FanPost

When the W's have to play AND think...


Bad things tend to happen (or good things don't happen.)

This team seems to have:

1. A lot of young players in key spots (so OK, i'll cut them some slack and hope the season shows improvement in hoops IQ stuff.)

2. A couple of players who don't seem to understand their own limitations (why doesn't Gadzuric know by now that he's purely a scrappy big? Really, Dan? If you just missed another layup, but it hit the rim, and you get your own rebound, or any rebound in those circumstances, just get the ball to someone else, back it out. For nature's sake man, you are NOT a good finisher. Those are possessions. They matter. You do not HAVE to shoot it again.)

3. Sorry, i know many have issues even hearing the term, but the W's do indeed have too many low hoops IQs.

Monta is our best player. I recognize this fact. And his Latrell-like endurance makes up for a lot (and sees him showing up on the road when others often don't.) I'm not knocking the H-E- double hockey sticks out of Monta, i'm simply saying: how does a man who knows he has 4 fouls, knows all night the Pistons Gs are trying to lean in to pick up fouls, and knows the shooter is righthanded...how does Monta foul him for his 5th foul coming into his left hand? Why was he so up close on him in the first place? The refs WERE calling them tonight. (Also, Monta was the perfect example tonight of what i'm saying here. When things are flowing, he flows. When they don't, he seems to do things he doesn't have to do that don't help things.

'Course we all like Curry, but he's making a habit of the high risk pass. These are harder to judge things since there are a lot of factors involving others, subtle eye contact stuff, and there could be reasons they turned into ugly looking plays. But, it's been awhile now that he's consistently made too many of them.

I could go on, but my point is that the Warriors have a lot of a certain kind of personality type. Lot's of positive, nice guys. They could use a hardass stickler. They could use a wily type like Dumars (who was smart even when he was newly in the league.) They could use a bit more on-court savvy, intelligence. Someone other than the coach who knows when and what to yell to get ahead of the game as to the other teams comeback beginnings. Nip that in the bud.

More proof of this and my main thrust here, is that the team seems to really flow and play smooth and easy from the beginning of games. Well, that's when you're just playing. But when teams adjust, when the flow slows down, when the Warriors have to play smart to hold the lead (which includes knowing when to slow it down, when to "not change a thing," when to keep the peddle to the metal,) they seem to lose their edge, consistently. They all have that Vlad/BWright passive puppy dog look in their eyes as the other team storms back, and it's usually fueled by some quick shots, a sense that the Warriors got complacent. (Maybe as an older fan it's just frustrating because we see the same old signs, but young players and fans need to go through them to learn them, i guess - although i also felt i was on this stuff most of my life.)

I think it's all because they have to think and play. The youth IS a legit excuse partially. I'll give them that and hope it improves. But i also fear it's somewhat their personalities. They don't have guys who sense the subtleties of high hoops IQ stuff, the managing of games, clocks. The staying on edge, even with a big lead. Etc.

I hope they grow into a team that NEVER feels at ease in a game until it is in THE bag. I hope they learn to finish out Q's, halves, and game situations with a better understanding of what to do, and what not to do, and when.

This FanPost is a submission from a member of the mighty Golden State of Mind community. While we're all here to throw up that W, these words do not necessarily reflect the views of the GSoM Crew. Still, chances are the preceding post is Unstoppable Baby!