Hollywood Baron on TNT: Nets [18-23] @ GSW [25-18]. THU 7:30

[old rem]

I still don't see how you guys know for sure Wright, POB and Belli will be solid contributors. Sounds like fans just overhyping their young talent.

A- We have an uncanny ineptitude at drafting and our last 5 picks...combined...are about = to a good rd 2

B- We have an inept staff of assistants good only at playing cards on road trips and fetching coffee for Nellie at practice. They don't improve anyone..they screw them up,they take blue chip talent and turn them into scrubs who still have the stagefright of first-day-on-the-job newbies after sitting and rusting for a couple of months or years

C- For whatever reason....Nellie neglects,ignores,wastes the players we draft. Strangely.....The Mbenga...never seen in Dallas-played. Azu + Watson play as undrafteds who arrive after a D league run. We played THud....the last place team paid him to go away. Our last 3 lott
o guys....too irrelevant to be allowed to emerge? We still have to guess at what POB/Wright MIGHT do if just allowed rotation minutes for 2 weeks.

D- All of the above



A is unlikely. We are not "reaching" we mostly drafted guys that other teams were seeing as in that range. Belli may have been a bit of a reach-yet he was the rook who was the summer star,so I guess he stacked up okay. Wright was nCAA #1 in FG% on perennial top team N Carolina.....as a FRESHMAN. The kid has speed-wingspan-handles...needs more beef but we use smaller guys at F. Wright leading college ball in FG% while scoring well at UNC says he's efficient,a shot selection guy.

Seattle-meanwhile-has played Durant at G so they can get him NBA experiance sooner.

We trail the Blazers who have...and played...a lot of draft picks. The Lakers big surge is payoff for USING Bynum and letting him emerge (with help from a Big Men coach)

Didn't Amare go from HS to regular for the Suns?

EVERYWHERE the draftees of the last 2-3 years have important roles..good minutes...good numbers. Here? We got LUCKY to get Monta,we got LUCKY he had more game than expected,we got LUCKY Monty played him enough that he was already a rotation guy when Nellie arrived.

A,B or C?

We can't really SEE the asst coach's work much.....especially with the young guys on the shelf. You'd think we'd at least have SOME guy who's competent by now...
The ability to play in a REAL GAME SITUATION only emerges when a player gets a little experiance playing in a REAL GAME SITUATION. 50 seconds and a hook....not much learning experiance. Most of us needed more time to learn to tie our shoes as kids...

The logical conclusion here....C..Nellie obstructs and delays the progress/contribution of our draft picks,yet strangely seems willing to use an "outsider" fresh of the bus or waiver wire-even guys with minimal NBA resume.

Why?

That's what's so hard to figure.

[old rem]

All the same....splendid games for Baron + Monta and a great surge by Al H.

Utah is right on our heels and it does not look like the Hornets or Blazers are about to meltdown.

Too bad we ain't in the East.....

[Mylie10]

Rem, I know you know this but:

It's as simple as......Nellie is 67 and has only a year or 2 left. He won't put his small window be affected by rookies who just aren't quite ready.

While we would develope them and hope they contribute by years end. He's of the belief that they learn on their own time and not under his watch. His watch translates to THE GAMES.

I couldn't agree more with you about the Russell Turners of the world. We need real coaches like Sydney who actually make a tangible difference.

Where's Jack Sikma when you need him?

[turk3d]

CWebb (Hofer Power Forward, one of the best ever) = Big man player/coach. Who cares how many minutes he actually plays for us especially if he's real cheap? They could even fire useless Russell Turner to make up the difference in salary if they have to in order to pay Webber more than the minimum if they want.

[NuWarriors]

If we DO sign Webber... which I'm against because I still hold a grudge... let's hope he's gotten over his fear of earthquakes and bridges.

[Souvlaki]

I think what Sleepy says about Nelly's conspiracy to get another player in a trade is pretty interesting, but it doesn't really hold water. If you are really trying to make a trade, you want to boost the value of your pieces. By not playing our promising rookies we are only degrading their value and removing or weakening our trading options.

The only scenario that would make sense under the trade conspiracy theory, is that Nelly is boosting the value of one of the guys he is playing a lot, Harrington perhaps? But the thing is that we are winning a bunch of games with these guys. You remove a guy like Harrington and what does that do to the chemistry?

The comparisons between Wright and Beidrins do not hold water. We were a bad team back when Andris was a rookie. If Wright was the draft pick back then, he'd be getting the playing time. During the regular season it's the objective to win as many games as possible and then to a far lesser extent get the younger players some minutes. I used to sound just like LF and 510 and slam the organization relentlessly for not playing our young guys. But all that has changed now that we are winning. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

[Souvlaki]

2 years ago I would've never guessed that we'd be 26-18 and people would be whining about how we are winning. Just unbelievable.

[GSWhoopfan]

2 years ago I would've never guessed that we'd be 26-18 and people would be whining about how we are winning. Just unbelievable.

i agree. seems like everyone would rather be in tank mode than playoff push mode.

we are playing great ball. i dont see how anyone could be pessimistic. we are exceeding expectations.

Monta played amazing and Richard Jefferson is an allstar and the best player on the Nets. Kidd displayed yesterday why hes shooting nasty this season. Hes taking low % shots. I was expecting a triple double from Kidd, not Baron.

[BooRadley]

That's what I was trying to say Souvlaki. You can't make the playoffs for 3-4 years straight, pull off an upset and develop young talent at the same time to make the playoffs for another 3-4 years after our current starting line up disbands. People are expecting the world.

We don't have that franchise mainstay like Tim Duncan to get us through everything.

[Souvlaki]

GSWhoopfan, the thing is we aren't playing great fundamental basketball and that irks some purists. Did you notice how the announcers last night hardly said anything about the Warriors in comparison to the Nets. We are a hard team to figure out. I mean, it's hard to figure out how we win games. Barkley was actually right when he said our shot selection is the worst in the NBA. We do so many things wrong and still win. This kind of bugged me at first, but I'm learning to just go along for the ride as long as we keep winning, because we are seeing something pretty unique.

[turk3d]

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i agree. seems like everyone would rather be in tank mode than playoff push mode.

we are playing great ball. i dont see how anyone could be pessimistic. we are exceeding expectations.

Monta played amazing and Richard Jefferson is an allstar and the best player on the Nets. Kidd displayed yesterday why hes shooting nasty this season. Hes taking low % shots. I was expecting a triple double from Kidd, not Baron.

What's even interesting to me (in addition to Monta's 39, 13-18 fg, 13-14 ft) is that if you didn't notice, he was playing man-to-man against Kidd practically the whole game. Although Kidd did get his 12 assists and 8 boards, he only shot 2-10 (6 points) and that includes his wide open 3 in the 4th quarter (because was helping out with Net mismatches as he did a lot this game) and furthermore, it was Kidd who was the one who one on the tail end of most of Monta's drives as well as his jumpers.

Very encouraging to see Monta have this kind of game and on a national level as well. Future allstar potential most definitely. This is not in anyway to take away from Kidd and his greatness, it's just to demonstrate the ability Monta has once again shown us (and the rest of the NBA).

[Souvlaki]

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Very encouraging to see Monta have this kind of game and on a national level as well. Future allstar potential most definitely.

Why do people fooking care about the meeaningless fooking all-star game??? All that does is make us overpay for our players.

[turk3d]

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Why do people fooking care about the meeaningless fooking all-star game??? All that does is make us overpay for our players.

Don't care about the game, but just indicative of what level a player has gotten to. I guess with the screwed up fan voting it doesn't mean that much any more, so I suppose you're right in dissing it.

[Thugleavy34]

GSWhoopfan, the thing is we aren't playing great fundamental basketball and that irks some purists. Did you notice how the announcers last night hardly said anything about the Warriors in comparison to the Nets. We are a hard team to figure out. I mean, it's hard to figure out how we win games. Barkley was actually right when he said our shot selection is the worst in the NBA. We do so many things wrong and still win. This kind of bugged me at first, but I'm learning to just go along for the ride as long as we keep winning, because we are seeing something pretty unique.

what we are seeing is an abundance of confidence. at any given moment we aren't afraid to shoot. at any given moment we might score---whether we do or don't usually depends on US rather than the D. it is ridiculously hard to stop. and during crunch time when we need a hard basket our chances of making a shot are higher because we've been jacking em up all game long. our guys are always warm out there because our games are essentially like warm-ups. we shoot and shoot without hesitation and pretty soon we are like 3 pt. shooting robots that have eliminated the human tendency to shoot with doubt and fear when it comes time to nail that big shot. none of this would work...if it wasn't for the insanely low amounts of turnovers. we do so well at not throwing the ball away. like it or not, chucking 3's IS our halfcourt basketball. for a fast break team i'll take it because we can get a good look whenever we want.

[Chris Porter's Hair]

So this is starting to touch upon something I've been pondering lately. I'm sure we aren't playing "right", but we are playing fun, and it is working pretty well, so I'm not sure how bent out of shape I am really going to get.

We shoot a lot of 3's. Some of them seem pretty stupid. The nice thing about 3's is when you make them, you get 3 points instead of 2. That is a pretty big modifier. I've been meaning to do this math anyway; let's see how it works out.

It looks like as of right now, the Warriors are shooting... wow. 49.9% on 2's. That's higher than I might have guessed, but I expect it reflects all our fast break points and so on. They always quote how well the Warriors are ranked on points in the paint, and that is despite our spending so much time shooting 3's. I guess when we take a 2, it is a good one. We're shooting 37.3% on 3's. So even though we are shooting quite well on 2's, it turns out that for every 2 we shoot we can expect .998 points, and for every 3 we shoot we can expect 1.119 points. So even with our seemingly reckless 3's and scoring well on 2's, we're actually being more efficient shooting 3's.

My hunch has always been that if you did this math for most teams, it would probably work out this way, however. Even if your team shoots a miserable 30% on 3's, if you replace all those shots with 2's, you need to make at least 45% of those to break even. So why don't more teams just huck 3's like crazy? A few reasons come to mind.
- You're not likely to get to the free throw line for "bonus points" if all you do is shoot 3's. Earlier in the year when we were so crappy at our free throws, this was probably less important. Now it is probably an interesting factor.
- My guess says you are less likely to get offensive rebounds. This again is not a strong suit of ours anyway.
- You might or might not tire out faster. More work taking the shot, but less banging and not running as far. No idea how this factors into things.

My hunch, bottom line, is that while it isn't right for every team, there are probably other teams that could benefit from playing the way we do, but they don't do it because you aren't supposed to.

[Twinkie defense]

I really enjoyed the game last night but am also getting a little worried about the team.

The 0-6 start didn't phase me at all, and then the Warriors went on a run, as expected, and proved that worrying about the start was a waste of time.

When floppy was saying Baron was hobbled, Warriors were still gutting out some nice wins, and I wasn't worried.

But then the losses to Indiana and Minnesota came, one not long after the other. Instead of close losses to the good teams, Warriors have gotten whipped by Dallas, New Orleans, and Portland. And some of the wins against the bad teams have been closer than I'd like.

Warriors are 7-5 in January. Still a good winning percentage but not what they had been putting up during the post 0-6 stretch.

Seems to me the Warriors are struggling, slumping a little right now. That 22-0 run last night was something we haven't seen as much of lately. Let's hope it's just a periodic lull, and the Warriors are going to get red hot again soon.

[Twinkie defense]

It looks like as of right now, the Warriors are shooting... wow. 49.9% on 2's. That's higher than I might have guessed, but I expect it reflects all our fast break points and so on. They always quote how well the Warriors are ranked on points in the paint, and that is despite our spending so much time shooting 3's. I guess when we take a 2, it is a good one. We're shooting 37.3% on 3's. So even though we are shooting quite well on 2's, it turns out that for every 2 we shoot we can expect .998 points, and for every 3 we shoot we can expect 1.119 points. So even with our seemingly reckless 3's and scoring well on 2's, we're actually being more efficient shooting 3's.

What an enlightening way to look at it.

Also, when Warriors are shooting threes, it forces the defense to come out and guard the perimeter, which in turn opens up the lanes for Baron and Monta to drive.

My hunch has always been that if you did this math for most teams, it would probably work out this way, however... So why don't more teams just huck 3's like crazy?

One reason is the Warriors are uniquely constructed in terms of the sheer number of guys you at least feel okay about shooting from the arc.

My hunch, bottom line, is that while it isn't right for every team, there are probably other teams that could benefit from playing the way we do, but they don't do it because you aren't supposed to.

That's a good point. Most coaches in the League do the expected, while Nellie is unparalleled at thinking outside of the box and taking advantage of opportunities that many coaches would not even consider. Unfortunately for "most coaches," just running your guys against theirs and let the better team win means quite often it's the other team that wins.

[ILOVEIT]

The good news is the Warriors can play bad basketbal for 3 quarters and still beat a bad team.

The bad news is that Sac crushed the Nets....In fact most teams had been doing so.

So winning by a couple of points...at home...after losing the exact same way against the Wolves....is not a great win IMO. Nets only had to make one three and we lose last night.

Harrington made some shots late. But let's not forget how pathetic he was...the whole fricken team was...in defending a very bad shooting team.

Watching skinny 6'9" guys set up on the offensive boards and feast is disgusting when we've all been watching that for three years.

PROOF that the Warriors have the BEST backcourt in the league is that they win DESPITE being crushed every night in rebounds.

[GSWhoopfan]

the Warriors play with uncertainty. and thats what has led to our winning record. you dont know how to defend us because our players dont even know what they are going to do. this is Don Nelson at his finest. keep the opposition guessing. the only thing that is certain with the warriors is we are going to run and get outrebounded. but our shot selection is a mystery. the way to solve it is to mimic our play. teams dont want to be in a back and forth fast paced game with us because we are conditioned for that style.

Nellie gives his players freedom. Nellie trusts his players. Our players hustle and work hard. This swagger and attitude has evolved to a Golden State Warrior culture.

[ILOVEIT]

By the way...regarding overhyping our young talent?

We don't KNOW how good they might be. THAT's the point. We don't know how good or bad Wright or Marco will be because Nelson won't let them play for more that 3 minutes.

Finally...last night Harrington was sucking and I thought...whoohoo..Marco...Yet he was only there to foul.

By the way...what the heck happened to CJ Watson's minutes last night.