I've been listening to the radio show on 680 AM during lunch break, and the host is a total asshole. That's not the reason for this post, though.From what he's talking about, I've noticed that even he is really biased despite the fact that he should have the most basketball knowledge. He's right that the Warriors do not have a chance going to playoff this year, but he doesn't really specify what they can do to make them better. More like, he doesn't have a valid point of what's probable. All he does was bash on people and call them stupid.
Again, that's still not the point for this post. The point is that Warriors DOES have a chance to go to playoff, even though it's about 1 % chance...... The team still has a lot of holes, and the offense/defense is not balanced. Here are some points that I jogged down.
The warriors have to work on their front court offence and, most importantly, defense (not just for the bench). The Warriors are allowing 106.5 points per game to their opponents. They are second the last, only in front of Minnesota. There's a lot to do with their defense. Andreas Biedrins fouls too much when playing defense, and he's like the only defense option. When he's foul trouble, which he is very often, the Warriors have to go small because there's no other good big guy. That's why Biedrins really needs to learn how to defend without fouling. He has to do it since the reserve is not that strong. Take a look of the reserve big men, Louis Amundson is the only one who can play 5. Dan Gadzuric can play but often he does not really know what to do. That yields to either easy layups for opponents or, even more embarrassing, a slam dunk. The rest of people are PF or even smaller. When they have to guard people like Dwight Howard or even, say, Tyson Chandler, they have no chance.
Warriors' reserve have to play better not just in the defense category. They also need to produce more on the other side. Right now, besides the starting five, Reggie Williams is the main firepower from the reserve. He can really play, whether it's shooting the ball or dribble penetration. The only problem is that he is too inconsistent. When he's hot, he can drain 30 points without any problem, but when he's not, getting 5 points can be hard. When the main firepower is like that, and the rest of bench does not produce, there's no way the Warriors can get into playoff, not mentioning the championship. Good teams have really deep bench and well balanced scoring. Take example of Boston Celtics, one of the most balanced team in the league, they have the big three, Rondo the distributor, big baby the sixth man, Nate Robinson the fast scorer, and the O'Neal's the big men. Every single one of them knows how to score, pass, and defend. This kind of deep roster gets them the championship. Another example is Lakers. They have Bryant, Gasol, Bynum as the main firepower. Others like Ron Artest who got defensive player of the year once, Derek Fisher who can clutch (and flop......), Odom who's the sixth man with an All-Star performance, Shannon Brown who can shoot 3's and dribble penetrate, and Matt Barnes who's a well-rounded player. This roster is deep, really deep. That's why when the starters don't have a good performance, they can still win games.
One of the reasons we are constantly in foul trouble is because, well, we foul too much. The centers are supposed to foul when they try to stop an easy layup or dunk. This has a lot to do with defense again, which I will talk about later. The problem here is that we are giving away silly free throws. Monta Ellis likes to do those light fouls like touching someone's hand when they are surging to the hoop. The ref's are trained to look at those plays, and the offensive side usually gets the call! It is like what Bob Fitzgerald said, you either foul hard or stay out of the way. Ther are so many times when Monta Ellis does those touch foul and the result is a three-point-play. The foul is so light that it cannot stop the motion of most of the players, especially those who are really good at balancing themselves when getting bumped. The commentators like to do those FTA difference and show how Warriors do not get to the free throw line. Well, the Warriors shoot a lot of jump shots instead of going in for post-up and getting fouled. This is the style they play, so not having too many FTA is not a problem (although the free throws are always good......charity stripe is called charity stripe for a reason......), but the FTA the opponents have shows how bad our defense is!
Defense, again. We see and hear this word so often when it comes to Warriors' games. Our defense is so bad that we have to foul to stop the plays. This is because we cannot get in front of the opponents fast enough. It shows slowness and flaws in design of defensive plays. Keith Smart so far does a good job on getting every starter to have some production on the offensive end, but defense-wise there is nothing. NOTHING! He once said he believes in DTW--Defense Travels Well. Well, I do not see that at all. If he truly believes in that we would not be allowing 106.5 pts per games. We really need to pick up the defense and try not to foul during the plays, one of the things Andrea Biedrins really needs to practice.
On the other side of the court, we are doing well, but not well enough. We are shooting the ball well, but I do think we still need someone inside for posts. Andrea Biedrins is not comfortable for those plays, for some reason. Sometimes his moves are just so stiff that everyone knows there's no way the shots are going in. He needs to have some moves like baby hook or pumps. Same goes to other front court players like Amundson, Ekpe Udoh, and Dan Gadzuric. When the front court can produce, the opponents' defense has to go towards the middle to stop the big men. This means the outside shooters have a better chance of getting open shots. It is kind of like Orlando's strategy, except Dwight Howard is dominating everyone, something none of the Warriors' big men can do. What's interesting is that Biedrins used to get double double every single game in 2009 season. However, after he came back from that injury, he just totally lost it. He really needs to have those back if he wants to help the Warriors. He's only 23, so he still has time.
With these, I really believe the Warriors are playoff contenders. They just need to keep working and make sure they don't slack off and have those horrible TO's. Good luck warriors, you can still rise and shine!
