Starting Five

[Twinkie defense]

I know there have been a lot of proponents (esp. Sleepy) for sticking with the "best five" to start.

Considering he's the Warriors "2nd best player," I wonder if this would ever happen, but I'm starting to wonder if maybe Jackson should sit to start a couple games. He's looked pretty bad out there, and his comments after the loss to Minny did not show any concern or passion about the loss.

Barnes has had a nice streak going lately (except for the DNP-porn), maybe it's time to plug him in to start instead of Jackson for a couple games. Or maybe move Al over to the three and start Wright at the 4, where playing at home, against some of the lesser teams in the League, he's got a better chance to avoid and work out the kinks without it coming back to burn the team.

Nellie has said Jackson is so important to the team in many ways that, even when he's not shooting straight, he feels the need to keep him in there. So maybe it's a longshot that Jackson would sit to start. And I'd have to wonder if we'd start to see the bad side of Jack if he's "benched." But Nellie sounded genuinely po'd at the Minny loss, so I would expect that he'd try to do something different, change things up, in order to get that bad taste out of his mouth.

Does the "start the fab five" still insist on starting Jack?

[rcs15]

40-17 when both Baron and Jax start together...He's not the problem.

You want to bench anyone, bench Al. The guy has one good game out of every 3 or 4. If he is not making his 3's he is useless.

[ILOVEIT]

Well...here is a point as well....

Jackson is really the only other guy besides Baron that can run the offense....He creates...he causes problems on the post for the other team...runs the pick and roll well with AB...

So why not start AL at SF....and have Jackson come off the bench to spell Baron a little earlier..for example.

Then we can play a more legit sized player like AB at PF......and the bench automatically become deeper and more affective.

Bigger starting five....better bench....

[mistatwo mayn]

Jackson's comments after the game were fine; that was a quick "barrier" he put up. Mental block if you will.

Harrington's comments :LOL: were like he hit the canvas and got back up.

[bballguy50]

So why not start AL at SF....and have Jackson come off the bench to spell Baron a little earlier..for example.

Then we can play a more legit sized player like AB at PF......and the bench automatically become deeper and more affective.

Bigger starting five....better bench....

I like the idea of a bigger starting five. But you can't just make Jax a 6th man.

Monta instead. Quickness and energy off the bench.

Its impossible that Nellie would start anyone but Beans at C right now - certainly not POB or Kosta.

But yeah, right now is high time to experiment before we bring on the homestretch.

[FNQ]

@ the premise...

Bench one of our starting 5 for who? The D-Leaguers? Waiver wire? Pietrus? Croshere?

Right now is about the time a team with any semblence of an FO would be debating whether or not to start their young players... this franchise gets to choose between 3 players not playing well consistently at all (Beans/Al/Jax) and a who's who of 10th-12th men and undeveloped rookies...

In retrospect, I wish we'd have a young player or two who was ready to contribute. Maybe we can re-hash the start Buke thread... I need a laugh right now

[ajbry]

Jack hasn't been benched in, well, a long ass time. As poorly as he's been playing it's still difficult for the team to sustain any success if he's not on the floor for 40 MPG (and obviously the same for Baron).

Nellie simply never would anyway. You can do it with Harrington, you can with Dre, and you can with Monta, but you can't do it with a slumping captain averaging 20/4.5/4.

Like I keep saying, he's going to snap out of it whenever he snaps out of it. There's no rhyme or reason to his recent struggles but this is as bad as it will get. Come March, April, and May he'll assuredly be in top form.

[floppymoose]

You want to bench anyone, bench Al. The guy has one good game out of every 3 or 4. If he is not making his 3's he is useless.

I'd have to disagree big time. Al is doing the dirty work inside. He is doing a lot of stuff defensively inside that compliments the team very well. He initiates a lot of the opponent turnovers with his harrassment of the ball. He positions himself very well to maximize the ease of everyone's rotations. And he boxes out beautifully and lets his teammates scoop up the easy board. He is the anti-Troy. He doesn't put up big stats but does what we need. And his +- since joining the team agree.

He's a bit like Cliff Robinson was, only better (than when Cliffy was a Warrior).

[Mylie10]

40-17 when Baron and Jax start together!

Why would you even think of changing that?

Beans is fine.

We just need to either consistantly play Wright, Obee, or dare I even say Kosta, more so that come playoff time they might be able to contribute.

But let's be honest. Nellie shortens things even more when it comes to the playoffs.

Barring a trade, we should just get a little bigger at times. It's really nice to see us be competative down low when we have a couple of long bodies out there. They don't hurt nearly as bad as Nellie would like to believe.

Maybe Nellie needs to sit for a while, let's bench him.

[old rem]

I don't think the idea here is to so much demote anyone as it is to get more guys involved at a higher level and conserver some energy for the second half. I WANT to see a 12 man TEAM..not a 5 man team and 3 "other guys". I want Wright-Azu-POB....on the floor -adapting - learniong,displaying what they can do. I want the rotation regulars able to go into sprint mode in the 4th qtr because they have not been worn down playing too much. I don't want a "Starting 5" that's gonna play 35-45 min each..always...no matter what. I want us to get all we can from every player we have.

Baseball teams give their stars a day off...mix up the lineup often. You'd think in basketball that's even more logical. If the underused guys can seemlessly blend with the regulars and we can have a cycle where we look to give a regular light duty in the first half...a different guy game to game...it's a plus.

Yeah..always wanted to see Wright + Harrington get some real time as the F duo. I don't care which you call a PF...we'd be thinking that with Al the bulkier guy--he's usually matching a PF. However-on offense-Al often would be the perimeter guy and Wright would be taking on a SF inside--which can be great for us.

Jax....Barnes...they really have somewhat similar stuff. You get some point F..some Hot/Cold perimeter shooting,a bit of nasty and a couple dozen tatoos either way. We SHOULD be looking at Azubuike as if he's the lotto pick who HAS been on track. 20 pt games...one over 30...games of 7-8 rbd,D that is a bit inconsistant-but for a virtual rookie--not bad. We need Azu to rotate in more so Monta can play PG more and Baron isn't playing 40+ unnessicerily

If we have Biedrins injured in the playoffs...or in a late run when Utah or the Rox challenge...we'd be SO screwed. Picture Cro posing as a CENTER for 35 min... We give POB/Kosta "freshman orientation" + Final exams simultaneously? That can't be well planned. This is where we VERY MUCH need to integrate he young guns into the mix so that IF we do have to rely on them later,we have more than rusty kids with stagefright.

Yeah....you'd think that just once or twice we might play Biedrins at PF a few min and have POB/Kosta in the game too...if only for curiosity sake. Just about any other coach takes a look at that long ago. Nellie? He'd rather coach in his underwear than play 2 7 footers at once.

[turk3d]

Kamikaze article in today's Merc:

http://www.mercurynews.com/warriors/ci_ ... ck_check=1
(actual article)

Chris Mullin Q & A: Not planning big changes for the Warriors, talking about Brandan WrightBy Tim Kawakami
Wednesday, January 23rd, 2008 at 8:58 am in NBA, Warriors.

This is a tag-along to my column for this morning

[turk3d]

-= original quote snipped =-



I'd have to disagree big time. Al is doing the dirty work inside. He is doing a lot of stuff defensively inside that compliments the team very well. He initiates a lot of the opponent turnovers with his harrassment of the ball. He positions himself very well to maximize the ease of everyone's rotations. And he boxes out beautifully and lets his teammates scoop up the easy board. He is the anti-Troy. He doesn't put up big stats but does what we need. And his +- since joining the team agree.

He's a bit like Cliff Robinson was, only better (than when Cliffy was a Warrior).

+ 1.

Of course, he has his occasional stinker (as does everyone else on this very flawed team) but I would say it's more like one out of 4 bad games, rather than 3 out of 4 and the percentages are much worse with guys like Jack and maybe even Baron (although I agree Baron does a lot more for us when he has a good game than Al). Al is definitely not the problem. I realize Barnes has had two consecutive goods (maybe the only 2 he's had all year) but are you really trying to say he should start over Al? No way. I don't care how many minutes a game you want to play Barnes (I really do but just not for the purposes of this discussion) but I want him coming off of the bench, not Al. Al needs to remain in our starting lineup until we get someone who's better than him.

[Sleepy51]

If Jack is playing bad because of his injury he should be on IR. Resting and recovering, not even comming off the bench. Jack's current condition has little to do with constantly jerking Beans and Al out of the starting lineup.

Apples and cabbages.

[Sleepy51]

I don't think the idea here is to so much demote anyone as it is to get more guys involved at a higher level and conserver some energy for the second half. I WANT to see a 12 man TEAM

Who plays 12 guys?

[Mylie10]

Nice Mullin read.

Confirming my belief that FT's missed at the wrong time are what cost us against Utah.

Adding a big guy for big guys sake won't work.


To me if we can somehow pull either Artest or Sam Cassell, they'd be the type of guy that it's worth using the trade exception on.

[Sleepy51]

So which one of you bufoons is actually Kawakami?

I swear he lurks here and rips off our discussion for his columns. It would be nice if he would credit the board once in a while.

[Twinkie defense]

Sleepy where have you been?!

It will be interesting to see who Nellie puts in to start tonight... based on past experience, if he doesn't shake things up after the last stinker, I guess he's gone over to the other side.

[Sleepy51]

Sleepy where have you been?!

It will be interesting to see who Nellie puts in to start tonight... based on past experience, if he doesn't shake things up after the last stinker, I guess he's gone over to the other side.

So he's going to be consistently inconsistent by becomming more consistent . . . inconsistently?

I need a drink!

[Twinkie defense]

Jackson's got a reprieve... Barnes in to start for Al.

[Sleepy51]

Our starters are
Baron
Monta
Jack
Al
Beans

They all play better as a unit. Thats how a team works. The only decent team ball minutes of the game were when we played them together. We need to stop screwing with it.