@JZAlvarado, below: hmm, could not disagree more. The bottom of the draft is worse than a "crapshoot" — the vast majority of guys picked there end up not being NBA players. It's just a fact of life. You can get on the front office for not finding the needle in every haystack, or credit them for unearthing as many needles as they have. I'd actually say the they've fairly massively outperformed their expected return, given that in one offseason they've added the following players age 23 or under:
Russell
Paschall
Chriss
Spellman
Smailagic
Bowman
Plus a top five pick incoming.
Book is still out on Poole; and the book seems to be in on Evans — he's probably not an NBA rotation player, alas. Still an insanely great haul overall, imho, given that we were able to acquire them with no assets to speak of. Gotta keep in mind we got everyone on that list with Damian Jones, a #28 pick, some second-round / post-draft / waiver wire signings, and a friendly phone call to Durant.
You win some and lose some; and even factoring the Evans miss in I'd still give our overall targeting, acquisition and development of young talent from 2018-2020 a solid "A." (Maybe knock it down to A- for giving up on Kendrick Nunn, but then I've heard Nunn made have had some pretty nasty personal skeletons in his past that caused the Ws to move on more than their assessment of his talent or potential.)
As far as 2013-2018, I mean, we're only talking about the greatest five-year run by any team in NBA history, lol. You want to have a "serious discussion" about how badly they botched things during that run ... go crazy. ;-P
Can we start having a serious discussion about this front office's inability to draft worth crap since 2012. I've been hearing the narrative that it's a crapshoot at the bottom of the draft but there have been some real solid players drafted immediately after the Warriors. To summarize:
2013- Nedovic
2015- Kevon Looney
2016- Damion Jones
2018- Jacob Evans
2019- Jordan Poole
I'm not even including all the second round flameouts because granted that for every Malcolm Brogdon or Draymond Green there are a ton of Tyler Ulisses. Now someone's gonna mention Kevon Looney BUT here's all the players drafted right after Looney: Cedi Osman, Montrezl Harrell, Willy Hernangomez, Richaun Holmes, Josh Richardson. I love Looney but I'd take any of those players over Looney last year when he was healthy.
We have to have a Frank assessment that the same Perfect storm that helped the Warriors land KD in 2016 flipped into the perfect storm of having the worst team in the league and part of it is the shitty ass drafting of Myers for the last seven years.
I get that Paschall and Smailgic look like solid contributors but when we talk about the here and now the FOs 1st round picks have been partly responsible for being in the crap hole that we are in. I get having three all NBA caliber players out (with one leaving in FA) trumps this completely but honest to God I hope Myers doesn't keep next year's pick and instead flips it with DLo because his drafting hasn't been exactly stellar
Why the rant? I just want to pull my hair out Everytime I see Kevin Porter Jr doing something. I said earlier that I didn't mind Myers taking a crap shoot this year as opposed to the 'We are drafting the most NBA ready player' garbage of last year but God damn I'm tired of whiffing so badly on these draft picks and the lack of depth has worn this team out more and more every passing year
Most of the flaws in recent drafts wouldn't be noticeable if Curry and Thompson were on the court. I do think that going cheap on Jerry West was a dumb move a FO that is light years ahead of the competition, and that's probably a major reason for the Poole pick.
But that's the problem. It is Noticeable when they're out... Like the Finals last year. That's when the glaring lack of depth shows up. You know who didn't really have a problem with this? Toronto. And Leonard was maybe not a shell of himself But certainly way less than 100 percent but that's a team that knows how to identify talent later in the draft or in rookie FA
Toronto with their vaunted depth ran out a seven-man rotation in the Finals cos the Warriors would have wrecked the back end of their roster. And if not for the most absurd spate of injuries in sports playoff history, the Warriors would likely have smashed them.
I do give Masai big props for his back-of-the-draft drafting, tho: he's probably the best in the league, results-wise (I say "results-wise" cos I think it's almost impossible for us as fans to discern good process from blind luck). You want to get on Myers for not being as good as the best drafter in the league, that's cool, so long as you realize that without the rotten injury luck the Warriors are probably five-time defending NBA champs working on another 50+ win season.
We also had a late first (Looney) and a second-rounder (Green).
It's kind of irrelevant, though. Your roster is your roster; you don't get bonus points for having built it one way or another. The Warriors had a much better overall roster last year than the Raptors. You said the Raptors didn't have a problem with depth, yet players #8-15 on their roster were stapled to the bench in the Finals.
Take out 2 of their top 3 guys (say, Kawhi and Siakam) and four of their top seven (say, Gasol and Ibaka) and tell me how their "depth" fares against our fully healthy roster.
Álex Abrines, Carrick Felix, Isaiah Canaan, Glen Rice Jr., Jordan Mickey, Anthony Brown, Willy Hernangóme, Deyonta Davis, Ivica Zubac, Cheick Diallo, Tyler Ulis, Džanan Musa, Cedevita Zagreb, Élie Okobo, Jevon Carter, Keldon Johnson, Nicolas Claxton, Eric Paschall to name a few of the players we missed out on shortly after the above picks.
Oh wait, we did end up getting Eric Paschall after all :P
Again I'm really not counting the second round other than those players we could have drafted instead of... But hey if we want to make a second round argument justifying Paschall and Smailgic (which still remain somewhat unproven commodities) then the same has to be said for Jordan Bell and Patrick McCaw. If you want to go back to the Draymond draft wit Kuzmic also being drafted then the FO is batting .500. Combine that with the single hit in Looney (which I don't consider as much of a hit at all considering all the impact players that were drafted right after him) and that still leaves the FO with a less than stellar record.
"For every...Draymond Green".....There are going to be lots and lots of Tyler Ulysses for every Draymond Green. Expecting to get a Draymond regularly at the 28th pick is like expecting to find a Benjamin on the sidewalk in front of your house every day.
No one expecting to get a Draymond or a Gianni's or a Brogdon with the 28th pick much less in the second round (where they were drafted respectively). No one also expects to hit on a Paul George or a Kawhi Leonard in the bottom half of the lottery either. What I personally do expect is to get a D Anthony Melton or a Kevin Porter Jr in the bottom of the first round instead of Evans or Jordan Poole or a Damian Jones.. players that many of the draft pundits or even a few of you armchair QBs had slotted to be available when the Warriors turn came. This FO is 8 years removed from that historic Draymond pick? How long are they gonna rest on their laurels before most of you take them to task. Again im talking drafting acumen or the lack thereof which has manifested itself more prominently now. You draft on average and I can certainly almost guarantee you that this is no damn ten win team at this point of the season
This isn't quite fair as in 2013, 2014 and 2017 they didn't have any draft picks due to the Iguodala trade, they only had a late 1st round pick in 2015, 2016, and 2018. Damian Jones they managed to flip into Omari Spellman and Jones primary problem was a couple of unfortunate injuries that slowed his development. Looney was a calculated risk that worked out for a couple of years. The jury is still out on Poole. Sometimes he looks like an NBA shooter, I doubt he will ever be even an adequate defender.
And I understand. I'm simply talking about the simple act of drafting. If they draft a serviceable NBA player instead of D Jones then they never flip for Spellman (who had pretty much wiped out in Atlanta after one season).
I think it's too early to say Smailagic looks like a solid contributor. He needs a lot of improvement. He's young enough where that's reasonable to expect, but it still needs to happen first.
Wow, it’s almost like I couldn’t agree less with this take. The FO has done an immediate turn toward a younger team filled with potential- something you can build around when our core is healthy again. Players like Paschall, Spellman, Chriss and Smailagić don’t grow on trees. These were serious finds for a team with no money to spare, and just getting DLo at all (that prized commodity you speak of) was astounding considering how unnecessary it was for Brooklyn to do that. Poole has been showing smarts and D lately, and could turn out okay. Maybe Evans is a bust, but a healthy Looney is so much better than you give him (or the team) credit for.
We're talking two different issues here G and B. I think Myers has done a decent job in the free agent market. My argument above is not advocating for his firing. My overall argument (which I failed to make above) is that we need to take the DO to task for their less than stellar track record as much as perhaps we need to take Lacob and Co to task for not investing as much in player development (up until this last off-season) as other teams have as much as perhaps Kerr and Co not being able to develop these draft picks/rookie FA signings adequately.
They've won 3 out of 5 on the backs of that historic 2012 draft (I count Barnes as a swap for KD), that 2013 Iguodala trade, those savvy minimum contract signings and of course Klay and Curry's growth as all NBA players. I'm talking about the here and now. This is the most God damn awful team in the league right now and the drop-off doesn't happen so severely as of we are able to draft for average the last 8 years In the position that we were drafting on.
Asserting counterfactuals as fact is fun cos there's no way to prove or disprove them, but we have no idea how these "average" draftees would have performed in this current situation. My general sense is that these hypothetical group of average late-round draftees would do no better than the DLo-Looney-Chriss-Spellman-Paschall-Smailagic-Bowman young core that we have. Your magical 20:20 hindsight team where you get to cherrypick the best player the Warriors passed on might have been a couple games better, but what's the value in being a couple games better?
Also, the Ws aren't the most goddamn awful team in the league — they're only the third-most god damn awful, lol. https://stats.nba.com/teams/advanced/?sort=NET_RATING&dir=-1 With the best goddamn backcourt in NBA history coming back soon, and a ton of interesting assets and players with which to build around them.
OT from the game, but has anyone else paid attention to Milwaukee lately? They only have 6 losses through the season so far, and I'm a little concerned about them breaking the W's 73-9 record.
They won't do it because they have a pretty significant lead for home court advantage and if that is still true by April, anybody with a minor ache or pain is going to sit.
Thoughts on the game: it must be incredibly difficult for all of them to play so competitively so much of the time yet still lose so much of the time. I think this season will be really good for the competitive fires and thicker skin of the ones we keep.
I think he has a good synergy with Dray. Can't wait to see Steph in the starting lineup instead of his B-I-L. Last year's WCF series feels like a dream.
Jim Barnett said postgame it was the best quarter he’s seen Chriss have. I do recall maybe one other quarter when Quese shined as well but the point is, a lot of good potential there if he can bottle that up for a whole game in future performances — not that other quarters were bad tonight. They were generally good.
Until formatting is worked out for SOL’s comments, could his contributions perhaps be worked into the post-game articles? That way paragraphs, bold amd gifs could happen.
Yeah, if SoL can get something up soon, I’ll put it in the main post with nice formatting and Pony. Even better if SoL can put it in a Google Doc with proper formatting
@JZAlvarado, below: hmm, could not disagree more. The bottom of the draft is worse than a "crapshoot" — the vast majority of guys picked there end up not being NBA players. It's just a fact of life. You can get on the front office for not finding the needle in every haystack, or credit them for unearthing as many needles as they have. I'd actually say the they've fairly massively outperformed their expected return, given that in one offseason they've added the following players age 23 or under:
Russell
Paschall
Chriss
Spellman
Smailagic
Bowman
Plus a top five pick incoming.
Book is still out on Poole; and the book seems to be in on Evans — he's probably not an NBA rotation player, alas. Still an insanely great haul overall, imho, given that we were able to acquire them with no assets to speak of. Gotta keep in mind we got everyone on that list with Damian Jones, a #28 pick, some second-round / post-draft / waiver wire signings, and a friendly phone call to Durant.
You win some and lose some; and even factoring the Evans miss in I'd still give our overall targeting, acquisition and development of young talent from 2018-2020 a solid "A." (Maybe knock it down to A- for giving up on Kendrick Nunn, but then I've heard Nunn made have had some pretty nasty personal skeletons in his past that caused the Ws to move on more than their assessment of his talent or potential.)
As far as 2013-2018, I mean, we're only talking about the greatest five-year run by any team in NBA history, lol. You want to have a "serious discussion" about how badly they botched things during that run ... go crazy. ;-P
Hello
This is a great format!!
Can we start having a serious discussion about this front office's inability to draft worth crap since 2012. I've been hearing the narrative that it's a crapshoot at the bottom of the draft but there have been some real solid players drafted immediately after the Warriors. To summarize:
2013- Nedovic
2015- Kevon Looney
2016- Damion Jones
2018- Jacob Evans
2019- Jordan Poole
I'm not even including all the second round flameouts because granted that for every Malcolm Brogdon or Draymond Green there are a ton of Tyler Ulisses. Now someone's gonna mention Kevon Looney BUT here's all the players drafted right after Looney: Cedi Osman, Montrezl Harrell, Willy Hernangomez, Richaun Holmes, Josh Richardson. I love Looney but I'd take any of those players over Looney last year when he was healthy.
We have to have a Frank assessment that the same Perfect storm that helped the Warriors land KD in 2016 flipped into the perfect storm of having the worst team in the league and part of it is the shitty ass drafting of Myers for the last seven years.
I get that Paschall and Smailgic look like solid contributors but when we talk about the here and now the FOs 1st round picks have been partly responsible for being in the crap hole that we are in. I get having three all NBA caliber players out (with one leaving in FA) trumps this completely but honest to God I hope Myers doesn't keep next year's pick and instead flips it with DLo because his drafting hasn't been exactly stellar
Why the rant? I just want to pull my hair out Everytime I see Kevin Porter Jr doing something. I said earlier that I didn't mind Myers taking a crap shoot this year as opposed to the 'We are drafting the most NBA ready player' garbage of last year but God damn I'm tired of whiffing so badly on these draft picks and the lack of depth has worn this team out more and more every passing year
Most of the flaws in recent drafts wouldn't be noticeable if Curry and Thompson were on the court. I do think that going cheap on Jerry West was a dumb move a FO that is light years ahead of the competition, and that's probably a major reason for the Poole pick.
But that's the problem. It is Noticeable when they're out... Like the Finals last year. That's when the glaring lack of depth shows up. You know who didn't really have a problem with this? Toronto. And Leonard was maybe not a shell of himself But certainly way less than 100 percent but that's a team that knows how to identify talent later in the draft or in rookie FA
Toronto with their vaunted depth ran out a seven-man rotation in the Finals cos the Warriors would have wrecked the back end of their roster. And if not for the most absurd spate of injuries in sports playoff history, the Warriors would likely have smashed them.
I do give Masai big props for his back-of-the-draft drafting, tho: he's probably the best in the league, results-wise (I say "results-wise" cos I think it's almost impossible for us as fans to discern good process from blind luck). You want to get on Myers for not being as good as the best drafter in the league, that's cool, so long as you realize that without the rotten injury luck the Warriors are probably five-time defending NBA champs working on another 50+ win season.
3 out of the 7 contributing players in last year's NBA finals were a late first, a late second, and an undrafted free agent for Toronto, Sleepy
We also had a late first (Looney) and a second-rounder (Green).
It's kind of irrelevant, though. Your roster is your roster; you don't get bonus points for having built it one way or another. The Warriors had a much better overall roster last year than the Raptors. You said the Raptors didn't have a problem with depth, yet players #8-15 on their roster were stapled to the bench in the Finals.
Take out 2 of their top 3 guys (say, Kawhi and Siakam) and four of their top seven (say, Gasol and Ibaka) and tell me how their "depth" fares against our fully healthy roster.
Álex Abrines, Carrick Felix, Isaiah Canaan, Glen Rice Jr., Jordan Mickey, Anthony Brown, Willy Hernangóme, Deyonta Davis, Ivica Zubac, Cheick Diallo, Tyler Ulis, Džanan Musa, Cedevita Zagreb, Élie Okobo, Jevon Carter, Keldon Johnson, Nicolas Claxton, Eric Paschall to name a few of the players we missed out on shortly after the above picks.
Oh wait, we did end up getting Eric Paschall after all :P
Again I'm really not counting the second round other than those players we could have drafted instead of... But hey if we want to make a second round argument justifying Paschall and Smailgic (which still remain somewhat unproven commodities) then the same has to be said for Jordan Bell and Patrick McCaw. If you want to go back to the Draymond draft wit Kuzmic also being drafted then the FO is batting .500. Combine that with the single hit in Looney (which I don't consider as much of a hit at all considering all the impact players that were drafted right after him) and that still leaves the FO with a less than stellar record.
"For every...Draymond Green".....There are going to be lots and lots of Tyler Ulysses for every Draymond Green. Expecting to get a Draymond regularly at the 28th pick is like expecting to find a Benjamin on the sidewalk in front of your house every day.
No one expecting to get a Draymond or a Gianni's or a Brogdon with the 28th pick much less in the second round (where they were drafted respectively). No one also expects to hit on a Paul George or a Kawhi Leonard in the bottom half of the lottery either. What I personally do expect is to get a D Anthony Melton or a Kevin Porter Jr in the bottom of the first round instead of Evans or Jordan Poole or a Damian Jones.. players that many of the draft pundits or even a few of you armchair QBs had slotted to be available when the Warriors turn came. This FO is 8 years removed from that historic Draymond pick? How long are they gonna rest on their laurels before most of you take them to task. Again im talking drafting acumen or the lack thereof which has manifested itself more prominently now. You draft on average and I can certainly almost guarantee you that this is no damn ten win team at this point of the season
This isn't quite fair as in 2013, 2014 and 2017 they didn't have any draft picks due to the Iguodala trade, they only had a late 1st round pick in 2015, 2016, and 2018. Damian Jones they managed to flip into Omari Spellman and Jones primary problem was a couple of unfortunate injuries that slowed his development. Looney was a calculated risk that worked out for a couple of years. The jury is still out on Poole. Sometimes he looks like an NBA shooter, I doubt he will ever be even an adequate defender.
And I understand. I'm simply talking about the simple act of drafting. If they draft a serviceable NBA player instead of D Jones then they never flip for Spellman (who had pretty much wiped out in Atlanta after one season).
I think it's too early to say Smailagic looks like a solid contributor. He needs a lot of improvement. He's young enough where that's reasonable to expect, but it still needs to happen first.
I disagree about the Looney take though.
Wow, it’s almost like I couldn’t agree less with this take. The FO has done an immediate turn toward a younger team filled with potential- something you can build around when our core is healthy again. Players like Paschall, Spellman, Chriss and Smailagić don’t grow on trees. These were serious finds for a team with no money to spare, and just getting DLo at all (that prized commodity you speak of) was astounding considering how unnecessary it was for Brooklyn to do that. Poole has been showing smarts and D lately, and could turn out okay. Maybe Evans is a bust, but a healthy Looney is so much better than you give him (or the team) credit for.
We're talking two different issues here G and B. I think Myers has done a decent job in the free agent market. My argument above is not advocating for his firing. My overall argument (which I failed to make above) is that we need to take the DO to task for their less than stellar track record as much as perhaps we need to take Lacob and Co to task for not investing as much in player development (up until this last off-season) as other teams have as much as perhaps Kerr and Co not being able to develop these draft picks/rookie FA signings adequately.
They've won 3 out of 5 on the backs of that historic 2012 draft (I count Barnes as a swap for KD), that 2013 Iguodala trade, those savvy minimum contract signings and of course Klay and Curry's growth as all NBA players. I'm talking about the here and now. This is the most God damn awful team in the league right now and the drop-off doesn't happen so severely as of we are able to draft for average the last 8 years In the position that we were drafting on.
Asserting counterfactuals as fact is fun cos there's no way to prove or disprove them, but we have no idea how these "average" draftees would have performed in this current situation. My general sense is that these hypothetical group of average late-round draftees would do no better than the DLo-Looney-Chriss-Spellman-Paschall-Smailagic-Bowman young core that we have. Your magical 20:20 hindsight team where you get to cherrypick the best player the Warriors passed on might have been a couple games better, but what's the value in being a couple games better?
Also, the Ws aren't the most goddamn awful team in the league — they're only the third-most god damn awful, lol. https://stats.nba.com/teams/advanced/?sort=NET_RATING&dir=-1 With the best goddamn backcourt in NBA history coming back soon, and a ton of interesting assets and players with which to build around them.
OT from the game, but has anyone else paid attention to Milwaukee lately? They only have 6 losses through the season so far, and I'm a little concerned about them breaking the W's 73-9 record.
They won't do it because they have a pretty significant lead for home court advantage and if that is still true by April, anybody with a minor ache or pain is going to sit.
I admire the Bucks. Personally, if there's one team I'd want to break the Dubs' record, it's them.
That said, I don't think they will. It's hard to lose only 2 more games with 35 of them left on their schedule. Possible, but extremely improbable.
Nah. Teams haven’t been gunning for them yet. Of course because I just said, the basketball gods will screw me over somehow.
Postgame thread of Q&As starts here with an absolute must-watch of Draymond’s introspection of himself plus Kobe’s final moments: https://twitter.com/letsgowarriors/status/1222360094458798080?s=21
Wow. He will make a wonderful coach. He just empathizes and observes at such a high level.
Thoughts on the game: it must be incredibly difficult for all of them to play so competitively so much of the time yet still lose so much of the time. I think this season will be really good for the competitive fires and thicker skin of the ones we keep.
Not the best game for Burks -31 with 4 Turnovers Yikes
I was only able to listen/watch a little. Seemed like Chriss was pretty good, and his +/- agrees.
I think he has a good synergy with Dray. Can't wait to see Steph in the starting lineup instead of his B-I-L. Last year's WCF series feels like a dream.
Jim Barnett said postgame it was the best quarter he’s seen Chriss have. I do recall maybe one other quarter when Quese shined as well but the point is, a lot of good potential there if he can bottle that up for a whole game in future performances — not that other quarters were bad tonight. They were generally good.
Our stable of bigs is unconventional, but I kind of like it!
Top players:
Warriors:
Russell: (-8)
28 points 10/22 FGs 6/12 three pointers 2/5 FTs
5 rebounds (1 off.) 7 assists 3 turnovers 2 steals
Green: (+7)
9 points 3/8 FGs 1/6 three pointers 2/2 FTs
9 rebounds 12 assists 1 turnover 1 steal 3 blocks
Robinson III: (+7)
20 points 7/11 FGs 3/5 three pointers 3/3 FTs
5 rebounds (1 off.) 3 assists 1 turnover 1 steal
Honorable mention:
Chriss: (+8)
15 points 6/10 FGs 0/2 three pointers 3/4 FTs
5 rebounds (1 off.) 2 assists
Sixers:
Embiid: (+10)
24 points 9/13 FGs 1/3 three pointers 5/8 FTs
10 rebounds (2 off.) 1 assist 5 turnovers 1 block
Neto: (+15)
19 points 7/10 FGs 3/5 three pointers 2/2 FTs
2 rebounds 2 assists 1 steal
Harris: (+11)
14 points 6/10 FGs 1/3 three pointers 1/2 FTs
7 rebounds 4 assists 2 turnovers
Honorable mention:
Horford: (+7)
12 points 4/11 FGs 2/6 three pointers 2/2 FTs
11 rebounds 8 assists 2 turnovers 1 steal
Milton: (+8)
11 points 5/6 FGs 1/2 three pointers
1 rebound 2 assists 2 turnovers 1 steal
Final stats: (Turnovers by both teams in the first possession are not counted)
Warriors:
41.9% shooting (37/87 FGs)
15/40 three pointers
15/21 FTs
40 rebounds (6 off.)
29 assists
13 turnovers
6 steals
3 blocks
76ers:
51.9% shooting (42/82 FGs)
11/32 three pointers
20/26 FTs
44 rebounds (2 off.)
28 assists
15 turnovers
5 steals
3 blocks
Points in paint:
Warriors: 38
Sixers: 50
Fastbreak points:
Warriors: 18
Sixers: 17
Points off turnovers:
Warriors: 20
Sixers: 17
Bench points:
Warriors: 26
Sixers: 37
No pony?
https://derpicdn.net/img/2013/11/28/484438/large.gif
Hmm, I don’t think Substack is handling the GIF right... maybe a non-moving one?
I put in something, the best I could do on short notice
I see it. A real pony at LGW.
Posted this in gamethread too:
Until formatting is worked out for SOL’s comments, could his contributions perhaps be worked into the post-game articles? That way paragraphs, bold amd gifs could happen.
Yeah, if SoL can get something up soon, I’ll put it in the main post with nice formatting and Pony. Even better if SoL can put it in a Google Doc with proper formatting
I feel ridiculous for wanting this so much.
*and