"Avery- you gotta check me out on my show!"
The final Don Nelson Show with the The Razor and Mr. T of the 2007-2008 Warriors season is up over at KNBR. Use your hops for some notes from the final segment.
Here some interesting points from the interview:
- Nellie doesn't consider himself a hall of famer.
- The Phoenix game was the worst game he ever saw Baron Davis play. "There's no secrets. There's no animosity."
- Nellie will make up his mind around July 1st about whether or not he's returning.
- He expected to have a down year without Jason Richardson and with 3 rookies.
- Tom brought up Tim Hardaway, Billy Owens, Latrell Sprewell, Josh Howard, and Mitch Richmon's rookie minutes under Nellie to illustrate that Nellie can be hard on rookies, but he'll play them as much as 30 minutes a game if he thinks they can help him. Nellie: "Whatever you say to try and defend yourself it just gets worse. They use whatever it is against you. It's just an unbelievable profession that way you know. So it's better just not to say anything. Let them write what they feel and just take it with a grain of salt. I guess that's one of the reasons the job pays a lot."
- The rookies weren't ready. If he played them a lot of minutes the Warriors wouldn't have won 35 games.
- 3 guys had career years for the Warriors this season.
- No consistency off the bench. Two leaguers Kelenna Azubuike and CJ Watson were his two most consistent bench performers.
- The biggest need for this team is rebounding.
- After the first 5 the Warriors need help at every position.
- It was hard to work for Mark Cuban.
- Nellie thinks Houston probably won't survive and he's skeptical about first time teams in the playoffs like the Hornets.
- He thinks the Lakers are the best team.
- Nellie's going with San Antonio against the Suns.
- Pre-arranged moves like Brent Barry coming back to the Spurs after trading him aren't fair.
Also check out: Don Nelson’s season-ending KNBR interview: Time to stop feeling sorry for yourself, Don [Talking Points with Tim Kawakami]
Thanks to Nellie, Ralph Barbieri and Tom Tolbert for the best 30 minutes on a Thursday afternoon you could ever ask for. We laughed, we cried, etc., etc. Can't wait till next season (Cohan- open the wallet and give this good man a raise!) and the return of The Don Nelson show!
Anything stand out in your mind from the final episode of this season?