Steve Kerr, Quinn Cook and Co. have one last stumble to end the regular season, getting overwhelmed in Salt Lake City.
Golden State enters postseason rolling in wrong direction
The Warriors’ regular-season work is done, and it was a bumbling mess. Just two seasons after their recordbreaking, 73-win masterpiece, they’re entering the playoffs as a team that has become strangely accustomed to losing.
If that sounds a bit extreme, point well taken. Things are going to feel dramatically different when the Warriors play Game 1 of the first round at Oracle this weekend, all set to humble the skeptics, entertain their fans and send an ominous warning to the rest of the league.
It’s just that some annoying facts
have surfaced, most notably (a) the team’s 7-10 record since Stephen Curry’s latest ankle injury, (b) a complete absence of the team’s customarily stifling defense over the last 10 games, and (c) a truly baffling situation at center.
In the NBA’s long history, no title-contending team entered the postseason with such confusion at center. Usually just two people would be involved, most notably the Warriors’ championship team of 1975, when Clifford Ray and George Johnson were virtual equals in a splendidly harmonious partnership that had been established throughout the season.
We are far removed from the days (decades on end) when centers ruled the NBA landscape and proved to be the essential difference in the end. But the Warriors have reached a point in which none of five candidates can count on starting, contributing or even playing in a given game. This isn’t healthy. It does none of them any good — nor is any of them feared, not even in the slightest, by any potential postseason opponent.
Zaza Pachulia and Ja Vale McGee are potential free agents, almost certain to depart, and until further notice, the magic of either’s play has worn off. Kevon Looney has been the team’s best all-around player at this position recently, but does head coach Steve Kerr trust the inexperienced UCLA alum Looney in the playoffs? Jordan Bell will get his time but too often looks lost out there, and Damian Jones, for all of his recent flashes of brilliance, is awfully raw to be thrown into win-or-else situations.
The Warriors’ center position doesn’t gain true clarity until those precious moments when Draymond Green assumes the position in a muchfeared alignment. We’ll be seeing that down the line, in times of desperation, but so much depends on Curry’s health and that of Andre Iguodala, who rounds out the so-called Hamptons Five. It’s disturbing for Warriors fans to know that Iguodala has a tricky left knee and will be watched very carefully. And Curry, let’s just say it, is highly vulnerable to another damaging injury.
So what’s ahead for this team? It all comes down to Wednesday night, one of the most complicated climaxes to any NBA regular season. There are too many scenarios and tiebreakers to detail here, but a few things to consider:
If the Warriors had a choice to play any of the remaining candidates for the No. 7 slot, it probably would be Denver. That happens if the Nuggets beat Minnesota (the loser of that game is eliminated) and OKC beats Memphis.
Don’t worry about New Orleans in the first round. The Warriors would face the Pelicans only if Memphis upsets Oklahoma City (no chance) and San Antonio beats New Orleans.
It’s remarkable to consider how far Utah has come. closing out the season on a 29-5 run, and the Jazz-Portland game will decide the No. 3 seed in the West. The game is in Portland, but the Blazers have lost four straight.
Tuesday night’s result means the Warriors can’t face Utah right away, but that doesn’t rule out a matchup down the line — and the way Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell are playing, that’s a series the Jazz can win. Even if Curry is on the court. The Warriors will need a dramatic revival to match this team on the defensive end.
Stats aren’t nearly as important in the NBA as they are inside a baseball clubhouse, but certain numbers are sacred. Running the risk of an inexcusable injury, Kerr knew that Klay Thompson needed four points to average 20 for the fourth straight season — so he played him well into the fourth quarter, sat him down, then brought him back for another stint at 6:52 to make sure that happened.
It was easy to say “just bench everybody” as the game got hopelessly out of hand, but Kerr didn’t have that luxury. If he’d rested all of his starters at once, and allowing for his reluctance to overwork David West and Shaun Livingston, he’d be employing four centers and the increasingly awful Nick Young.
Yes, it actually happened: The Houston Rockets, considered a serious but not terribly threatening team to the Warriors’ superiority as the season began, are a bunch of guys chuckling to themselves and ordering enormous plates of shrimp. The Warriors don’t seem to be anyone’s favorite just now. Just be glad that, very soon, we can actually believe what we’re seeing.