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.