A condensed version of some ramblings from elsewhere... here are some general thoughts on the team's performance, without wading into player-specific details.

1) The Team Has Been Bad So Far

Not horrible, but bad... there's really no way to spin it. Most adjusted rankings peg the Warriors as the 21st-best team in the league and the 12th-best team in the West. Yes, the Warriors have played much better of late, but then it's a stretch in the schedule where they should be playing well: plenty of home games (the Dubs have now played as many home games as any team in the league), and just as important, very few back-to-backs. It's also worth noting that the Warriors have actually been healthier than the average NBA team. The Curry-Monta-Wright-Lee-Biedrins lineup has started more games than all but four NBA quintets; the top six guys on the depth chart have missed nine, nine, eight, one, zero and zero games respectively. The usual excuses simply don't apply: the Warriors have been in good position to succeed. They haven't succeeded. They've played solidly below-average basketball to date.

2) The Team Has Been Bad For The Usual Pair Of Reasons

The first is road ineptitude: the Dubs have stunk on the road this season, as they usually do. The second reason is defense. For all of the hand-wringing about Monta's tunnel vision and Curry's turnovers and Biedrin's timidity, the Warriors have the 11th-most-efficient offense in the league... they're playing effective, playoff-level NBA offense. Their defense is 28th in the league, and is just about as bad as it was last year. The offensive issues are really beside the point. The four main problems with this team's play have been defense, defense, defense and defense.

3) The Defense Has Been Better Of Late...

A shorthand way to gauge how well a team plays defense on a given night is to compare its opponent's offensive efficiency in the game to their season-long mark. As an example, the Jazz have an offensive efficiency of 108.5 to date this season... the Warriors held them to an OE of 107.2 Wednesday night, a bit below their overall mark. There's a ton of noise in this method, but it serves as a quick-and-dirty way to tell if your team is rising to the defensive occasion or not.

Using that method, I split the Warriors' season to date into five eleven game segments. Here are the results. (Negative numbers are good here... a -1.0 would suggest that the Dubs' opponents scored one point less per 100 possessions than they'd normally be expected to.)

Games 1-11: -0.05 differential

Games 12-22: +7.96 differential

Games 23-33: +3.66 differential

Games 34-44: +6.74 differential

Games 45-55: +2.15 differential

After a brutal couple of months, the Dubs have slowed the bleeding some of late. The trend is even more pronounced if you just look at the last nine games, where the Warriors' differential is -0.62. The last couple weeks have seen some downright credible D from dem Dubs.

4) ...But It May Not Be Sustainable

It's not like a good defensive stretch like this is unprecedented: the Warriors played solid D in the first couple weeks of the season as well, and that sure didn't last. And in these past nine games, the Dubs still put up some stinkers: the Suns and Nuggets games are obvious, but the Dubs also allowed Milwaukee to score a good bit more effectively than usual (+5.2, despite the Bucks shooting just 6-for-23 from three), and didn't actually put up a great effort against the Hornets (+0.2 in a game that saw just three Hornets treys and zero Emeka Okafors). The Warriors' good overall showing is thanks in large part to the complete shutdown of a Deron-less Jazz team a couple weeks ago (-18.0). Make no mistake -- the defensive efforts against the Bulls (-6.6) and Thunder (-3.3) were also excellent. But even in this, the hottest stretch the Warriors have had in several years, their D could best be described as "hit-or-miss". And in the four games before this stretch -- Clippers (+15.7), Spurs (+7.2), Hornets (+10.2), Bobcats (+17.8) -- the Warriors played defense about as bad as you can play it.

Maybe the Warriors' defense has turned a corner, or maybe they just had a peppy couple performances in front of the Oracle faithful. I'd tend to believe the latter. And given the road-heaviness of the remaining schedule, and the likelihood that their opponents aren't likely to miss as many threes as a bunch of recent opponents have, I have trouble seeing the Dubs closing the season strong. I'm guessing they go something like 11-16 after the break, ending with 37 wins and a middlin' draft pick FTW.

Jeremy Britton's WoW article that predicted 50+ wins for the Warriors via WP48 (actually 57.6 wins, to be exact) got a lot of play around here. I think those numbers are inflated, because WP48 fails to account for a player's influence on his team's defense. If a team gives up 110 points per 48 minutes with a certain guy on the floor, and 100 points per 48 minutes when he sits, I think it's fair to ding his defensive numbers. You can't do so perfectly, of course -- there's a lot of noise in these numbers -- but an imperfect adjustment strikes me as a better solution than no adjustment at all. So for funsies, I figured I'd do some rough estimates of the Warriors' '10-'11 win total using a couple other metrics that make those defensive adjustments.

Methodology

I estimated the minutes allocation thusly...

PG: Stephen Curry (36), Charlie Bell (12)

SG: Monta Ellis (36), Reggie Williams (12)

SF: Dorell Wright (30), Reggie Williams (18)

PF: David Lee (30), Brandan Wright (18)

C: Andris Biedrins (30), David Lee (6), Dan Gadzuric (12)

...and then factored in each guy's '09-'10 results via Basketball Prospectus's Win Percentage, Basketball Reference's Win Shares, and Basketball Value's Adjusted Plus-Minus. (In the case of Brandan Wright, I used his '08-'09 numbers.) I go into the gory details here, for those (few to zero) who are curious.

Results

By Win Percentage, the above lineup would total 42.5 wins.

By Win Shares, the above lineup would total 40.5 wins.

By Adjusted Plus-Minus, the above lineup would total 38.6 wins.

All three metrics peg a healthy Warriors team right around .500.

In What Ways Might These Estimates Be Pessimistic?

Lee might be a more effective player alongside a center. Several players -- Curry, Biedrins, maybe Monta -- seem like good bets to play better. Other players -- Lin, Udoh, Amundson, someone else -- could factor into the rotation and remove weak links Bell and Gadzuric. With good coaching, the defensive weaknesses of guys like Curry and Monta might be reduced.

In What Ways Might These Estimates Be Optimistic?

A couple guys -- Reggie and Brandan Wright spring to mind -- might not perform as well as their early career numbers suggested they would. Nellie (or whoever) might resort to more smallball than the above lineup accounts for. Other players -- Lin, Udoh, someone else -- could factor into the rotation and stink. Most importantly, the Warriors' top seven will not play nearly as many total minutes as these estimates suggest... we are not likely to get 82 games of work from Curry and Monta and Lee and Biedrins and Reggie and both Wrights. And as things stand, any missed time by a top-seven guy will result in increased minutes for a pretty bad player.

Conclusion

Well, "conclusion" is a strong word... this is just a fun silly exercise. But to me, 40 wins sounds like a more reasonable estimate of the Warriors' potential than 50+, and injury issues would make even 40 wins a tall order. This is a bad defensive roster, a far worse one than WP48 can account for, as most of the guys who had a positive impact on team defensive performance last year -- Turiaf, CJ, Morrow, Tolliver -- are now gone. The offense will be good, but terrible defense and a terrible bench is a tough combo to overcome. I think the Warriors will be a good bit better. I still don't think they'll reach .500 this season.

The results through February 25th, along with the data for every other team, courtesy of Joe Sill at Hoop Numbers. I will leave an explanation of the effects of regularization to those who are less ignorant than I, but supposedly Sill's method filters out teammate effects and other noise better than most. He lists the data in several ways... the link above points to the four-year time-weighted data, which gives a bigger sample size and hence more reliability. But the usual plus-minus caveats still apply, of course, and for low-minute guys like Hunter and Tolliver, grains of salt are especially recommended.

The numbers listed are the player's on-court effect on his team's point differential per 48 minutes... a +1.000 guy makes his team a net point better per 48, a -1.000 guy makes his team a net point worse. The vast majority of players lie somewhere between 3.000 and -3.000. LeBron (naturally) has the best four-year time-weighted RAPM of 6.046. (If that doesn't sound like a lot, consider that the difference between the Thunder and the Knicks is about six net points a game.) Helpfully, Sill separates results into offensive and defensive RAPM, giving a clearer picture of where guys help and where guys hurt.

Longer-winded thoughts on the Dubs' results can be found here, but a couple big takeaways...

1) Curry and Morrow are two of the biggest offensive assets in the league, and two of the biggest defensive detriments in the league.

2) Turiaf rates much better than Biedrins, but only because of the offensive gap between them... Biedrins's presence helps the defense a bit more than Ronny's does.

3) Randolph's somewhat subpar on both ends, and rates poorly overall. This is true of many young bigs -- Brook Lopez, Al Jefferson, Speights, Gortat, Hawes and Hickson rate worse than Randolph, among others -- but it's interesting.

4) Speaking of J.J. Hickson -- you know what he, Al Thornton, Sasha Pavlovic, Maurice Evans, Chris Wilcox and Ryan Hollins have in common? Of the 537 NBA players in these rankings, these are the only six guys that rate worse than Monta Ellis. Be afraid... be very afraid.

5) Let's end on a bright note: a young Warrior point guard rates as the 20th-most beneficial player in the entire league. Take a bow...

...C.J. Watson.

Tool through the numbers if you're bored. They're not the gospel, but they're damn interesting.

Seriously... we should grab this guy.  Check out this line he just put up in 40 minutes:

16 points (8-11 FG), 12 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 steals, 2 blocks, 2 turnovers, 4 fouls

Solid stuff, right?  He's not a world-beater, but that's some efficient work, and considering how dire things are for us on the boards and around our rim, he could make a big difference.

Who is this player?

IT'S ANDRIS FRIGGIN' BIEDRINS.  And if you don't recognize those stats, that's because Nellie has seen fit to only give him forty minutes, TOTAL, over our last two miserable games, in which we were outrebounded by 15 and 16, respectively.

Andris is not an elite player.  He's limited offensively; he gets outmuscled at times on defense; his free throws are troubling, to say the least.  But other than his free throw woes -- a big issue, but an issue that is neither totally crippling nor totally new -- Andris Biedrins is the exact same player he's always been.  He's scoring less often because nobody's running plays for him and grabbing fewer offensive boards because Nellie has him setting screens behind the arc, but he's grabbing defensive boards, affecting shots, making shots and passing as well as he ever has.  Andris Biedrins is the same player he's always been: a good one.

More to the point, we suck.  And do you know the main three reasons we suck?  1) We're the worst-rebounding team in basketball, 2) we give up the second-most points in the paint of any team in basketball, and 3) we let our opponents shoot better from the field than any team except for the Nets.  And when those things are true of your team -- when your opponents are running roughshod all over you on the boards and near your rim -- and you have a player on your roster who

* is one of the ten best rebounders in basketball (the sixth-best rebounder two years ago, the fourth-best rebounder last year, would be eleventh-best this year if he had enough minutes to qualify);

* blocks a ton of shots (would be tenth in the league this year if he had enough minutes to qualify);

* is on pace to be the most efficient field-goal scorer in NBA history;

* passes extremely well for a big man;

* is offensively unselfish, and willing to both find open men and set picks on the perimeter,

* has the rare quality in a center of being able to run the floor with the rest of your team, and

* has been a genuinely good NBA player for three years running...

...then maybe, just maybe, you ought to give the guy some consistent playing time.

Let's be clear: Don Nelson has already failed this test.  But you, faithful Warriors fan, you can still pass it.  You can realize that Andris Biedrins -- occasionally soft defense, cringeworthy free throws and all -- is a good player, one of our best players, and a player who could help to heal a lot of our wounds if simply allowed to stay on the court for awhile.  The problem isn't the B-plus center who's anchored this team for the past three seasons... the problem is the deranged old coach who won't use him anymore.

Randolph's ankle injury continues a rash of injuries that has plagued us all year -- Wright, Azubuike, Biedrins, Turiaf, now Randolph. We have had a very unlucky year on that front. And media coverage of the team, which has already gotten a lot of fodder out of the injury angle, will soon frame our health woes as the defining characteristic of the '09-'10 Warriors. Articles like this one are already cropping up. Injuries, you'll hear it said and suggested, are the story of our season.

And, hey. Your top two centers miss a ton of time, your starting small forward is out for the year, you're down to seven playable guys at points, you've had to use a washed-up non-rebounding vet at center, you've already had to sign two D-Leaguers, and now your young stud power forward hurts his ankle... I mean, that's your season, right? Of course you're gonna suck.

Here's the problem: everything in that description applies to the Portland Trail Blazers. Health-wise, they've had it every bit as bad as us. Their top ten guys -- Roy, Miller, Aldridge, Oden, Przybilla, Batum, Fernandez, Outlaw, Blake, Bayless -- have missed a combined 115 games due to injury or illness thus far. Our top ten guys -- Monta, Biedrins, Maggette, Randolph, Curry, 'Buike, Turiaf, Wright, Morrow, CJ -- have missed 111. And yet the Blazers are 23-15, and on pace to grab the sixth seed in one of the most loaded conferences in league history. The story of their season will not be about injuries; the story of their season will, more than likely, be written in the playoffs. If they're not willing to accept health woes as an excuse, why should we?

Our star player hasn't missed a single game. Our touted rookie hasn't missed a single game. Our most effective player has missed only a single game (which is amazing, because our most effective player is Corey Maggette). CJ, Randolph and Morrow have only missed eight games combined. We've had at least a couple good players and at least a couple useful role players available in every single game this season. Yes, our bigs have been decimated, but so have the Blazers'; they've made do just fine with their stud shooting guard, his high-scoring sidekick and their young point guard friend. They're 6-3 since losing both of their centers for the year. In our games without Biedrins and Turiaf, we went 5-17.

We are not 11-24 because of adversity. We are 11-24 because we have failed to respond to adversity. Larry Riley has failed to address the frontcourt shortcomings that have been glaring since Brandan Wright got hurt in early October. Don Nelson has failed to align our players in arrangements that had chances of competing. Monta Ellis has failed to justify his supremacy in our offense with star-level efficiency. So far, the overarching theme of our season is not injuries; the overarching theme of our season is ineptitude. Properly handled, this team could be 16-19 right now, injuries and all.

Now, the story of the season is not yet fully written. If we go 24-23 from here and play up to our potential for the next three months, the optimism engendered will change things dramatically; we will view this 35-47 season as more of a promising transitional step than an abject failure. But if we continue to underperform, and end the year at 25-57 instead, our failure will be colossal, and our excuses will be feeble.

That will not stop the team from making those excuses. Nellie, Riley, Rowell, Fitz -- every official Warriors mouthpiece will keep trumpeting the injury excuse, as they have been ad nauseam since Jack left. "It's just not our year -- we're too injured to compete." It sounds plausible on the surface, and it's a simple story to tell... most members of the local and national media will accept it without scrutiny.

But when you hear this party line, remember the Blazers. Remember the Rockets, who are on pace for the playoffs despite getting forty-six total minutes from 54% of their payroll. Remember the Knicks, who have won twelve of nineteen with a roster that doesn't have half the talent of ours. Remember the Clippers, who have competed all year, even though Blake Griffin's injury gave them the perfect excuse not to. Remember the Bobcats, who keep grinding away in miserable obscurity, trying to scratch their way past their low levels of talent.

A real basketball team fights past adversity. A real basketball team wins the games they should win, no matter what excuses they could fall back on. A real basketball team doesn't throw its hands up and ask for pity when it's not looking like their year; a real basketball team gets angry and smart and stubborn and makes it their year. A real basketball team takes its destiny in its hands, and either earns its success or owns its failure. A real basketball team writes its own story.

We will see what story arises from the '09-'10 Golden State Warriors... a happy story, of a sort, is still possible. But like any good English teacher, we will not accept a story told in the passive voice. Don't tell us what happened to you, Warriors. Tell us what you did.

There are four salient questions here.

1. What Do We Mean When We Say Smallball?
This is not as simple of an exercise as it might first appear. When we say that a team is going "small", how do we quantify that? Is it when a team fields a couple players at positions that are "bigger" than their natural ones? Is it when a team fields a frontcourt that is shorter than usual? Is it when a team fields a frontcourt that is lighter than usual?

I'd argue that none of these criteria quite capture what we mean by "smallball". A Showtime Lakers team with Magic at the two would not be "small" just because his natural position is the one. The Suns teams of the early nineties were not "small" simply because their power forward was 6'5". We do not become "small" with Anthony Randolph at the four just because he weighs so little.  For our purposes, "smallball" is most usefully thought of as a tradeoff in production. Specifically, it involves putting yourself at a rebounding disadvantage in the hopes of gaining a countervailing advantage somewhere else. As we'll see in a moment, any team you'd think of as "small" has been outrebounded by their opponents to a significant degree. This rebounding-based working definition is not only intuitive, but useful: it gives us a filter by which to examine "small" teams. Which brings us to our next section...

2. How Well Has A Predominant Smallball Strategy Worked Over The Years?
To really get to the bottom of this, we should try to cast a pretty wide net: let's take a look at every NBA team that has been outrebounded by at least, say, 3.5 rebounds a game. Opponents' rebound totals have only been kept since 1970, so we're just looking at the last forty years, here... in those 40 seasons, 112 teams have been -3.5 or more on the glass per night. Not all of these teams were intentionally playing smallball, of course... the majority of them were simply outgunned on the boards. But we'll worry about intent later. For now, let's just see how outboarded teams tend to fare.

Twenty-six teams have been outrebounded by 3.5 to 3.9 boards a night, including a 61-win Sonics team, Baron's farewell season, and a bunch of crappy teams. Really crappy teams. A number of these teams were also competitive: 10 out of the 26 had winning seasons despite being outrebounded, and three teams won 53 games or more. Still, the overall winning percentage for these teams is .408, amounting to a 33-49 record. Getting outrebounded by this much makes it fairly difficult to win.

The next tier, the teams ranging from -4.0 to -4.9 on the boards per night, contains forty-two teams, only eight of which posted winning records... the aggregate winning percentage here was .377, equal to a 31-51 record. No team in this range won 55 games or more; twenty teams lost 55 games or more. If you get outrebounded by four to five rebounds a game, it is extremely difficult to compete.

Finally, those miserable teams that have been outrebounded by 5.0 more a night have an aggregate winning percentage of .308, equating to a 25-57 team, with only three winning teams out of forty-four. This group features not only the worst team in NBA history, but the active team that stands poised to outsuck them. If your opponents outrebound you by five or more a game, you will probably be downright terrible.

All this means we have a pretty conclusive answer to our second question. The answer: not very well.

3. When Smallball Works, How Does It Work?
In the exact same way that that it worked for the '07-'08 Warriors did: it can work if you take many more threes than your opponents and win the turnover battle by a lot.  That formula is the only one that has made smallball viable in recent years. That's not to say that it always works... these are not sufficient conditions to make you a winning team, and they alone do not necessarily justify favoring smallball over another strategy. But these are necessary conditions. If you allow yourself to get dominated on the boards, this formula is the only demonstrable way that you can possibly survive.

So what do you need to make this formula work? Three things: 1) a roster that takes extremely good care of the basketball, 2) an excellent point guard that finds open shots for his teammates, 3) a roster that is willing and able to shoot tons of threes at a viable percentage. If you don't have all three of these things, opting for a smallball strategy is a fool's errand.

4. Do We Have The Elements Necessary To Play Effective Smallball?
Short answers: 1) no, 2) no, 3) sort of.

1) We're committing the second-most turnovers per game in the league. That's not as bad as it sounds -- our breakneck pace has a lot to do with that, and we do force more turnovers than we commit -- but we simply don't take good enough care of the basketball to build a huge edge in the turnover battle.

2) We also lack an excellent point guard. We do not have a good point guard. Depending on what night you're looking, it seems like we may not even have a point guard. Neither Monta nor Curry nor CJ can run an offense remotely as well as Chauncey Billups, let alone Baron or Timmy or Steve Nash. We just don't have the playmaking impresario we'd need to do this.

3) Three-point shooters? We certainly have some -- Morrow's a killer, Curry, CJ and Vlad shoot them well and Monta can hit them -- but we're only 13th in the league in three-point percentage, and more critically, only 18th in the league in three-point attempts. (If Nellie wants smallball to have a prayer, he should be spending 100% of his time designing plays to get our marksmen open. But he can't even be bothered to do that.)

To recap, we don't have the elements you need for smallball. We have neither the teamwide offensive discipline you need to win the turnover battle, nor the brilliant point guard who can find open shooters and keep your efficiency high. We have guys who can rack up steals and guys who can hit three-pointers, but those things alone are not nearly enough to make the strategy a good idea. We just don't have the pieces for smallball.

But you know what we do have? We have some pretty good big men. In Biedrins, Randolph and Turiaf, we have two ace rebounders, three excellent shot-blockers, and a couple of really efficient scorers. All three of these guys run the floor well; all three of them even pass well. They are godsends for a team that likes to run. This trio of bigs may be the biggest strength on our roster. And if we want to win, we should use them. We should shelve this untenable strategy we've been obsessed with and start winning with rebounds, rather than trying to figure out a way to win without them. Without Baron Davis, smallball just won't work. Nellie has spent the last 114 games chasing a ghost.

There is no argument for smallball as a predominant strategy for the 2009-10 Golden State Warriors. None whatsoever. Don Nelson is embarrassing himself by pursuing that strategy against all evidence, and those who defend his tactics are embarrassing themselves too. There is simply no other way to say it.

I've already bitched about this, here and elsewhere.  And I get that our top two centers are hurt, and that there may be good reasons for being conservative with Randolph, and that starting Chris Hunter would probably be a little hasty. I get that Mikki doesn't play as much as the phrase "starting center" suggests, and that every team has to give a bad player 15-20 minutes now and again.  I even get that he's a nice guy who's playing hurt, and that he's trying to help us, and that he's taken Hunter under his wing.  I get all that, I really do.  

But holy hell, Mikki Moore is killing us.  Let's sift through the wreckage here.

We'll start with the obvious: Mikki can't score.  He averages 11.8 points per 48 minutes, a tiny number -- he's tied for 35th out of 43 NBA centers who've played significant minutes, and if you correct for our fast pace, he's more like 38th. Still, he shoots well when he shoots (.569 from the field), and he passes pretty decently for a center (third among centers in assists per 48 and A/TO, though nobody's setting the world on fire in either category)... at least Mikki plays within his limits on offense.  Besides, a number of good players -- Jason Kidd, Anderson Varejao, Chuck Hayes, Thabo Sefalosha -- score as rarely as he does.  You can still be a useful player if you do other things really well.  Does Mikki do anything really well?

Well, he sure doesn't rebound.  Eighty players who ESPN lists as centers have taken the court for NBA teams this year.  By rebounds per minute, Mikki is the 73rd-best rebounder of those eighty, and of the seven who are worse, only three have played for more than half an hour total.  He would rank 71st out of 90 amongst power forwards; he would rank 24th out of 66, only slightly above average, amongst small forwards.  Again, these rankings don't correct for pace... if anything, they overstate his contributions.  So he doesn't score, doesn't rebound.  What else do we got?  Defense, mebbe?

Mikki rates a little better in shot-blocking, but only a little... 61st among centers, by ESPN's reckoning.  Steals?  58th among centers, again significantly below average.  Blocks and steals don't necessarily equate with good defense, of course... a tight man defender can shut down an opponent in ways that don't show up on the traditional stat sheet.  But looking deeper, this explanation doesn't seem to apply to Mikki.  Per 82games.com (whose numbers are a couple days out of date), through our first 18 games, our opponents shot significantly better (55.8% to 53.3%) and scored more efficiently overall when Mikki was on the floor.  All the evidence, statistical, anecdotal and otherwise, suggests that Mikki makes our defense a good bit worse.

"Okay, so Mikki doesn't score, rebound or defend.  He at least doesn't foul much, right?  After all, if you never do anything, you're not going to trigger many whistles."  If you're Mikki Moore, you are!  Mikki ranks 10th in the league in fouls per minute amongst guys who've played a significant amount.

"Well, maybe Mikki returns the favor.  Maybe he gets to the line a lot himself.  That could balance out all the opponents he sends to the line."  No.  Dear God, no.  Mikki has played 321 minutes... in that time, he has earned a tolal of nine free throws, of which he has made five.  Let's be clear on this point: in almost seven full games of basketball, he has netted us five points from the line.  Fifteen NBA players give their teams more points from the line per game than Mikki has given us all season.  He doesn't score, or defend, or rebound, or draw fouls, or avoid fouls... he may very possibly be the worst player in all of basketball.

The upshot of all of this, most insane and chilling stat of all?  Here ya go.  We have played Mikki-free lineups in 66.5% of our minutes, just under two-thirds of the time.  In that time -- the majority of our minutes so far, encompassing Jack drama and smallness and shorthandedness and all of it -- we get outscored by 0.6 points per 48 minutes.  That's not ideal, but it's not terrible, either... a team with that point differential would be expected to go something like 39-43.  When Mikki's in?  We get outscored by 13.6 points per 48 minutes.  That is terrible.  No NBA team has ever been outscored by that much over the course of a season... a team with that point differential would be expected to go something like -- no joke -- 4-78.  Sans Mikki, we're close to being a .500 team.  With Mikki, we're the worst team in the history of basketball by a country mile.

This franchise needs a lot of things.  A coaching change would help.  A new defensive philosophy would help.  Shooting more threes, as I rambled about yesterday, would help.  But the easiest change of all is obvious -- it lies in a single conversation that starts like this: "Mikki, we couldn't help but notice that you've been playing in pain.  Go ahead and have that surgery you were considering."  If we get Mikki off the court, we will have a dramatically better chance of winning every night.  There's just no good reason to deny ourselves that chance.

(Slightly douchy self-promoting note: I originally wrote this for a blog a buddy of mine and I started, Golden State Worriers.  It's like GSOM, only worse and less fun!  Come check it out if you like, no worries if you don't... we are no threat to the Mothership. And this is the only time I'll bore y'all by mentioning it here.)

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Looking at the Warriors' league-wide ranks in various statistics is always pretty amusing, as we can be found near the very top or very bottom of most of the categories. Thus far, this season is no exception: we play the fastest pace of any team, we're the worst-rebounding team, we're the next-to-worst defensive team. We lead the league in steals and forced turnovers, but only Indiana turns it over more often per game than us. Only two teams get blocked more often per game than we do.

All of these rankings should sound pretty intuitive: we're a bunch of little fellas, scurrying around with no rhyme or reason. You can practically hear "Yakety Sax" when you watch us play. And while we may have the spunk of a half-naked British policewoman, we would need a brilliantly efficient offense to overcome our various deficiencies. We don't have one -- despite all the storm and fury and Montaness and Morrowing, our offensive efficiency is 15th-best in the league, dead average. Wussupwidat?

For help, let's turn to Dean Oliver's esteemed Four Factors, the four attributes that most contribute to a team's offensive success. Those factors: shooting, limiting your turnovers, offensive rebounding, and the frequency with which you score free throws. Defensive success can be measured inversely -- good defenses make their opponents shoot poorly, force a lot of turnovers, and keep their opponents off the offensive glass and off the foul line. But this is a Warriors blog, so let's not depress ourselves with talk of "defensive success". It'll be a while till we stop giving up eighty thousand points per game... let's just see where there's room for improvement on offense.

Per KnickerBlogger.net, our rankings in the Four Factors: 7th in shooting (51.6% eFG), 18th in turnovers (16.1 per 100 possessions), last in offensive rebounding (21.4 OREB%), 16th in converting at the line (23.4 free throws made per 100 field goals taken). At first glance, it's not clear that there's much room for improvement here. If you account for pace, we're not actually that bad at taking care of the basketball, and with a rookie and a pocket-sized two handling the playmaking duties, we're not likely to shoot up the rankings in that department. More sanely designed lineups would boost our offensive rebounding a bit (MORE RANDOLPH AND HUNTER, PLEASE), but we're basically screwed there until Biedrins comes back. Getting to the line more often? It'd be nice, but Morrow, Curry and Watson hang out on the perimeter for a reason, and in 300 minutes, Mikki has only gotten to the line nine times. Again, bigger and saner lineups would help (MORE RANDOLPH AND HUNTER, PLEASE), but we already knew that. 

It doesn't seem like this exercise has brought anything to light. I mean, it's not like we can improve our shooting. We're already shooting pretty damn well -- in fact, if we maintain our current .477 field-goal percentage, it'll be the highest for the Warriors since Webber's rookie year. There's no real way to improve on our scoring efficiency... is there?

In fact, there is. There's something we can do, a simple strategic change that could go into effect as early as tonight, a change that would absolutely improve our offense and our chances of winning every night.

The Warriors need to shoot more threes.

I'm not saying they should take one or two more a game. I'm saying they should take, like, ten more a game. Twelve wouldn't hurt.

We currently take 17.8 threes a game, 18th in the league, and when you account for pace, we fall even further behind; only 20.5% of our shots are threes, putting us 20th in the league. The Magic take 35.1% of their shots from behind the arc. We need to be like them. Now.

The eFG% that denotes shooting quality in the Four Factors stands for effective field-goal percentage... unlike regular FG%, it credits you for the extra point your three-pointers give you, which is why it's the best way to gauge effective shooting. Making threes at a 35% clip is better than making twos at a 50% clip, so if you can shoot the three competently, it's a pretty effective shot. After the dunk, the layup and the free throw, the three-pointer is the most efficient shot in basketball. In fact, it's so useful that taking lots of threes is positively correlated with winning, even if you don't shoot them all that well. Yes, really. No, really. And that shouldn't come as any surprise to Warriors fans. We led the league in 3PA/FGA just two years ago, with a much worse array of shooters than we have now.

If there was ever a roster meant to go whole-hog on three-point shooting, it's this one. We're 5th best in the league in three-point shooting as it stands. Our few remaining bodies include C.J. Watson (career 3P% .392), Vladimir Radmanovic (.382), Stephen Curry (.370, .412 in college), and Anthony By-God Morrow (.481), who -- let's be perfectly clear -- is on pace to be the best three-point shooter in the history of professional basketball. Monta's got an above-average percentage so far this season. Even Maggette can hit 'em. Yes, it's gross when he shoots threes. But his career percentage is .321... Baron's is .322. I'd sure rather see Maggette shooting from 23 feet than from 20.

It's not like this requires much of a shift. We've been living on drive-and-dishes and jump shooting already... we just need to be more energetic about taking those jump shots from long distance. Monta DRIVES and either SCORES or kicks it out, Morrow, CJ, Vlad and Curry LET IT RAIN, Maggette perhaps occasionally LETS IT RAIN, Randolph and Hunter BANG DOWN LOW, Mikki SITS, and the Warriors PROFIT. Sure, teams will start to cluster around us on the perimeter and we'll get a couple threes blocked per game. You got a better idea?

Even in these darkest of days, there are adjustments that can be made. We can claw our way back a bit closer to respectability. All we have to go is gun more from the outside. We're the Golden State Warriors. Should that really be all that hard?

Really and truly.  The recent ugliness shouldn't obscure the fact that you gave us some awesome moments.  As a wise man once said, "I'll never forget you and love you in spite of your faults/The good and the bad, I want to remember it all."  I know how you love your Waylon Jennings, Jack.

You brought swagger to a team that had forgotten what it felt like.  You reinvigorated Baron.  You covered for hundreds of defensive lapses (early on, anyway).  You mystified Dirk Nowitzki.  You nailed threes on fast breaks and laughed as you ran back down the court.  YOU ENABLED US TO DUMP MURPHY AND DUNLEAVY!  All that stuff was awesome.

Did you go out like a jackass?  Sure.  But it should be noted: your jackassedness was not solely your fault.  Robert Rowell gave you a contract extension befitting a star; Don Nelson gave you the huge minutes and offensive leeway of a star.  If you think you're better than you are, it's partially because this franchise did too, and foolishly told you so.

Good luck in Charlotte.  If you kickstart that team the way you kickstarted ours three years ago, the NBA will be a much more entertaining place.

Fare thee well, you lovable, maddening, crazy, crazy man.  It has not been boring.

A thought prompted by one of DFiB's and my patented ramble-offs.

So things got pretty dire pretty quickly up front.  Biedrins is out for at least two weeks, according to the latest reports... Ronny could conceivably come back as early as tonight, but even if he does, we've only got three big men, one of whom is close to useless.  We need to do something about this.  It'd be great if we could wring a big out of whatever deal gets Jack off our hands, but it's not clear when that deal will happen... it might not happen till December or February, and we need help now.

A complicating factor is that we don't have many roster spots available.  Almost every spot is filled by either a rotation guy, (Biedrins, Ronny, AR, Wright, 'Buike, Maggette, Morrow, Jack, Monta, Curry), a useful expiring contract (Law, Speedy) or a guy who can't yet be traded (CJ, Mikki).  But there is one spot left to play with.

Devean George is currently hurt, and even healthy, would give us nothing on the court.  He's one of the worst offensive players who still has a job in the NBA, his fading lateral quickness has made him a non-asset on defense, and he rebounds horribly for his size.  We wouldn't get any value from playing him.  I don't think we'd get any value from packaging him into a bigger trade, either... his $1.6M expiring contract is only our third-biggest, and you don't see teams taking on bunches of little expirings in trades, due to roster constraints.  We could just let his deal expire, but I'm not sure what the point would be... even if we managed to dump Jack for a '10 expiring, we'd only be a wee bit under the cap, essentially in the same MLE territory we'd be in otherwise.

Simply put, Devean George isn't really worth anything to us.  We should turn his roster spot into a big body we could use right now.  There are three way to do this:

1) We could simply drop George and pick up the best available big we can find.  He doesn't have to be great.  Even if he's worse than Mikki Moore, he'd still help us right now... better that some big scrub waste fouls on Shaq than Maggette or somebody.  We're starting to face some bigger teams.  We're not going to last long without a fourth big body we can use.

2) We could trade George to a team looking to save a tiny bit of dough, for a big whose contract is a year longer. Possibilities on that front: Alexis Ajinca of the Bobcats, James Johnson of the Bulls, Hamed Haddadi of the Grizzlies.  All three guys have failed to make their teams' rotations thus far; all three play for franchises that might want to shed '10-'11 payroll for one reason or another; all three have some potential; most critically, all three are not Devean George.  It's more than possible that these teams wouldn't want to punt on these guys' potential so quickly (although I'd bet Haddadi's available, even with Thabeet's injury)... we might get hung up on if we offered these trades.  That doesn't mean it's not worth making the calls.

3) We trade George for a big who also expires this year, sending money along to make it worth the other team's while.  Essentially, we use George to buy a player, in much the same way the Raptors used George to buy Marco from us.  Devean and cash to the Heat for Jamal Magloire?  Devean and cash to the Nets for Sean Williams?  Devean and cash to the Blazers for Juwan Howard?  Devean and cash to the Raptors for... dare I say it... Patrick O'Bryant?

I'm not gonna lie.  None of these options are pretty.  But in my mind, they're a lot prettier than playing Cleveland, Boston, Portland, Dallas and San Antonio in eight nights with two credible big men and Mikki Moore, which is exactly what we have to do starting Tuesday.  That stretch is gonna be ugly either way, but it's going to be soul-killingly horrible unless we add another big body.  Dumping Devean George seems like the best way to add that big body.

This four-day layoff came at a pretty inopportune time.  Usually you don't have a lot of time to dwell on a bad loss, because another game pushes it aside; thanks to our odd early schedule, we've still got a while to go till we can wash the taste of that Suns game out of our mouths.  It's got a lot of us feeling worried and cranky.  And to be sure, there are issues aplenty: Jack's a headache, Randolph's screwing up again, Monta's slowing himself and the team down by trying to play point guard, and we're already razor-thin in the frontcourt, two games in.

Still, I feel good about this season.  I like this team, and I like our future.  Here are five reasons why.

1) Stephen Curry!  I am not saying that he'll be Steve Nash.  I'm not saying he'll be an All-Star.  I'm not even necessarily saying he'll be an above-average point guard.  But I think we've seen enough to say that *we have a point guard*, a guy who can play and defend the position credibly.  That's a great, important thing for this franchise... it means we don't have to live and die with Monta's development.

2) Kelenna Azubuike!  Hot damn, he's looked fantastic... glad to hear he's been practicing with the first unit, because he absolutely deserves to be considered for a starting job.  There's of course a dark cloud to this silver lining: I think it's pretty much a no-brainer that 'Buike will opt out of his contract this summer.  That adds urgency to the drive to trade Jack, as we'd ideally get a clear sense of what we have in Morrow and 'Buike before we'd decide whether or not to extend them.  Right now, 'Buike's making a pretty compelling argument that we should at least think about keeping him around.

3) Andris Biedrins!  For all the talk of the MJM trio's selfishness hurting Curry, I'd say Biedrins has actually been the most affected... there hasn't been any sustained effort to get him involved in the usual screen-and-rolls of years past.  But I think Biedrins has looked pretty good out there, and in particular, his passing seems noticeably better.  His assist rate took a jump last year, and while we're only two games in, considering the smoothness with which he's been finding people, I'd expect another little jump this year.  That'd good be, not only because it'll make him a better player, but because it may make Nellie more willing to give him consistent starter's minutes.  Biedrins will never be a Nellie-friendly type of player, but I'd improved passing would make him a lot more palatable to the big man.

4) Don Nelson!  I'm not going to pretend that I think that Nellie's doing a stellar job... any athletic team with defense as woeful as ours is not being coached perfectly, and Nellie continues to think that Jack's more useful than he is.   But I do think that Nellie's doing an overall *good* job, as opposed to last year.  He's generally playing his best players and deploying lineups that make sense; as much as I hate seeing Maggette at power forward, I can at least understand where it comes from when the alternative is Mikki Moore.  Nellie's going to war with a rookie at the point at the risk of alienating a star veteran; I think that's the right call.  And he seems very good at knowing how to coax smart play out of Randolph.  

I do think that this roster's brightest moments will come under a different coach.  Between Monta and Maggette's abilities to get to the hoop, the efficiency of Biedrins, the sharp-shooting of 'Buike and Morrow and the promise of Curry, this is actually *not* a team that needs the offensive genius of Nellie to figure out how to score.  This roster's big limitations are on the other side of the ball, and that's a side where Nellie just doesn't give you much.  In a weird way, I think Nellie's a poor fit for this roster.  But Nellie *is* a very good coach when focused, and he seems genuinely focused again this year.  I hope that keeps up... if you ask me, Focused Nellie is 8 to 10 games per season better than Tuned-Out Nellie.

5) Stephen Jackson!  Okay, okay... Stephen Jackson is not a Good Thing for the Warriors right now.  But we've heard a number of rumors about possible destinations for him, enough so that it seems likely that we'll be able to dump him for '11 expirings at worst, and possibly better.  I'm frankly shocked by that; I wouldn't have thought he'd bring back that much even *before* he demanded a trade.  But luckily for us, it would seem that a lot of GMs overrate him almost as much as Rowell and Nellie do.  If his unhappiness forces us to get from under his contract, he will have actually done us a huge favor.

I really like this team.  I want Jack gone yesterday, and I'll admit to being a little tired of The Corey Maggette Show, and I'm ready for Monta to start playing like Monta again, but overall, I think this is a fun, likeable bunch of guys with some real upside.  Playoff-bound this year?  Nah, but there's real promise here.  Not in the usual "we're the Warriors and we suck so we need to pretend there's promise" sort of way, but in a "dang, we actually have pretty interesting young players at every position and a decent cap situation if we can get Jack gone" sort of way.

Of course, if we lose to Memphis at home on Wednesday, OMGSEASONZOVERFIREROWELLLARRYELLISONetc.  But for now, that glass is looking mighty half-full to me.

Geoff Lepper mentioned this thought in his most recent 48minutes column, and it's indeed an interesting thought.  We want to get rid of Stephen Jackson, but he has negative value... we'll probably either need to take back crap in return or pair him with an appealing piece to get something decent.  Monta is still an appealing piece overall, especially if he starts the season decently, and he's also a guy who's an awkward fit for us, both in relation to Curry and possibly personality-wise.  If we do end up trading Jack this year (God willing), I wouldn't be at all surprised to see Monta shipped out along with him.

So let's say this was possible.  Let's say we could trade Jack and Monta for expiring deals... for now, let's say Jack and Monta for McGrady.  I don't think Rockets would agree to this trade, even if McGrady never plays again; they have a better version of Jack in Ariza, and a GM as savvy as Morey can do better with their coming cap space than Monta and Jack.  But let's say he goes on a drinking binge and calls Riley or Nellie and offers this deal.  Should we take it?

It's close, but to me, I think it'd be worthwhile.  The subtraction of Monta and Jack would leave us with a rotation that looked something like this:

PG: Stephen Curry (30), CJ Watson (18)

SG: Anthony Morrow (32), Kelenna Azubuike (16)

SF: Corey Maggette (32), Kelenna Azubuike (16)

PF: Anthony Randolph (32), Ronny Turiaf (16)

C: Andris Biedrins (32), Ronny Turiaf (16)

It wouldn't be quite that neat, of course... Mikki Moore would probably soak up ten 4/5 minutes a night when some of the bigs get in foul trouble, Wright will grab a few minutes if and when he's healthy, and of course more injuries would muddy the picture further.  But this would pretty much be it.

I like this lineup, for six reasons:

1) It features eight guys at their natural positions.

2) All eight guys are efficient scorers (assuming Curry rediscovers his stroke).

3) All four backcourt members can shoot the three (again, assuming Curry's return to form).

4) This is a better rebounding lineup than any that features Monta at the two and/or Jack at the three.  This is, in fact, a downright *good* rebounding lineup, if Curry's rebounding is anywhere near the level projected.

5) This is an efficient allocation of minutes, with everybody getting the playing time they deserve.  As things stand, useful players like CJ and Azubuike will rarely see action... in this scenario, we'd get value out of their presences.

6) This is, at least as far as we know, a 100% drama-free group.  It's basically Kawakami-proof.

There are, of course, some problems.  Our defense would suffer without Jack; our aggregate playmaking would be worse; we'd be punting on Monta's possible superstar potential.  But to me, none of these quite qualify as dealbreakers.  We had the league's worst defense last year *with* Jack, and our younger guys might develop more quickly if they're not told he'll be there to bail them out (which, again, he usually didn't last year).  Our assist totals would go down, but so would our turnovers; I don't think our overall playmaking would suffer much.  And if Monta can't play the point, as it seems like he can't, he probably *doesn't* have superstar potential... he's an undersized two who doesn't shoot threes and is iffy on defense.  He's as good as anyone with that description could possibly be, but that falls a bit south of "superstar".

Don't get me wrong... we'd be worse this season without Monta and Jack, particularly if the injury bug hits again.  But I doubt we'd be more than 5-6 games worse than if we had them.  And next summer, we'd have enough room to sign a max player, no matter how low the cap goes.  Who would that be?  I have no idea... I don't think we'd land any A-list guys.  But the flexibility would sure be nice.

So, overall, yeah.  I think I'd be okay with saying goodbye to Monta if it meant saying goodbye to Jack and getting cap space back.  But it's really all predicated on Curry panning out.  If he's as good as we all hope, Monta is thoroughly expendable.  If he's not -- if his shot doesn't return, if his playmaking doesn't live up to projections, if he can't defend credibly -- it's probably too risky.

It's yet one more reason why I'm excited to see Curry's regular-season debut tomorrow night.  If this kid's a star or anything close to it, things will get very, very interesting.

What do y'all think?  Is Monta + Jack better than or worse than 2010 cap space?

This thing got ugly quick.  I don't think we're yet past the point of no return... Jack's a sane and intelligent guy, and it's not impossible that he'll shape up come Opening Day and things will quiet down a little.  But the odds of that aren't looking very good.  Jack has created a nasty feedback loop, where trading him becomes both more necessary and more difficult.  There's no way we're getting any expiring '10 contracts for him... there's no way we're getting anything of real value here.  The guy's looking pretty radioactive right now, and the only way we'd be able to move him would be if we took a horrible contract back.  I'm talking HORRIBLE.

We're Warriors fans... we're used to staring horrible in the face.  So let's look at the worst case scenario.  Let's assume it comes down to the grossest contract in the league.  Let's talk about Stephen Jackson for Eddy Curry.  (We'd have to throw in one of our expirings to make the trade work... I threw in Speedy, but Law would work too.)  If there were no other possibilities, if it came down to trading for Curry or nothing, should we do it?

The argument against is pretty simple.  Eddy Curry is a horrible player on a horrible contract, a malcontent, a fat and lazy bum, a blight on the earth.  Wherever he goes, locusts and vultures and spiders follow soon after.  The very idea of him is almost depressing beyond belief.  The sheer negative power of the karmic combination of Eddy Curry and this franchise could create streams-crossing levels of risk to the universe as a whole.  It's not hard to argue against this trade.

I'm going to argue *for* this trade.  My argument has five pillars:

1) This is a trade we could make tomorrow.  The Knicks would love to get out of the Eddy Curry business.  They're about the only bad team that can feel somewhat confident that Jack will play hard for them.  They could use another decent player to try to attract free agents.  Above all, they could use as much '10 cap space as they can find, to try to attract free agents... this would give them $2.8 million more of it.  There's an argument that we should wait till the deadline to find a more attractive deal, but that deal may never come... come February, there will be many more appealing guys available than Jack.  Pressing the dreaded Eddy Curry button now would end this headache.

2) We actually could use a power forward, and we're not likely to get any decent ones in return for Jack.  On the rare occasions when Eddy Curry plays, he plays a position of need for us... he plays that position badly, but he's probably not much worse than Mikki Moore.  I'd rather see Curry out there than Moore, for entertainment value, if nothing else.

3) An unhappy Eddy Curry would be much less of a distraction to this franchise than an unhappy Stephen Jackson.  An unhappy Jack brings a lot of baggage: "We Believe" memories, captaincies, friendships with other Warriors.  There'd be no baggage with Eddy Curry.  He's just some goof we'd be adding for non-basketball reasons.  No history, no fuss, no problem.  If he's feeling down, he doesn't even need to show up.  What do we care?  He sucks, after all.

4) Curry's contract expires in 2011 (assuming he exercises his player option next summer, which he absolutely will).  An $11.3 million-dollar expiring contract always has value as a trade chip, no matter what the economy's doing.  There are always going to be some teams that need to shed payroll for one reason or another... come February of 2011, those teams are going to be mighty interested in Eddy Curry all of a sudden.

5) Even more intriguing than the prospect of trading his contract, though, is the prospect of simply letting it expire.  This trade would leave us with Monta, Beans, Maggette, Turiaf (assuming he exercises his player option), Randolph and Curry under contract for a total of about $40.7 million dollars, with 'Buike, Morrow and Wright as our relevant free agents... depending on the cap level, we could have $12-15 million to play with before we re-sign any of those guys.  This would be a pretty interesting situation.

2011 will be a much weaker free agent market than 2010, of course, but it'll feature a smaller number of bidders, as well.  There definitely won't be that many *attractive* bidders -- most of the destination teams will have already shot their wad this summer.  2011 is a year where we might actually win the bidding for somebody.  And who might that somebody be?

Andrei Kirilenko will be 30 to start the '11-'12 season.  That's not young, and he's not necessarily the type who'll age gracefully... there'd be some risk to signing him.  But you can't tell me that a Curry/Monta/Maggette/Kirilenko/Randolph/Biedrins/Turiaf core doesn't sound at least a little interesting.  Would a $26 million two-year deal be enough to nab a thirty-year-old Kirilenko?  I think it's at least possible.

So, yeah, I'd do it.  If it came to it, I'd trade Stephen Jackson for Eddy Curry.  Would you?  Would you pay... the Ultimate Price?

(I figure it'd be good to discuss the first game most of us were able to see... if a mod puts up a recap, feel free to remove this.)

So, that wasn't pretty.  There was no real reason to expect it to be... if you only have two real NBA-quality bigs in uniform, the Lakers are not the team you want to play.  Add in the absence of 'Buike and the early exit of Monta, and this was bound to be ugly.

Still and all, I gotta say that I was delighted to see the boys again.  Fun to see Randolph's hyperness, fun to see Morrow's quick release, fun to see Maggette being his jostling, frustrating self.  I like these guys!

You can't glean much from a preseason game, but if we're not gonna overanalyze, why are we here?  Thusly:

1) If Stephen Jackson's body language looked familiar, that's because it was identical to Al Harrington's body language around this time last year.  Tunnel vision, gunning, no interest in fighting through screens (that was Jack who gave Sasha those open jumpers), *zero* rebounds.  The idea that Jack is a brilliant team leader becomes more comical by the month... it's a PR gimmick he invented, a savvy one, but an empty one.   If we can move him for contracts that expire in '11, I think we've got to consider that.  It would be good to not have the guy anymore.

2) Curry!  He reminded me of a young Monta, actually -- more shooting and less driving, o' course, but another little combo guard who can do a lot of stuff and makes his share of mistakes.  I'm very, very excited about him, but I'm not convinced that giving him heavy PG minutes to start his NBA career is the right move... learning the league *and* the position simultaneously is a lot to ask.  He seems like he's at least annoying on defense, which is a start.

3) God, I love Randolph.  I don't know if he'll get as good as we all hope, but he's pretty damn entertaining as it stands.

4) There was something exciting about watching Morrow catch fire and realizing that last year really wasn't a fluke... that we really got a pretty good player out of nowhere.  If the franchise's plan is to promote Randolph, Curry and Morrow as our nucleus for the future, this game accomplished that, if nothing else.  I heart those three.

5) Not much to say about the other returning vets.  Glad to hear Monta's okay.  Biedrins was Biedrins, and it's weird how nobody thinks that's an important thing anymore... we still have a good young center here, people.  I didn't have any beef with Maggette's game, as it's not like we should expect him to be able to cover Pau Gasol.

6) I didn't see much in the four non-Curry newcomers.  Law's numbers look good, but really he shot a lot of free throws because Lakers kept bumping into him randomly, not because he was making things happen.  He's playing hard, at least, and I guess he's probably good enough that we wouldn't miss CJ if we threw him into a package deal near the deadline.  Moore didn't look at all useful... Pruitt didn't show anything to make you think he's a must-sign.  It did put a smile on my face to see Speedy, and he did okay in limited time.  But really, if any of these guys play significant minutes, something's gone wrong (which it already has, with Wright's injury... I hope we're trolling the D-league for an improvement on Moore). 

Overall, it was vintage Dubs basketball: a bunch of fun plays, porous defense, tons of mistakes.  Most of the guys played hard, though, and for a night where we faced the world champs and were several rotation guys short, it could've been worse.  A .500 season isn't out of the question.  But the first order of business should be to get Jack out of there... he's making a stink, he doesn't lead, he doesn't rebound, he doesn't shoot well, and his defense isn't nearly good enough to solve our problems on that end.  Thank him for the good times and send him on his way... let's kill "We Believe" once and for all and see what the young 'uns can do.

The thread jae started about a possible trade for Amar'e Stoudemire (trying to get used to the apostrophe) has been one of the best around here for awhile.  It's covered a lot of ground and inspired a lot of useful, thoughtful discussion.  It's also revealed one simple fact: collectively, we seem pretty conflicted about this trade.  Amar'e offers big upside, but any trade would involve giving up a lot of talent and taking on a lot of financial risk... there are arguments in both directions. Some GSOMers think we need to grab this guy at all costs, some GSOMers think it's not worth messing with the young talent we have, and some GSOMers fall somewhere in between.  

I have no hope of ending this debate, nor any desire to do... as I said, it's been a great discussion, and people on all sides are making excellent points.  But I do want to try to get a rough sense of how many people are taking each position.

There are obviously thousands of possible offers we could make, a few of which have been suggested by people (including me), but most will never come close to happening, and trying to account for all of them would bog us down, at any rate.  Let's stick to the various packages that the teams have actually discussed, according to reports: the base package of Biedrins/Wright/Belinelli, that package plus Curry, or that package plus Curry and Azubuike.  (A Biedrins/Curry/Belinelli configuration was briefly rumored, but didn't seem to have legs, and it'd mess up the math anyway.)

So.  How far would you go?  Package A?  Package B?  Package C?  No offer?  Any offer?  Where you at?

This time of year, both of GSOM and on most other NBA blogs, you'll see the acronym "BPA" an awful lot.  The credo of "best player available" is a fairly sacred one in fan circles, and understandably so.  If your team is bad -- and the teams of most fans who obsess over the draft surely are -- you want your team to aggregate talent above all else.  Don't worry about making pieces fit if the resulting puzzle is ugly.  Don't pass up Michael Jordan just because you have Clyde Drexler; don't draft Patrick O'Bryant just because you want a center and he's the next one on the list.  When drafting, it is said, your team should follow one and only one commandment: DRAFT THE BEST PLAYER AVAILABLE.

That's wrong.

It's not wrong in the simplest sense -- you *should* draft the best player available whenever possible.  But the point is, *there is usually no obvious best player available*.  This year, anyone with a pulse will tell you that the best player is Blake Griffin, and the Clippers will draft him accordingly.  But that's the exception, not the rule.  Memphis currently sits at two... the consensus pick there is probably Ricky Rubio, but if he's a majority choice, he's only barely one.  The third pick is probably Hasheem Thabeet by a weak  plurality, and after that it's pure chaos.  In well over 90% of NBA draft slots, this year and in most years, nobody agrees on who the best player is.

That's not to say that a particular person doesn't have a strong opinion about the best available players.  Many GSOM posters have ranked the top prospects in some order or another... NBA GMs obviously do the same.  But it's unrealistically reductive to assume that every GM's top-ranked guy is and should be the right choice.  GMs are surrounded by assistants, coaches, scouts, statisticians, owners, friends, mentors, influential and knowledgeable players... the best GMs listen to these people.  Do the GMs ultimately reject the input of others and take the guy they had in their gut all along?  Sure... they often do.  But they sometimes don't, and they're sometimes right to stop listening to their gut.  Determining who the best available player is is often next to impossible.  And it's sort of obvious why.

Think about it.  You're evaluating hundreds of players, some as young as 19, some (in the case of certain overseas players) as old as 25.  Players from dozens of different countries, players of all different positions and shapes and sizes.  You're judging them on play -- shooting, driving, rebounding, passing, defense -- but if you're a good GM, you're looking at a lot more than that.  You're looking at their psychological makeup.  You're looking at their health.  You're looking at their chances to be a superstar... you're looking at their chances to be a bust.  You're looking at their ability to handle the media, and yes, you're probably looking at their marketing potential, or lack thereof.  The NBA is an infinitely complicated business.  It's tempting to say that the right drafting strategy is determining the best available player and picking that person, but the situation is often not nearly so simple.  Quite often, you're left with a bunch of guys who, when you balance all the various dimensions, seem about equally promising.  If that's the case, how do you break the tie?

It's really sort of obvious: you draft the guy you *need*.

There are several relevant actors in the Kings' front office, and they may not -- by most accounts, do not -- agree on the best player who'll be available at four.  But they can agree on one thing: *they need a point guard*.  If all else is equal -- if you can draft a B-minus power forward or a B-minus point guard -- why *wouldn't* you draft the guy who'd actually address the issues on your basketball team?

Many Warriors fans, including many of the smartest Warriors fans, are allergic to this idea.  When you have a crappy team like ours, the feeling is that you need to maximize the potential of every single draft pick.  Don't let a stud pass you buy... don't let a dud seduce you because of fit.  And at the extremes, this philosophy is absolutely right.  If the available picks include Danny Granger and a bunch of guys who have significantly less potential than Danny Granger, forget about positions and take Danny Granger.  If you really want a center, but the best one available is significantly worse than many available players at other positions, you shouldn't draft a center.  I don't think anyone here would disagree.

But usually, it's not nearly that clear.  Usually, you're looking at a bunch of guys with comparably similar potential.  In that scenario, not only *can* you think of your team's needs, you *must*.  Which is why the ideal drafting philosophy is *not* as simple as "BPA"... it's something more like this:

1) If one player is *clearly* the best available player, you must take that player.

2) If no such player exists, you must take the top-tier player who best fits your team's needs.

I don't always (or even often) agree with Chad Ford, but his concept of draft "tiers" is absolutely right. He has revealed his rankings of this year's top crop.  They are by no means the gospel, and I actively disagree with a couple of his rankings, but let's regard them as wise for the sake of argument.

Tier 1

Blake Griffin

Tier 2

Tier 3

What does this mean?  It means that if Blake Griffin is available, you *have* to take him, no matter your positional situation, because he's the only Tier 1 guy there is.  (Even the Clippers understand that.)  But if you have the #2 pick -- whether you're Memphis, Minnesota or whoever -- it's not quite so simple.  There are three available players of fairly similar value, similar enough so that trying to determine the "best player available" is essentially impossible.  In that case, take the Tier 2 guy who fits you best.  For the Grizzles, it's probably Thabeet... for the Wolves, it's probably Rubio.  Either pick would be completely defensible, even if you thought a guy who fit you worse might have *mildly* higher potential.

The Warriors?  Well, as always, we're a weird case.  It's not actually that clear what our "need" position even is.  *But it is totally appropriate that we would take that into consideration.*  If there is no available guy who jumps out, you *have* to take the shape of your roster and franchise into account.  There is no reward at year's end for the team that accrued the most players with agreed-upon "potential" scores... there is only reward for the teams that won the most basketball games.  Fit shouldn't trump potential, especially on bad teams... but fit is far easier to measure than potential.  When the potential of two players seems for all the world to be similar, you should pick the one you think you *need* more.  That's just logic.

I don't post this to suggest we should be leaning hard towards one player or away from another... I don't follow the college game at all closely enough, or understand the difference between levels well enough, to have an informed opinion about any of these guys.  But I do think our collective conversation could use a little kick in the pants.  "BPA" is not a very illuminating credo by itself.  Need is of secondary but still-critical importance, and any argument that omits that misses the boat.

(This got really long.  I'm sorry for what I've caused.)

Tonight's win -- against a strong Hornets team, despite the absence of our top four players -- was fantastic.  It was one of our most impressive, most satisfying and most encouraging games of the season.  But more than anything, it got me thinking about this team's most critical flaw.

We lost 34 games last year... this season, we'll probably lose, say, 52.  Eighteen games is an ocean's worth of difference, and if we want to make the playoffs again anytime soon, we're going to need to make up most of that.  Dramatic improvements aren't easy in the NBA; you usually need a star to show up, and Blake Griffin and Chris Bosh dreams notwithstanding, there's no particular reason to think one will.

So how do we get better?  What's the most important thing for this team to focus on going forward?

Health is the easiest answer.  A full season of Monta, and fewer nicks and scrapes in general, and we'll certainly improve.  But health will be there or it won't... that's nothing that the coaching staff or players can really control.

Rebounding?  Rebounding's an issue for us, and an area in which we can improve a bit next season simply by playing two bigs at all times (preferably Biedrins and Randolph more often than not).  But let's not forget, we won 48 games last season despite getting significantly outrebounded by our opponents.  We have been, and can be, a successful team without being a rebounding force.

Defense?  Well, our defense definitely stinks, and ideally we'd improve it.  But a team with this roster and this coach is never going to be all that good at defense.  The best we can do is to slow the bleeding there a bit.  Defense won't be our salvation.

A true point guard?  Would be nice, I guess, but I just don't see a pressing need.  Our offense has been decent, and it's been quite strong whenever Monta's played.  He may not be a true point, but we seem to score just fine whenever we slot him there.  I don't see a pure point guard being vital to our improvement.

So what is it?  If it's not health or rebounding or defense or a new point guard, what is the key to improving?

The key is simple.  To travel down the road to respectability, we need to focus on, well... the road.

Tonight's win clinched a winning record for us at the Oracle on the year.  We'll finish no more than six games worse than last season at home, and we might cut that deficit to three or four games.  And our 21-17 record is no fluke, either... we're outscoring opponents by 2.6 points per game at home, a better point differential than either the Hornets or Suns have on the year overall.  At home, we're an above-average NBA team.

But on the road, we're 6-32, and with a -9.9 PPG differential, if anything, we're a little crappier than that record suggests.  No NBA team's had an overall point differential that bad since the '99-'00 Clippers, and that team was no picnic.  I mean, we are *disgustingly* bad on the road.  We won 21 games on the road last season, and the most we can possibly win this year is nine.  There is currently a *fifteen-game* disparity between our home record and our road record.

Now, a disparity between your home record and your road record is natural.  Minnesota has identical home and road records this season... every other team is better at home than on the road, and in several cases the gaps are big.  The Hawks have as big a gap between their home and road records as us, and Utah's gap is a bit *bigger* than ours... they're 32-7 in SLC and a mere 14-23 on the road.  Teams tend to struggle more away from home.

Still, there's nobody quite like us.  At home, we play like a six seed... on the road, we play like one of the worst teams in league history.  So the obvious questions are 1) why, and 2) what can be done about it?

The first answer people might throw out there is youth -- the idea that our guys are just too inexperienced to pull out wins in front of unfriendly crowds.  I imagine this is a factor, but I don't think it's an overwhelmingly large one.  Portland is even younger than we are (the absent LaFrentz skews their numbers), and they're a fairly solid 17-20 at home.  Memphis and OKC, two young and thoroughly crappy teams, edge us by a game on the road.  Young teams do struggle on the road, but they don't usually struggle like *us*.  I don't think youth is the whole answer.

Fatigue probably plays a part.  Teams play many more back-to-backs on the road than at home, and the second half of back-to-backs are very hard games for teams.  I'd think that'd be doubly true for a team that plays at the fastest pace in the league and shoots lots of jumpers.  But in fact, we're 5-9 in second halves of back-to-backs... 3-0 at home, 2-9 on the road.  2-9 is pretty bad, but we're 4-23 in all of our other road games, which is only marginally worse.  So fatigue isn't really the answer either.

I'd expected the biggest factor to be defense.  Anecdotally, my impression is that the enthusiasm of the Oracle crowd spurs this team into more of a defensive effort than they usually give on the road.  But the numbers don't bear that out at all.  Our opponents score 112.9 points per game in Oracle and 112.6 points per everywhere else, meaning we actually give up *fewer* points on the road.  I think our home defense has been a tiny bit better than our road defense, as our opponents score those 112.6 non-Oracle points more efficiently, with fewer shot attempts and turnovers.  Still, the difference is miniscule.  Our defensive effort on the road is not the problem.

It's our *offense* that's killing us on the road.  We take the same number of shots both at home and on the road, but we miss 3.5 more of them on the road, we take 5.5 fewer free throws on the road, we record 3.3 fewer assists on the road, and we turn the ball over an extra 1.5 times on the road, to boot.  The result?  We score 115.5 points per in Oracle and 102.7 per on the road, for a mind-boggling differential of 12.8.

This is... pretty weird.  Most teams aren't like this.  For most teams, their worse performance on the road is due to worse defense, with slightly worse offense on top of it.  For us, it's all due to a catastrophic drop in our offense.  You can explain some of this with context -- our schedule has been home-heavy during our most prolific periods, when Jack was hot and Monta was around -- but not all of it.  We just seem to forget how to score on the road.  'Buike, Biedrins, Monta, Randolph and Wright all shoot significantly better in Oracle than elsewhere... Jack only shoots a little better in Oracle, but is much more productive generally there.  And Maggette's disparity is absurd: he shoots 54% from the field in Oracle, but only 38% elsewhere.

I'm not exactly sure how a team goes about addressing this, but at the risk of straying too far off the stats reservation, it seems to me that this team could use a little more confidence when it hits the road.  I'm not talking about the swagger that a guy like Jack puts forth -- I'm talking about confidence in your offensive game plan and confidence in your teammates.  Even in this disaster of a season, the young, flawed Warriors have responded and played well whenever crowds have cheered them on... they've played smart, enthusiastic team basketball in Oakland.  On the road, they've settled for isolation and gunning far more often, and it's hurt them horribly.

The key guy is Nellie.  Monta can try to lead the offense, Jack can try, guys like Marco and CJ can try in their brief appearances, but really it's on Nellie to make these guys play smart offense.  It's his bread and butter, it's something this team can do fairly well when directed properly, and it's not like Nellie's busy teaching guys about defense.

To make the playoffs next year, we'll need to be able to squeeze fifteen wins out of road games.  To do that, we'll need to play significantly smarter offense away from home.  And that will only happen if Nellie demands it.  He's gotten nice offensive play out of this team in Oakland, but he needs to keep their focus sharp elsewhere.  Without that, the Dark Ages 2.0 will continue.

Sounds crazy, I know.  Every road game we play, our opponents' announcers mention Morrow's 37-point game, and meanwhile he's scoring like nine points on middling shooting.  It seems like Morrow was a flash in the pan and he'll never amount to anything.

I'm not entirely convinced.  Don't get me wrong -- I'm not saying the guy's going to be a star.  But he plays effective basketball.  Even since he went cold, he's helped us.  And he's one of the better rookies in the league.

Let's look at his December numbers.  These numbers don't include his 37-point and 25-point games... these are all numbers that have come since Morrow, seemingly, turned back into a pumpkin.  How has Morrow done in December?  Let's look at his numbers prorated to 36 minutes per game.  (He's played over 20 minutes a game this month, so this isn't some sort of POB/Kosta-style imaginary inflation.)

Anthony Morrow, December, RATE/36

15.8 points, .438 FG%, .333 3P%, .875 FT%, 5.6 REB, 2.1 AST, 0.7 TO, 1.6 ST

His shooting isn't great -- remember, we're only looking at his colder month -- but it's far from disastrous.  It's substantially better than Jack and Crawford's, and the percentages are better than Maggette's, though Maggette's ability to get to the line closes the gap between them.  Even in December, Morrow's been an okayish scorer.

But the scoring's not what I want to look at.  Look at Morrow's other numbers.  They're *good*.

5.6 rebounds is downright elite for a shooting guard.  Morrow's played the three some as well, so "elite" would be overstating it, but he's a good rebounder.

2.1 assists?  Nothing special.  But 0.7 turnovers per game, and a 3:1 assist/turnover ratio?  Those numbers are pretty damn special.  Morrow almost never makes a mistake out there.  He's not a talented passer, but he makes such good decisions that his passing is an asset anyway.

Finally, Morrow has averaged 1.6 steals per 36 minutes in December.  On the year, only Watson's stolen at a rate that high.  Morrow's savvy shows up on defense, as well.  (To round out his stats, he only has one block on the season.  That ain't good.  On the other hand, that's one more than Marco.)

A final point about Morrow that the stats don't quite relate: he fouls smartly.  When Morrow gets whistled, more often than not, it's a spot where a foul makes sense.  Whether it's a layup, a breakaway or a mismatch in the spot, Morrow has a good sense of when to foul an opponent.

Morrow's Roland Rating is still the highest, by far, of any Warrior.  Is that number skewed by his 37-point/25-point back-to-back?  Sure.  But he's played in 21 games at this point, and those two games represent less than 20% of his minutes on the season, so it's not like those two games alone could make a bad player look good.  The vast majority of his minutes have come during this brutal 3-15 slide... Morrow's Roland Rating has stayed high.

I'm starting to think Anthony Morrow is a pretty good player.  He's not going to shoot 60% from three-point land his whole career, but even when he's not shooting great, he helps you.  He doesn't put you in a hole by trying to shoot his way out of slumps.  He's above-average on the boards... he passes decently.  He'll take the ball away from your opponents a good bit, and he'll almost never give it back to them.  He's probably not a good defender overall, but he's not a terrible one... after Jack, I think he might be the best non-big defender we have.  This is a guy who, even cold, helps you more than he hurts you.  And if he can keep his three-point shooting in the 38-40% range (he's still at .451 on the season, tenth in the league, so it's not an outrageous assumption), he's a real asset.

Bright spots are few and far between right now.  But Anthony Morrow is one.  We have a rookie who's already a pretty decent NBA player.  And that's something to be excited about.

With this horrible stretch of losses, some people have started saying we should punt on the season and just try to position ourselves for a high pick in next year's draft.  It's an understandable impulse, but here are five reasons why we shouldn't do it.

1) Tanking Is Gross

As bad as we've generally been over the last fifteen years, we've almost never explicitly tanked... there's almost always some effort behind bad Warriors teams, no matter how misguided.  Actual, honest-to-God tanking, like the Heat did last year and the Celts did the year before, is disgusting and dispiriting.  I have friends who are Celtics fans who are still ashamed of '06-'07.  We wouldn't respect ourselves in the morning.

2) Tanking Usually Doesn't Work Anyway

Very few teams become playoff contenders just because they land a top-five pick.  For every Lebron and Dwight Howard, there are a whole bunch of Adam Morrisons and Shaun Livingstons and Drew Goodens and, dare we remember, Mike Dunleavys.  Hell, J-Rich was the #5 pick, and as much as we all loved him, he never really got us anywhere.

3) It's A Weak Draft Class, With Lots Of Point Guards

Both these things are relevant.  People are projecting next year's crop of rookies to be pretty middling... grabbing the #5 pick in this draft wouldn't mean nearly as much as it would in a strong year.  Additionally, there'll be no shortage of point guards in the first round, most of whom show comparable potential.  We may end up wanting a point guard for sure, but why strain for the third-best one when the fifth-best one will be about as good?

4) This Franchise Can't Stand Another Nightmare Year

Look at how crazed we've all gotten after a six-game losing streak early in the year. Those twelve years in the wilderness had their effects on this fanbase... Warriors fans are SCARRED.  Yes, Oracle attendance generally remained high during the dark days, but I don't think it could survive another gut-wrenching fall down to the very bottom of the league.  The difference between 26-56 and 36-46 might not mean much to some franchises, but it means a lot to this one.  The franchise needs to convince the fans that this team is, if not good, at least still worth taking seriously.

5) We're Not Capable Of Tanking

I know this sounds odd.  I'm not saying we're so good that we couldn't possibly manage to lose... that's ridiculous.  As we know all too well, this team can lose.  This team seems pretty damn good at it.

But think about what tanking generally entails.  The way teams tank is to bench their star veterans for specious reasons and to give a lot of playing time to young, unproven guys.  If we did that, we'd actually get better.

If Jackson, Maggette and Crawford all sat out the rest of the season with mysterious, undisclosed injuries, we'd improve.  I'm not saying those guys are horrible (though they're all flawed and have all played poorly thus far)... I'm saying that minutes that don't go to Jackson, Maggette and Crawford will go to Wright, Watson, Turiaf, Randolph and Morrow.  Nellie would be forced to play some bigger lineups, and in doing so, would accidentally start winning some games.

I'm not saying our young guys are world-beaters.  Randolph's a spaz.  Morrow may have been a flash in the pan.  Marco's not very good.  Watson probably isn't as good as he's been lately.  But Wright *is* good, and so is Turiaf (who's only 25 himself), and we've played better with guys like Randolph and Morrow and Watson on the floor.  Lineups composed of Monta, Biedrins and those guys would win some games.

Hell, think about Richard Hendrix.  He's a second-round pick who's currently in the D-League... if you wanted to tank, he's the EXACT kind of player you'd turn to.  Well, does anybody here think we'd be worse if we started playing Richard Hendrix?  I sure as hell don't.  He might not be any good, but he's a type of player we could use, so we certainly wouldn't suffer for his presence.  This team is simply not designed to lose 60 games.

We will probably go something like 32-50, and get the ninth pick in the draft, and it'll sorta suck.  But it's better than being terrible and hoping for a rookie savior.  Tanking's gross, it usually doesn't work, it especially wouldn't work this year, it's not something this franchise can risk, and I don't think we could even do it if we tried.

Kawakami: Stephen Jackson is the Warriors’ best player, but his peripheral stats stink

I think Kawakami can be kind of a goofball sometimes, but this is worth reading.  It basically underlines a lot of the issues many of us have been complaining about.

- Jack's plus-minus stats are terrible.  We shoot better and opponents shoot worse when he's *off* the floor.  Some of that is due to the fact the Jack's not on the floor for garbage time; nevertheless, it's worth noting that we consistently win in garbage time, because we play a regular-sized lineup.  Kawakami still seems to think that Jack's our best player, even better than Monta, which takes some real mental gymnastics.  Jack has been hurting us.

- Maggette's defensive numbers are as bad as you'd think: teams shoot significantly better against us when he's on the floor.  Nevertheless, his plus-minus stats are much better than Jack's, because Maggette has been fairly efficient on offense, even with his cold shooting.

- Crawford is scary bad so far on defense, FAR worse than Maggette (which accords with my sense of this past week's games).  We give up points at a 135-per-game pace when Crawford plays.  Kawakami: "It’s a tiny sample size, but Jamal Crawford might be the worst defensive player the Warriors have ever had, which is saying something."  Oy.

- Azubuike's plus-minus is surprisingly bad.  I suspect that's partly due to the fact that Azubuike is usually featured in the smallest lineups we use.  Still, troubling.

- We are dramatically better when Wright is on the floor (both offensively and defensively), when Watson is on the floor, and when Turiaf is on the floor.  None of this should be a surprise to anyone who's been watching the games.

The takeaways: Nellie is every bit the fool we think is for keeping Wright and Turiaf on the pine.  What Jack is doing is really, really not working.  Crawford may be an even worse acquisition than some of us feared.  And C.J. Watson is turning into a quality backup, making the Crawford trade completely pointless.

Adjustments could address almost all of these problems: you clamp down on Jack, make Wright a starter, give Turiaf 25 minutes a night, make Crawford a sixth man (if not seventh), and we'll play better.  Will Nellie make any of those adjustments?  I'm not holding my breath.

With a roster in flux like ours, it's a worthwhile question... after all, you'd ideally give your best players the most minutes.  I'd rank our best players, from best to worst, like this:

1. Andris Biedrins

Biedrins is pretty clearly our stud -- he's providing elite performance at the most important position, and he's the main reason that Nellieball has been at all effective in the last two-plus years. This dude should be playing as much as his stamina and foul situations allow. Happily, Nellie seems to have finally realized that.

2. Monta Ellis

We haven't seen him yet, obviously, and he could be a different player when he comes back... maybe his injury has slowed him down, maybe he's learned a new trick or two, as he has in previous offseasons. Nevertheless, I think this will end up being the right slot for him: less important than Biedrins, more skilled than everyone else. Like Biedrins, he should play as much as his conditioning will allow.

3. Corey Maggette

He hasn't been great so far, but I believe in Corey Maggette. He's clearly a smart, effective player... when his shot starts falling consistently, he'll be a real asset. He should play starter's minutes, but probably *not* at power forward.

4. Brandan Wright

This is where this may start to get controversial, but I'm confident that Wright deserves to be this high... if anything, I could see an argument for slotting him above Maggette.

Brandan Wright has been effective just about every time Nellie has called his number over the last two years. He scores efficiently, he blocks shots, he hustles, and he doesn't make many mistakes... we do markedly better when he's on the floor. This is no longer a fluke. We have a very good young power forward, and somehow he's *eighth* on the team in minutes.

Brandan Wright should be starting for us. I don't know that he's tough enough to play 30-35 minutes a night for a full NBA season... in fact, I suspect that he's not. But we should put him out there and let his performance tell us when he's had enough. He's good enough to deserve that opportunity.

5. Stephen Jackson

I'm not putting Jack this low to hate on him. I like Jack a lot. He's important to this team, and he's taken on an unfairly heavy load so far this year. Having said that, he isn't the best player on our team or anything close to it. He's inefficient on offense, especially so this year, and a dreadful rebounder; he's a good passer, but not nearly the playmaker that he thinks he is. He's a defensive asset, particularly because he can defend so many types of players, but I think his defense has been a little off so far this season. Jack helps us on a lot of plays, but he kills us on a bunch too, far more than the four guys I've listed above him.

I think Jack should probably start for us, especially since Monta may need help running the offense. However, Jack should *never* be our first option offensively, and he should *not* lead the team in minutes, much less the league. 30 minutes a night of a Jack that focuses on shutdown defense and taking open threes is the best version. Iron-Man Gunning Jack should be in our rearview mirror as soon as possible.

6. Jamal Crawford

While I didn't love the trade that brought him here, Jamal Crawford looks to be a strong sixth man for us: scoring, playmaking and spunk is not a bad combo. He's like Stephen Jackson without the defense: an All-Star that ain't, but it makes for a dandy third guard. 25-30 minutes a night would suffice, as I really don't like the idea of him and Jack on the floor together for long stretches.

7. Kelenna Azubuike

Buike continues to be solid, and if he's your second guy off the bench, that speaks well for your depth. Ideally Nellie finds a way to get him around 25 minutes a game.

8. Ronny Turiaf

Perfect for his role. He could maybe play a few more minutes than he does, but he fouls too frequently to ever be anything resembling a starter.

9. Anthony Morrow

Hard to know what this guy is. He could still be good -- could potentially rise on this list. I don't think he merits more minutes than Crawford or Azubuike as things stand.

10. C.J. Watson

A fine reserve guard. I think CJ gets a bad rap, and in fact I think there's an argument that he should be ahead of Morrow on the depth chart. Having said that, he shouldn't be playing over most of our guards. I'd be down to see him 15 minutes a night, whenever our ball-handling gets dicey.

11. Anthony Randolph

This guy is fun to watch, and like everyone here, I'm intrigued by his potential. Let's also keep in mind -- he currently sucks. Rebounds well, blocks some shots, has a smooth handle, but he plays like a chicken with its head cut off, and there's no particular reason why we should want that. Brandan Wright is currently a better player in every way that matters; Randolph can probably lead a fast break more smoothly than Wright, but does anybody really want to watch Randolph leading fast breaks right now?

Randolph is a fine play in garbage time, or, maybe occasionally, as a brief change of pace. He should not be a part of our regular rotation. There's a good argument, in fact, for sending him down to the D-League. I think being around Nellie might be more important than the in-game experience he'd get down there, but the point is, Randolph playing significant NBA minutes isn't great for him or us. We don't want him learning bad habits, and we don't want to suck. It's time Nellie sat on this guy a little bit.

12. Marco Belinelli

Might currently be a bit better than Randolph, but has less potential and is buried deeper, considering the composition of the team. He's shown no real indication that he deserves more than garbage time.

------

Monta, Jack, Maggette, Wright and Biedrins is a credible starting lineup, and Crawford/Azuibuike/Turiaf is a fine trio off the bench. This team is not hurting for talent. Nellie just needs to adjust to the realities on the ground. Biedrins and Wright should be playing alongside one another, no matter how much that crimps Nellie's usual style, no matter how many wacky guards they displace. Stephen Jackson is a complementary player, and he should get minutes and responsibilities that reflect that.

I still like this team. But Nellie needs to steer it better. Here's hoping tonight's game made him more aware of that.

That's my take on our roster, from best to worst.  What do other folks think?

Al certainly didn't go out with a bang, but I enjoyed his presence the last year or two.  He was really fun to watch when he was on, he had some big performances for us, and most of all, he was neither Mike Dunleavy nor Troy Murphy.  Really likeable guy.  He had a falling out with Nellie, but that's certainly not the first time that's happened with Nellie... I don't think it means Al was unprofessional or a bad Warrior.

My biggest memory of Al is actually of his defense: of the killer job he did against Yao last year (not unlike Maggette's schooling of Aldridge the other day).  Al was, if not a great player, an interesting, versatile player, and he lit up the Oracle on a good number of nights.  I will remember him fondly.

Any other fond memories of Al can go here (or elswhere, if a mod's going to start a thread like this).