POB working out with Clifford Ray

[Chris Cohan]

Addendum:

The favorite rant from the online plants (documented) is to list other young players getting tough love from teams, in ISOLATED cases, and pose this supposed equivalence as some form of justification. But no team wastes talent under relations as tense as the Warriors'. NO ONE. There's simply no contest. The draft is a crap shoot but we've squandered pick after pick after pick and blamed predecessional decision-making for 15 years. Bear in mind, Garry St. Jean was a Don Nelson hand-picked assistant coach and executive presence before he was Satan Incarnate for the casual semi-serious team observer. Others are on top of the severe Riley parallels to St. Jean.

Players are publicly being presented as not wanting to play for the Warriors (Stoudemire) and concerns about Curry's interest in the Warriors continue to be voiced nationally and in the forums. The Ellis issue. Arenas says he wasn't pleased with Cohan's approach when they met to talk money years ago, before Chris Mullin was available for the blame game, though there are new rules on second rounders b/c extenuating circumstances influenced Arenas' departure heavily on the bottom line.

The Warriors have a failed front office cultural model. It's documented, it's decided, and Nelson is the current band-aid free pass for some folks. Keith Smart isn't the answer and breeding the crony incumbency via PR efforts is precisely what one should expect, precisely what's been happening, and precisely what will mark continued failure. Meanwhile, Nelson IS a serious problem and if the Ellis issue escalates (now Monte Poole saying Ellis won't be with the team for 2010-11) but is painted as Cohan/Rowell's "fault" at the mitigation level, they'll have to scramble to find the next "bad guy." They tried to pin it on Mullin but Mullin bears no responsibility for further tensions. Mullin is documented as the peacemaker for a very snarky team infrastructure. That's gone. It's croneyism and excuses and smear campaigns.

Time to deal with it.

[Subaculta]

Your take on Biedrins is criminally off.

please enlighten me. the Part about how I agree that his game hasn't been developed by Nelson? Or that he might have been tired going into the last 2/3rds of the season?

If you want to open up this discussion, open it up.
Hendrix is better than your scouting report.

He was awful. Is using one game the way to go in scouting someone? no way. But, that's why I'm not making money and travelling around the country watching games. If you feel that he improved in the D-League, then I guess in the next year or two we'll see him catch on with another team and I'll admit that I was way off. In the meantime I'll stand by what I saw - unathletic and hands of stone - and you can't teach a young man to improve those two attributes.

I watched him a ton in the D-League (all games still fre online!). Lasme I watched with Miami. He's good. Not great and a serious tweener, but he worked on his shot.

More importantly, both of these cuts were financial.
The online plants (documented) love to crack about how neither is playing to distract from both being cheap cuts that they didn't have to develop. Lasme is making money to play ball and Hendrix is on a Summer roster, just like Rob Kurz. Nellie chose Kurz and got him guaranteed cash to suck.

they might be financial, but once again we're talking about 11th and 12th men, so with them it's not going to get me riled up

These decisions have to be considerd int he context of all the in-fighting in the Warriors front offices. HAVE TO. Diogu and O'Bryant were crapped on by Nelson, who has no other "teaching mode" to offer. If Randolph is tougher than those two, fine- Randolph's freaking tougher. That's part of why he's a potential starter. But it's still a player's league and te Warriros are killing kids left and right. All of them. Every pick. Even the formerly hyped and pampered (Busty) are on the outs, it seems.

This is a massive problem in this league. Coupled with the crappy vets the team continues to bank on hard when they issue their divine wisdom in dollar signs, like Maggette and Jackson, and the silliness Don Nelson breeds in the midst of his own successive contract "negotiations," and the picture is bleak.

Curry has a shot because he has, well, a SHOT. And he's fast. But fitting Nelson's default lazy schemes isn't good enough. If Randolph is not getting 30 MPG on this lottery team, I expect the same lame-brained pot-stirring Poster War vets to distract from the endemic realities. It's the Warrior Way. But I'm not taking any more crap from those tools. The team has proven itself to not have what it takes upstairs, for 15 years.

Things have to change and I consider all of these "wasted" draft picks to be the glaring case study on this. Folks might FINALLY be starting to realize the cyclical mania the team engenders and exploits, time and again, to no better end after "The Core" is locked up and The Trash removed.

Then again, they've gone this far. Maybe it's forever.

everything else that you've written here has a ring of truth to it. Am I sad to read little bits here and there that open a window into the disfunction that permeates this organization? sure... but at the same time this isn't Howard Zinn trying to open my eyes to some of the injustices of recent history. It's the Warriors - and no that's not me trying to give a copout - I'm powerless (and relatively uninterested) in trying to change the ownership and coach. I cancelled my season tickets after last year, so I've used up all of my leverage.

final thought - I still don't hold an inkling of regret or care for the way that POB and Ike were used. more then one team has made it clear that they are journeymen at best. The only mistake was not using them to better the team in the form of trade filler.

As for Randolph, Wright, Belinelli and Curry... well the good news is that they're under contract for at least one more year and might outlast Nelson's stay.

[Chris Cohan]

You're still trying to shake it all off as inconsequential and inSIGNIFICANT. You make your slightest concession to the overarching thesis I'm offering- "ring of truth" in the midst of less important issues.

Your spin: 11th/12th men.

That's company line in the Mullin bashing, actually.

The truth: MANY successive lottery picks, no consistent team to show for it.

The downplay routine sounds EXACTLY like Bob Fitzgerald. Maybe you don't mean to do it, but I think you need to simply move on if you're only in this for the interpersonal intrigue (as you've admitted- thanks for that).

[Chris Cohan]

Biedrins "looked worn down" in the latter half of the season.
Jesus. The dysfunction seems to be your problem, too.

Season tickets from the North Bay seems like a lot of work. How long did you do that?
Maybe I'm incorrect about North Bay, but I think that's where you are, right?

[Subaculta]

You're still trying to shake it all off as inconsequential and inSIGNIFICANT. You make your slightest concession to the overarching thesis I'm offering- "ring of truth" in the midst of less important issues.

shake off all of what? The chaos reportedly taking place behind closed doors? sure to an extent. I dislike Cohan and wish he would sell the team. I dislike Rowell and wish he would stick to some bean-counting job in the real world. I'm growing tired of Nelson and hope that this is his last season.

I could lie awake at night worrying about all of that. I could let it eat away at me while I'm trying to enjoy some highlight reel play by Randolph, I could go and start up a foul-mouthed blog trying to stir up.

But it's just basketball. It's my favorite sport, I love to watch it and once a week at open gym I like to play it.

I have a vested interest in this team, but I save the passionate concern for the important things in my life.

Your spin: 11th/12th men.

come on CC, I know you're a smart man. I respect your intelligence, so please try and do the same for me. When I'm talking about POB, Lasme, Hendrix and Kurz, I'm talking about the "11th/12th man" - when I talk about Biedrins, Wright, Belinelli, AR, Morrow, etc, I'm talking about starters and rotation players.

moment of truth. If you truly think that my "spin:11th/12th men" is incorrect, then tell me if this upcoming season any of these guys will be more then the 11th/12th man on an NBA team.

That's company line in the Mullin bashing, actually.

The truth: MANY successive lottery picks, no consistent team to show for it.

help me out here. I like Mullin, I agree with you that he was an idiot with money, but he was a good fit for this team (had an eye for talent, good go between man for Ownership and the players). I must be reading your second sentence wrong - it seems to contradict the first and I know that's not what you mean.

The downplay routine sounds EXACTLY like Bob Fitzgerald. Maybe you don't mean to do it, but I think you need to simply move on if you're only in this for the interpersonal intrigue (as you've admitted- thanks for that).

lets not make this a discussion about semantics. My "downplay routine" is me simply saying that there's a level of interest that I have in this team/the NBA. It reaches a certain point (one that is still beyond the interest level of your average fan), and then I cut it off and I'm happy. I attend games, have league pass, visit this site (don't post on any others beside a hand full of posts on Tim K's blog), and I'm happy.

I'm not in this to push an agenda (Bob Fitz), most of the time I just lurk this site because I enjoy reading some of the regulars on here, and this is where news usually breaks first.

[Chris Cohan]

Oh good god- you're driving right back into the ditch.
Quit chasing me around is all I can suggest.

[Subaculta]

Biedrins "looked worn down" in the latter half of the season.
Jesus. The dysfunction seems to be your problem, too.

Season tickets from the North Bay seems like a lot of work. How long did you do that?
Maybe I'm incorrect about North Bay, but I think that's where you are, right?

I can tell we're just going to have to agree to disagree on the Beans thing. He's my 2nd fav Warrior (next to AR), and he lit it up in November, and progressively lost a bit each month. I could use stats, and they do support this, but stats aren't the whole story - he wasn't catching passes that he usually handles without a problem, he seemed a step slow, putbacks were a bit more challenging...

if you have an *insider* perspective into this, then share it... otherwise it seemed to me that his Latvian summer play might be adding to his fatigue.

and yes I am in the North bay (San Rafael), in fact thats why I wasn't able to respond to you right away - took the baby down to the farmers market... and it wasn't a problem to make the trip over to Oakland just about 40 mins.

[Chris Cohan]

Ewing and Webber.

Go ahead.
Try to downplay those.
Spin spin spin.
Chase chase chase.
Snark snark snark.

It's like a Warriors executive meeting in here all of a sudden!

[Chris Cohan]

I K-N-E-W you were moving to criticize his national team participation!

KNEW IT.

Nellie knocked his minutes way down. Azubuike was playing more than him before any sort of injury ever popped up, Suba.

And season tix from the North Bay, huh? How long?

This is getting downright creepy.

[Subaculta]

why don't you actually respond to my post (ie answer my one question), instead of curling up into a ball and hurling insults.

You know, even if I agreed with you, it's like agreeing with Bill O'reilly or Keith Olberman - both are extremely loud, opinionated and leave you feeling dirty.

[Chris Cohan]

Suba, you're dancing aorund every one of my primary points and bagging on players I've seen far more of than you and taken my lumps for supporting.

So I don't see where you're trying to discuss anything.

Meanwile, if you're looking to criticize Biedirns for National Team work, start a new thread.

[Chris Cohan]

Randolph was getting bagged on by the plants this year, too. Hard.
Randolph was in every fantasy Amar'e trade package at the February deadline.

Let's hear it.

[Chris Cohan]

You're still trying to shake it all off as inconsequential and inSIGNIFICANT. You make your slightest concession to the overarching thesis I'm offering- "ring of truth" in the midst of less important issues.

I could lie awake at night worrying about all of that. I could let it eat away at me while I'm trying to enjoy some highlight reel play by Randolph, I could go and start up a foul-mouthed blog trying to stir up.

But it's just basketball. It's my favorite sport, I love to watch it and once a week at open gym I like to play it.

I have a vested interest in this team, but I save the passionate concern for the important things in my life

This tells me this is about ME.
NOT basketball.

If you're not that interested, keep it to yourself.
Don't try to veil your shots at me after including me in your forum wide signature.Happy to have this thread revisited but you're not addressing much seriously, per your own admission, and I do take the time to follow closely even if you don't.

So that's that.

[Sleepy51]

Biedrins was INJURED

[Subaculta]

Creepy?? Ok CC. you go back to being pompous and irrelevant. Say lots of outrageous things in order to get attention and then make sure everyone knows that your picking up your ball and leaving (wah wah! Sept 22nd I'm out of here!!). It's easy to tell everyone that -

POB is going to succeed with the Celtics
Robert Rowell is going to set this team on a correct course
Maggette is going to end up being everyone's favorite Warrior
Stephen Jackson is going to play out his two years here and leave...


its another thing to stick around and be humble enough to admit you were wrong... or wait, easier to call the dissenting opinion a "creep"

you've walked into a party, yelled out at the top of your lungs, "I"M HERE", and then think anyone that pays attention to you is "stalking" you.

please don't try and goad me into another response. you didn't respond to me a few posts earlier, so i'll just follow your lead.

[Chris Cohan]

I ALREADY ADMITTED I MISSED ON POB IN BOSTON.

It was the first thing I did.
This is getting out of hand, Suba, and yes- I AM irritated by your chasing me around now.

You rarely contribute but have probably spent more posts today on this than you have in the entire last month. That's an issue I don't see diminishing if you're this worked up about me.

[Sleepy51]

Stop feeding it and it will go away.

[FNQ]

1 out of 4 guesses ain't bad... props to Bobby Ro