SB Nation User Blog: ffgolden

Report: Harrington as sixth man?

ffgolden — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 06:11:54 -0000

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/10/15/SPCJSQ8QA.DTL&type=sports

We've heard Nellie talk about Harrington as a sixth man before, and it really does make a lot of sense: he's a tweener that can play three positions (at least for Nellie), he can be a big time scorer, and Nellie can choose who to match him up against, rather than him going against the opposing PF by default. All well and good.

But who starts at PF? According to Janny:

If that happens, Nelson said that Matt Barnes, Mickael Pietrus and Austin Croshere were all candidates to start at power forward.

Do any of these guys make more sense as starters than Harrington? I always thought the move would be great if we had a solid role-playing PF that could rebound, play defense, and finish inside when asked to. Barnes and Pietrus rebound well for their position, but their position is not starting PF. Croshere... well, we'll let Sleepy speak on him.

Obviously both Barnes and Pietrus did an admirable job down the stretch and in the playoffs last year. Does that work in the regular season, when teams have all of that game tape to scout and find advantages? Does this suddenly put even more of an onus on Baron in the first quarter, without one of their top scorers on the court?

Poll

Should Harrington be the sixth man?

Yes

23 votes

No

78 votes

Allison Stokke

22 votes

123 votes | Poll has closed

Biedrins: To extend, or not to extend? (Update: SFGate art.)

ffgolden — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 17:36:32 -0000

For much of the offseason I've been in the "re-sign everybody" camp: Baron, Barnes, Biedrins, Nellie, hell even Pietrus for a little while. Obviously, I liked last season's team, and my gut reaction is to keep them together.

But as we all know, Mullin's played a great game of hardball throughout the offseason. Nellie backed off of his demands, Barnes returned at a reasonable price, Sarunas was bought out for a little more than the price of his first-class plane ticket to Greece, and now Mullie is refusing to overpay for Baron's return. So far, so good. Mullin's converted me to a hardballer.

So what about Biedrins? It seems like a given that he's going to be re-signed, because lord knows we need him on this team. But at this point, after all of the other hard bargaining Mullin has done, why offer a lucrative extension to Biedrins now? If you're not going to offer an extension to your superstar and team leader, why offer one to Andris? He's going to be a restricted free agent next summer, so the Warriors can always match whatever offer sheets are put on the table, and surely Andris' free agent value is not going to surpass the $10mil/year we're all assuming Mullin's going to re-sign him for, even if he does improve by another leap/bound.

He could, of course, pull a Varejao/Pavlovic and just refuse to report to camp, if nobody offers him a decent contract and the qualifying offer of $3.6mil is all that's on the table. But unlike Cleveland, we should have decent cap room next summer, which would allow us to increase the offer if Andris refuses the qualifying.

So aside from "good will"--which nobody else has received from Mullin this offseason, without any negative consequences quite yet--what other reasons are there to offer Biedrins big money this offseason?

============================================

[Moderator's Note, by OptionZero:]

According to Janny Hu, the Warriors are indeed looking to get a deal done this month:

Both Warriors vice president Chris Mullin and Bill Duffy, Biedrins' agent, anticipate talks to pick up as preseason moves along, and although neither is publicly offering any numbers, all signs point toward a deal getting done.

GSoF: Manny Lawson tears ACL, done for season

ffgolden — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 19:49:28 -0000

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3029152

Crap. He was really starting to come along, too. I don't really know too much about Navies; he hasn't made any notable plays thus far in his limited minutes. Might open up the opportunity for Brandon Moore to take back some of the minutes Willis took from him (for good reason).

Sarunas speaks to ESPN

ffgolden — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 18:01:00 -0000

Runi spoke with Chris Sheridan of ESPN.com. Not really all that much new here, but worth posting nonetheless. Here are some relevant quotes:

"I'm really waiting for [Golden State] to trade me. It's been going on since February, and nothing's happening. I really don't understand this franchise, to be honest with you. I know what kind of offers they got for me, and they're not taking them. I know they're not planning on using me, so I really don't understand what they're trying to do with me. In that league, absolutely nothing depends on me, so I'm sitting by the phone and waiting."

Well maybe you shouldn't have picked up your option.

"It's a decision I'm going to have to make after the Eurobasket, but I think I'm going to go back to training camp and just wait and see what happens."

Buyout thus doubtful.

"As far as I know, there's really not much going on now," Jasikevicius said. "But from what I hear from my agent, Golden State had a lot of interesting offers. Whether they want to add another piece or add another expiring contract like mine with another piece, I've had my hopes up 10-12 times of getting out of there, and nothing happened."

Again, if you wanted out, you shouldn't have picked up your option. Greed is a bitch.

Report: Adonal to Orlando Now Official

ffgolden — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 19:44:31 -0000

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/orl-bk-foyle082207,0,2019944.story

Obviously Howard's the man there, but Otis Smith really blew it when he gave away the franchise's future for Rashard Lewis while ignoring Milicic's existence. Foyle actually has a good chance of getting PT there, as they are desperately thin in the front court. Congrats and good luck, Adonal.

====================================

[Moderator's Note, by OptionZero:]

The signing is now official.

According to user djchuckdeez:

The Orlando Magic signed free agent center Adonal Foyle on Friday, bringing in a shot blocker to join star Dwight Howard in the front court. Source: Yahoo Sports

I am happy for him, I think he'll probably see some more pt too.

Report: Francis signs with Houston

ffgolden — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 18:50:10 -0000

This may be a non-factor, but I found it interesting. Steve Francis is going to sign with the Houston Rockets.

Years after Houston traded him for McGrady, they end up getting him back for close to nothing (probably--haven't seen the contract details, of course).

Does anybody think Francis has anything left in the tank? If he does, and they stay healthier this season, Houston is going to leapfrog a number of teams in the West, right into that top echelon that includes the other two Texan teams along with Phoenix. They've already acquired Euro-star Luis Scola, as well as getting Mike James for Howard. If Francis gets in shape, they'll suddenly be a lot more athletic in the front AND backcourt.

This doesn't really affect the Dubs too much, as Houston was already ahead of them on the conference depth chart.

Belinelli in the eyes of Hollinger

ffgolden — Sat, 30 Jun 2007 01:23:15 -0000

I feel like it's often necessary to take what Hollinger says with a grain of salt. But whether you like him or not, his take on Belinelli is almost hard to read. Proceed with caution:

Marco Belinelli (13.3 pts/40, 3.1 reb/40, 33.4 FG percent, 7.34 PER)
What's the Italian word for "dog" again? I'm just shocked that Belinelli went as high as he did, because basically, the numbers say he can't play ... at all. Based on last year's stats he's not even a CBA player. His translated stats from the year before are a little better (42.1 FG percent, 10.72 PER), but still make him look like end-of-the-bench fodder at best. If the Warriors think this guy can replace Jason Richardson, I think they're in for a rather rude surprise.

I'm hoping this is one of Hollinger's drastic miscalculations...

JRich trade may have still been a shot at Yi

ffgolden — Fri, 29 Jun 2007 06:04:08 -0000

I hadn't realized this at first--forgive me if I'm just slow on the uptake--but this trade actually went down before the draft started. ESPN says:

The Bobcats had spent the past several days trying to trade both draft picks. They settled on the Richardson deal just before the draft began. ... When the Bobcats picked Wright, they were actually picking for the Warriors since the trade had already been done.

Mullin may have been banking on Yi being available at #8. Or he might have been targeting Brewer or someone else. Regardless, it's certainly not clear that Wright was his man all along, which is almost disconcerting. But would the masses be as upset about the trade if Yi HAD been available?

As a side note, I have a question about the salary cap space we just cleared up, for all you CBA nuts: doesn't this trade net us a Traded Player Exception rather than "pure" cap space? And I believe that exception cannot actually be used to sign free agents until it expires, which takes place a year from when it's created. Is this correct? Is the result, then, that we can't actually use this cap space to sign any free agents, unless it's arranged via sign-and-trade? Someone help me out here.

Minutes for Azubuike Please

ffgolden — Wed, 31 Jan 2007 19:39:43 -0000

I'm hoping that Monta's ankle sprain means one thing: a starting job for Kelenna Azubuike.

We all know that stats can be deceiving, but let's look at some anyway. Kabuki's stats look like this:
PPG per 48 minutes: 24.6 on 15.7 attempts
RPG per 48 minute: 7.3
FG%: 45.46
3FG%: 53.0
FT%: 77.78
SPG per 48 minutes: 2.24
TO per 48 mnutes: 1.82

Looking damn good. Again, deceptive in that he may just be an efficient bench player and he's learned to make the most of his brief time out on the court; he may not be able to produce that nicely in big minute situations. Of course, it's interesting to look at his stats for the game this season that he DID play 48 minutes: 28 points, 7 rebounds, 47% FG, 50% 3FG, 1 TO, 2 steals. Matches up pretty damn nicely (though he only made 66% of his FTs).

Let's briefly compare to Monta Ellis's stats:
PPG per 48 minutes: 24.5 on 19.5 attempts
RPG per 48 minutes: 4.04
FG%: 46.87
3FG%: 26
FT%: 74.75
SPG per 48 minutes: 1.92
TO per 48 minutes: 4.74

Slightly better FG%, but otherwise, he's below Kabuki's efficiency level pretty much across the board--even defensively, as his steals are lower. The biggest stats that jump out to me are rebounds, turnovers, and 3-pointers. See duggie25's diary today regarding what's wrong with the W's, but if you ask me, the above three categories are huge for us. And Azubuike handles his business in those categories.

Now, I'm not trying to claim that Kabuki is actually a better player, or even a more effective player, than Monta. Boy Wonder is the future, no doubt. But, I think that Kelenna deserves an extended look at the SG position, especially when Monta's sidelined. He has better size for a SG, better outside shooting, better rebounding, and good decision-making.

Lastly, I know he hasn't yet proven himself. But neither had Barnes, and he worked his damn tail off to do so. Now that he's "proven" (to a degree), he's slacked a bit. It might be time for Kelenna to get a few more minutes to prove himself, as he might still be in "work-tail-off" mode to gain Nellie's confidence. We need somebody like that, especially on the road when most of our players play like newly-awakened coma victims.

Nellie, put him in the starting lineup tonight and see what he can do.

But what about the shoes!?

ffgolden — Mon, 18 Dec 2006 08:20:05 -0000

I've never posted a diary before, but I felt like this had to get some attention. Frankly, as fashion-savvy as you GSoM guys are, I'm surprised we haven't already seen pages on this. What exactly am I talking about?

Behold!

To rock, or not to rock? That is the question. Or not--you wouldn't catch me dead in those monstrosities. What's up with the scaly look? Are we actually supposed to be the Warrior Reptiles or something? I actually dig the colors enough, but the whole design makes them come out looking like toy shoes. I'm always down to represent the Dubs, but man, adidas played us for sure. Not all of the line was bad, either--the Raptors' kicks came out decent:

Click here for a look at the full line.

I'm no shoe expert though, so I wanted to get some opinions. I guess they could have been worse.