EmpireFalls wrote:Convince me they aren’t winning the West this year.
They’re the tier 1 favourite in the West to me.
Right off the hop (but these numbers are from before last night's game), they're 3rd in the league and 2nd in the West in SRS. Top-4 O, top-2 defense. 3rd in Net Rating.
There's a pretty good chance the D sticks. They've added some extra pieces and Kerr is doing great things.
But the O is predicated on some serious shooting. 42.9% from Draymond on 3.1 3PA/g. My guy couldn't hit the broad side of a barn with an artillery fusillade for the majority of his career, and has been assisted on 96.6% of his 3s across his career. That isn't going to last.
Hield is still shooting 49.4% on 8.6 3PA/g, which is going to calm down. Wiggins may stay around this level, but I"d expect a little regression because he isn't in the corner enough and he isn't an especially strong above-break shooter over his career.
Moody is shooting 47.4% from 3 on over 4 attempts per game.
You see what I mean? There's going to be some normalization there, so we'll see what happens to that offense. And as that offense dips, so too their chances of exiting the West. Leastwise, enough that it stops being so likely a thing.
Last night from 3, Wiggins was 2/4, Melton was 5/8, Kuminga was 2/4 (and he's a career 34% shooter), Hield was 2/5, Moody was 1/3, Draymond was 2/3. They shot 48.8% overall from downtown.
That's not something you can rely on game to game. It's going to settle some over a longer stretch. We will still need another 20 games or more to get a better idea of what they're going to look like over the season, and what this offense is going to look like as the playoffs arrive.
