Warriors’ circus is high-wire act
The Warriors are like your sick uncle who is just not quite himself these days, but the doctors can’t figure it out, so everyone has a diagnosis.
“Maybe it’s the cigars and vodka he has for breakfast.” “Clearly a light case of dengue fever.” “Man his age shouldn’t be taking up breakdancing.”
With the Warriors, it’s obvious what’s wrong. Kevin Durant is out of action with a banged-up knee. But what’s wrong-wrong? That’s the mystery that leaves the team open to amateur diagnosis from all the unlicensed hoop doctors.
No reason a team with Stephen Curry, Klay
Thompson and Draymond Green should be under .500, but the Warriors, going into Thursday’s game at home against the Orlando Magic, were 3-4 since Durant was injured.
Head coach Steve Kerr, asked recently how to handle this sudden fall from grace, said, “You let everybody else freak out and panic. You just keep your nose down and keep working.”
First of all: Freak out? Uh, Steve? Nobody has freaked out since 1969.
But a lot of Warriors fans have been getting pretty wiggy and un-mellow about their team’s state of affairs.
There is much concern over the Warriors’ lost chemistry and their seemingly inevitable lost No. 1 playoff seed. Imagine fans of the mighty Warriors quaking over the prospect of having to face a dangerous No. 7 seed instead of the No. 8.
All that consternation took a brief vacation Thursday as the Warriors Globetrottered the Magic 122-92. It was a timemachine trip back to the good old days of February, a game that seemed to have no bearing on, or connection with, the Warriors’ current disarray.
Early in the game, Curry zipped a bounce pass between the legs of Nikola Vucevic to Zaza Pachulia for a dunk. Much of the worry recently has been about Curry’s tendency to play sloppy and loose, but when that risky stuff works, the circus is in town and the Warriors are at their best.
It was a good sign, a reminder that Steph gonna Steph, that even if his shot’s not dropping, he’s not going to start playing conservatively. Or worse, scared.
Later in the half, Draymond Green fired a 45-foot pass to Andre Iguodala, who doublepumped home a dunk.
It’s circus stuff, but it’s not just for show. That kind of basketball can demoralize an opponent and light up an arena. The Warriors can’t play stupid, but they have to play fast and fun, and they did Thursday night, and it was a hoot.
Curry, still cold from the three-point arc, took his action to the rack. Then, after going 0-for-4 on threes in the first half, he finally hit one, a desperate shot-clock beater that banked in, and Curry playfully hippety-hopped back down court like a kid who just found a dollar.
But it was one game. Reality lurks. Durant’s return is still somewhere in the distance and the Warriors have a tough opponent Saturday, Milwaukee.
On Wednesday, there was a buzz over comments by Warriors beat writer Ethan Sherwood Strauss (ESPN.com), who said on his podcast, “There’s one guy in particular on the team that keeps saying the same thing to me, and I can’t say who he is, but he keeps saying ‘We've got problems, and it ain’t basketball.’ ”
Hey, Strauss isn’t perfect. I sat next to him on press row Thursday and he spilled his popcorn. Seriously. But he’s a legit reporter and his comment, however cryptic and vague, can’t be lightly dismissed.
Actually, it would be shocking if the Warriors, deep into the third season of their marvelous run, didn’t have the occasional squabble or discord. As highly evolved as Kerr’s interpersonal skills are, no NBA coach is immune to the odd grumble and second-guess from the locker room.
At least the Warriors have taken the humdrum out of the stretch run. At this time last year, the only suspense was how many more lopsided wins the Warriors would pile up. The chase for the win record added a bit of zest, but nobody was sweating the Warriors’ playoff seed or questioning their emotional stability.
Or their character. This is a test of whether the Warriors, with all their talent, can avoid the physical and psychological pitfalls that trip up mere mortal teams.
If the Warriors are crumbling, they’re putting up a good front. The Pachulia dunk off Curry’s wicket pass allowed the center to cash in a bet. Pachulia has had a season-long wager with weight-room trainer Kurtis Rayfield that if Pachulia gets a double-double plus a dunk, Rayfield has to shave his beard.
The double-double (10 points, 10 rebounds) wasn’t a first, but Pachulia is no dunk machine. His vertical is horizontal. But he rose to the occasion Thursday, and so did the Warriors, and reports of their death by choking are at least premature.