Sunday, March 6, 2011

Golden State Warriors: In limbo


Alright so from my previous post you guys can tell I'm a big Jeremy Lin fan, so this past NBA season I bought NBA league pass just so I could follow his NBA development. I've watched almost every Golden State Warrior game this season along with reading Golden State message boards to try and find people's opinion on Lin. During this time I've grown some type of interest to the Warriors basketball team. Not the kind of the interest in which I hope they win, but more of an interest of how Warrior basketball fans perceive the team and just following how the team functions.

First things first, this is really not a good team. But yet the way they talk about this team on CSN BayArea especially that guy Bob Fitzgerald, you'd think this team is a few players away from being a playoff team or something. But I think now the stark reality is starting set in on this team and that "suck" mentality is starting to show.

Joe Lacob, the new Golden State owner, had better blow this team up quickly if he wants the Warriors to be competing for playoff positions a few years down the stretch. I'll give a quick note on some people

Keith "Smart"
It seems like the general consensus on the message boards and media is that this guy sucks and can't coach at all. When I first started watching Warriors games I thought Smart was doing ok however my opinion of him completely changed as the season wore on. I realized that Monta Ellis was leading the league in minutes per game. That's right, more minutes than Kobe, Lebron, Wade, Durant, Rose, (insert player better than Ellis). What really confused me is that Keith Smart keeps complaining that his team has no bench, but yet he plays his starters 40+ minutes every game. The reason you have no bench is because you never play your bench! Every other NBA team I can think of has a regular rotation in which the second unit can develop some type of chemistry together over the course of the season. However with the way Keith Smart coaches he basically just throws players in when he feels like it and doesn't really have any sort of consistency in his rotations. For example against the 76ers, "Smart" thought it was a good idea to put Vladamir Radmanovic at the 5 while they were getting killed by dribble penetration. I don't know what gut feeling tells you to do that. Anyway this guy can't complain about not having a bench since he never let a second unit really gel. Before the All-Star break the Warriors were playing their best basketball of the season, you know why? Because Smart was finally using the bench! Guys like Lin, Wright, Bell, Udoh were all contributing and getting meaningful minutes. But what happens after the break, Acie Law comes back and Smart thinks it's a good idea to throw him in there and give him 20-30 mpg while not giving anything to Lin and Bell and severely reducing Udoh's minutes for Vlad's. So how's that working out for you "Smart"? Also another thing I can't stand about this guy is his double standards for coaching players. He yells at Stephen Curry for not playing defense but then when Monta Ellis is letting guys drive by him like a turn style not one word comes out from him except comparing Ellis to Hercules. This is why this defense sucks, there's absolutely no accountability for defense as long as you score. Even though Acie Law was getting torched last night on the defensive end he made some offensive plays in the 4th quarter now all of a sudden he's getting critical minutes. This defense is probably still the worst in the league despite the numbers. I can go on and on about how bad Keith Smart is but I'll end it here before I write a paper. Bottom line, this guy needs to get canned, if Keith Smart is in the future of the Golden State Warriors expect mediocrity for years to come.

Monta Ellis
OMG this guy is like top 10 in the league in scoring, he needs to be the guy the Warriors build around! Yeah only if the league changed the rules so your not allowed to play any defense. The Warriors would be NBA champs every season with Ellis as the MVP. This guy in my mind is what you would call a "Team Killer". The entire team lives and dies on whether Ellis has a good game or not. This happens because Smart just gives him the ball and says make something happen. That or Ellis hogs the ball and basically just either A) Drive to the basket B) Drive pull-up jumper C) Drive and kick where all his teammates are just waiting if he kicks it to him. Nobody moving without the ball, just standing to see if he passes them the ball. So when Ellis is hot the offense and him look great. But when he's not he basically just shoots the team right out of the game. When your entire team's success is dependent on one player you'll never be able to win consistently throughout an NBA season (Look at Kobe pre-Gasol, whose in another dimension than Ellis) It's not just me that has this opinion other GMs across the league don't view Ellis as a star either. If I were Lacob this would be the first thing I would do this off season to build a TEAM, get rid of Ellis.

Stephen Curry
This guy is a great shooter...... that's about all I can say about him. Oh wait I also forgot that sometimes he'll make a nice ally-oop pass, can't forget about that. But seriously I don't really see what all the fuss is about this guy. It seems to me that the fans/media think that this guy is a franchise point guard. I just don't see it. He is a very similar player to Monta Ellis but to a lesser extent. I wouldn't call him a team killer but he certainly hurts the team more than he helps them. For every 3 pointer/jumpshot he makes in a game he already made 1 or 2 ridiculously dumb turnover or foul. Also he may be the worst point guard in the NBA in terms of defense. He tries at least compared to Monta Ellis, who I don't think he even cares, but this guy CANNOT guard anybody. He is a very streaky player and like Ellis if he's not shooting the ball well, he really can't help the team in any other way. But his development has been stunted my Smart's terribly erratic rotations so I'll give him a break on this.

Jeremy Lin
It's been a real up and down season for him, and I admire the fact that he was able keep his confidence despite the constant changes in his environment. When the season first started he looked pretty good to me, however he started regressing when he went back to his shooting guard mentality. In one of his interviews he stated this exact thought, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kJIXiSvR8g. I really thought the D-League was a true blessing for him to learn how to be a point guard, and Eric Musselman really prepared him a lot for the NBA. After being recalled for the third time he truly looks like an NBA point guard now. His defense is already, in my opinion, one of the best in the league for point guards. I may seem a bit delusional but from what I've seen so far Jeremy has got the potential to be a solid starting point guard in the NBA.

Golden State finished the season strong beating teams like the Mavericks, Lakers, Trail Blazers, however in my opinion these wins were pretty hallow. Most playoff teams toward the end of the regular season tend to play a bit relaxed even if there's seedings to play for. For the Warriors sake I hope Lacob doesn't view these wins as hope for the future and that nothing radical needs to happen. Too often what happens in sports is that the ability of a team is looked at from a bias sample size rather than the season as a whole. Also I'm not really a strong believer that finishing the season strong means success in the next season.

This may sound drastic but if the Golden State Warriors want to win Ellis needs to be the first one to go.


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