The Fallacy that has to be laid to rest

[Sandy333]

All our players have declined except for marginal improvements from Kuminga and Moody who haven't improved enough to start.

[Chupchup]

i think it is time for steph to make up his mind. he is clearly frustrated, he wants to compete. but you can't win with this old cats. if he realizes it, than ask him what he wants to do? ride into the sunset, try a reshuffle or to be traded to a contender. Than act accordingly.
if he wants change, fire kerr, try to trade klay and dray, one of wiggs or kuminga and see what you can get.

what we are doing right now is wasting time for everybody.

and i don't know, who thinks we are one piece away to be a contender is dreaming, imo.

i remember last year people stating that otto and gp2 were the only missing part. i guess this year is only otto then

The Warriors w/o KD have always need some luck to thread that needle to win a championship. This is expected I guess for a jump shooting team. If our 3's aren't falling, then we're going to lose that day.

In 2022, if Dallas did not beat Phoenix, I don't believe we would have beaten Phoenix ourselves. I don't think we matched up well to them.

In 2023, we played Lakers really well. IF Poole had played like he played in 2022, I think we would have had a much better shot at beating Lakers. A stretch 4 like Porter would have helped as well since Porter can actually dribble, pass, and shoot decently.
After that we matched up better against Nuggets with Draymond at the 5. If Poole plays well in that match up, we would have a good shot against Nuggets. The same could be said if we faced the Heat. Again thread that needle but I don't think it was impossible. It wasn't like Lakers blew us out 4-0.

Enter 2024, we played OKC very very well. We played Nuggets very very well. We played Sac very well. I think we played Minny really well too. This is with Klay and Wiggins not really playing well in the beginning of the season too. Klay has bounced back a little. We're still waiting on a more consistent Wiggins. CP3 is out now. GP2 is out. Draymond is back. We still have a shot. With that being said, yeah we should be open to some trades. I'm pretty sure Lacob doesn't like us having the highest salary in the league and us not being in the hunt.

[SinceGatlingWasARookie]

I keep seeing people saying that you cannot play Looney and Draymond together or you need a guy to space the floor when Curry and Klay are on the court.

To this I say: BS!

This team won a championship with its best lineup being one with both Looney and Draymond in it. This team was known for its Death Lineup that had who again as the third player to space the floor? Barnes? Iguodala? To try to appease the people saying the team needs more spacing Kerr has been playing three guard lineups and a poor defensive center in Saric. What we've seen as a consequence is a lot of losing.

Can the people who say this team needs more spacing even when Steph and Klay are on the floor give it a rest already? What this team needs is more defense and better screen setting.

Last year Looney Dray Wiggins Klay Curry had the best plus minus of any starting 5 in the league. So our starting 5 got off to a bad start this year but how could they be so much worse than last year?

People are too much in love with 3 point shooting centers. The center’s number 1 and 2 jobs are rim protection and rebounding.

When you have Curry and good Klay screens at the 3 point line create as much floor spacing as a 3 point shooting center does because 2 defenders must come out to the 3 point line to defend the screen. Looney and Draymond are good screen setters. Looney offensive rebounds. Draymond is a great passer and Looney is a good passer.

Looney and Draymond do not need to be good scorers if the team offense is working well. Want more scoring from center; Trayce inside or Saric outside but if Curry and Klay are playing well a Looney screen is as good as a Saric shot.

We want the ball in Draymond’s hands while Curry and Klay use Looney screens.

[ILOVEIT]

None of this makes a difference if you concede that Wiggins, Klay, Looney are nowhere near even last year's ability.

So...I agree that prime Curry, Klay, Wiggins (Durant, Poole) could win with prime Draymond and Looney. That's not reality anymore.

[ShayDee]

Steph is almost 36, people need to let that reality set in really quick, he is not going to carry this team anymore. 2 none scorers next to Steph will never work anymore, unless someone from the other 2 starters is a 30ppg scorer. It just will not. Looney worked with Draymond when OKC was trash, Minny was in the lottery, Zion was fat and injured, Sac couldn't get into the playoffs.

Now those teams are good and Looney is no longer effective, because these teams have multiple people on their roster that can get a bucket and this team can no longer overhelp. The FO did not have a future insight of these things happening so this team is paying the price of not having a good big on the roster

Screens and whatnot don't mean **** when every team has defenders that can fight over them and rim protectors that can prevent drives from this unathletic team and when Steph and Klay don't have the legs to get separation any longer on those screens. Asking 36 year old Steph to turn back time for 82 games a year is just not realistic, he needs production from everyone else on the roster, a scoring big man that can rebound will help the most because of frees up the paint and helps so much with spacing

Also Steph can no longer have another negative defender next to him, he is not even putting in any effort on defense and therefore the overall team defense has tanked this year. Klay and Looney need to be getting considerably less minutes if this team wants to succeed around Steph and Saric also needs to play less with Steph even if he provides some spacing I'm not sure the defensive deficiencies are worth it

[superunknown]

klay is cooked on D. let's start from here. until 2019 he was the guy taking defensive pressure off steph so he could cook on offense, and steph back then was years younger. now that steph is 36, the role are reversed and the first one to be hidden on D is him. he and steph cannot longer shared the court together defensively, it's evident, only some nostalgic fans and that impostor of a coach don't see it. he needs to go, trade him when you can still get something in return for his expiring 40+M dollars contract.
same with paul. he hasn't played bad in warriors uniform, actually some can argue he's been the best player on the team this year after steph. but like klay, he cannot share the court defensively with steph at this stage in his career so he needs to go as well. package his 30M contract with kuminga or whoever and see who you can get in return.
basically, you can only play one of steph, klay and paul in the backcourt as you can only "hide" one guy at a time. and the choice is obvious.
perimeter D has been atrocious, the worst in the last 10 years, it's a problem of personel and you need to change the personel. klay and paul have to go asap. they are too much of a defensive liability to overcome when you also have a 36years old steph in the backcourt.
that should be the starting point of any consideration moving forward.

[jozef]

Perimeter defense is usually (with an exception of few elite on-ball defenders - GP2, Smart, Holiday...) a byproduct of inside defense. If there two or three players who can provide a rim protection then perimeter defenders can stay close to perimeter. But if they had to sag off to help inside then perimeter defense will be weaker.