6'6) and Nick Collison. Lee's not a horrible athlete and hes a pretty smart guy, he really needs to be coached up on defense though.
Well, the season is still fairly young, but the way the warriors play doesn't make me believe they could pull off the sf giants. The warriors are hopeless at times (they can't be completely hopeless if they have a chance to put together a win streak)
I don't think the Warriors need to blow things up. I think this team can be similar to the good Kings teams of about ten years ago. They were not strong defensively but they were successful. They had Bibby/Christie/Peja/Webber/Divac. If the Warriors got Igudoala then perhaps that can make the starting lineup much more similar. But the Warriors would lack their bench with players like Bobby Jackson. Curry/Iggy/DWright/Lee/Udoh. That's not bad.
Yes, that would be night and day, defensively. Remember, Doug Christie was an excellent perimeter defender, and he was 6'6". Vlad wasn't Dwight Howard with blocks, but the guy was 7'1", 260 pounds and pretty intelligent. C-Webb wasn't a flashy defender either, but he was a superstar. He won the rebounding title his first year in Sac, at 13.0 per game. He was tough and had the respect of the opposition and the officials. And Peja, for all the "guard" comparisons he gets, is still 6'10", and that counts for something. But really, that team did okay on the perimeter because of Christie. If you pair Bibby with a 6'3", rail thin guard like Monta, what happens? Who guards Kobe (the way Christie did?) This is why I've ben saying all along to get Iggy. He would definitely change things dramatically, simply because it would stitch up our paper thin perimeter, defensively. So, yes, if that were to happen, I agree, it's workable. But looking at the roster, other than Curry, there's no one I feel is a sure franchise cornerstone. Everyone else can go, IMO, if the right deal comes along. I hope eventually guys like DWright and David Lee prove me otherwise, but until then, I'm sick of watching the league's softest team get diced up, play after play, game after game. It's boring.
Wow I forgot how good Webber was. I had to look at the basketball-reference website. He was a 25 points 10+ rebound 5 assist 2 blocks per game player there. Now how could have the Warriors dumped him? Haha. Yeah he was a superstar. I think the Warriors can and should go toward a Kings style of basketball because they are all good at passing. Lee is strong in that area not unlike Webber. Wasn't that the Princeton style offense Adleman was using? That would be much better than what they are doing now. And yes defensively, I think it's clear that a Smart coached and coordinated defense is not going to work. The Warriors win against teams that are just poor shooting teams, because any team that can shoot a lick can explode against this team. The Warriors solid shooting accuracy is usually their best defense so far this year. Do you think Udoh can be a Divac like player? Nothing superb, but very solid in many areas of the court? Doesn't he have decent handles for a big?
Divac was just so unique. That Kings team was, in some ways, 1-of-a-kind. He was one of the best passing big man in the history of the game. Consider this interesting fact: That's pretty unique company. In 94-95, he had a monster year with 16 PPG/10.4 RPG/4.1 APG/2.2 BPG/50% FG... playing 80 games. He is only 1.4BPG career, but he had several years over 2 blocks per game. With SAC, he was right around 1 BPG. But still, 7'1", 260 pounds, can score, rebound, and pass so well...he was the catalyst for a lot of that ball movement... GS has Beans, so that is quite a different thing. You have to play to your roster strengths, or strengthen your roster to suit your play. Right now, if GS wants to be that kind of a team, they'll need a legit perimeter SG defender, a superstar PF, and big 7-footer who can do everything very well...
Divac was also very durable. I took a quick peek at his stats and it didn't seem like he ever missed more than five games in a season. Maybe smoking is not a horrible thing for you. Jk, wasn't he a smoker? Yeah I'm wondering what we have in Udoh. See if he can play a role more in the mold of Divac. It's hard to say. I'm with Lacob, let's see more Udoh. Udoh is probably a slightly better defender, as a solid shot blocker though he may be a couple inches shorter.
That certainly was a unique Kings team. Perhaps two of the top 5 or 10 big man passers in the history of the NBA and Adelman really had a unique offense that took advantage of them. Also remember Bobby Jackson and a young Hedo Turkoglu off their bench? Just very dynamic and explosive.
Lol hard to get injured when you never jump or sprint. And when you never take any REAL contact. Dude's flopping skills put Ginobili to shame.
Playoffs!?!? Don't talk about...PLAYOFFS??? are you kidding me? playoffs???? Nawww, but seriously...if you guys thought this team was going to the postseason, you are farrrrrr more optimistic than I. And on the flipside, now, I think you're being a little too pessimistic. Those fouls by Lee were absolutely, unforgivably, god-awfully retarded...I do not disagree. But I haven't seen him commit a foul as dumb as those two before. I can't remember the last time I saw a team give up so many and-1's in such a short span. We were lucky they shot so awfully from the line, or we wouldn't have been in it at all. That was probably the worst loss of the season though...especially against Jackson's dumb ass. But our problem isn't that we lack talent, it's that we are either poorly coached or just plain retarded. You would trade our starting 5 for their starting 5??? Nooo wayyyyy. If our team was disciplined and cut out the unforced turnovers and played intelligently on defense and the boards, we would be in damn good shape. If you put the brains of the Bobcats starters into the bodies of the Warriors starters, then you'd have something. We play like idiots, but we are FULL of talent. Can intelligent basketball be taught to these players? Is it beyond their capabilities? I don't know. As far as blowing up the team, I think most people would have always agreed that most of the squad is expendable. Like Lacob said, anybody can go if it improves the team. But we have some good pieces right now. There is no reason to get all gloomy. If you guys were expecting playoffs, you set yourselves up for massive disappointment. Also, I've been as down on Curry as anyone lately. For someone who's supposed to be a smart player, he still makes a lot of stupid plays. Curry only averages .3 more assists per game than Monta...that's essentially equal! Monta averages 7 more points a game than Curry at only 1% worse from the field. They average the same number of boards. I realize that the stats don't tell the whole story, but still, no reason to make Steph exempt from criticism.
