Burks too valuable off the bench to use for trade bait
Just weeks away from the Feb. 6 trade deadline, the Warriors’ 129-124 overtime loss at Portland on Monday night was a showcase of sorts for Alec Burks.
Burks scored a season-high 33 points on 11-for-23 shooting (2 for 6 from 3-point range, 6 for 6 on free throws). With 26.7 seconds left, his leaning 3-pointer gave the Warriors a one-point lead that almost won them the game.
Burks now has 11 games with 20 points or more this season.
There are several playoff-bound teams that could use a scorer such as Burks off the bench. Even the Trail Blazers could use Burks. Couldn’t the Lakers and Clippers use a ball-handler who could score points in bunches to take a bit of pressure off their superstars?
Already, one playoff team is already thriving after acquiring a bench scorer, as the Utah Jazz are 10-1 since trading for guard Jordan Clarkson.
Still, the Warriors won’t trade Burks for just anything. After all, they will be a playoff-contending team next season and, during the Steve Kerr era, have long sought a bench scorer like Burks. They would likely prefer to let free agency play out rather than trade Burks for a secondround pick or even cash.
But if Burks, 28, keeps having performances like this, the offers could get more enticing for a team short on future assets. Takeaways from the Warriors’ 129-124 overtime loss to the Trail Blazers.
WARRIORS DEFENSE ON DAMIAN LILLARD » With the Trail Blazers missing guard CJ McCollum (ankle sprain) and center Jusuf Nurkic (leg fracture), the Warriors’ defensive strategy was simple: Take away Lillard.
Well, they couldn’t. Oakland’s Lillard scored a career- high 61 points on 17-for-37 shooting (11 for 20 from 3-point range), grabbed 10 rebounds and dished seven assists. Even when they went over on every screen and picked him up near half court, Lillard still managed to make 11 3-pointers.
When Golden State was too aggres- sive in trapping him, he split the double team and got to the rim. He often drew fouls, and went 16 for 16 from the line.
“It’s hard to stop a guy like that,” rookie forward Eric Paschall told re- porters after the game.
But there were also several times Golden State’s defense broke down. When it didn’t pick Lillard up in advance, he punished it in the way Stephen Curry made fashionable: by pulling up from 30-plus feet.
When it did force the ball out of his hands, it failed to rotate onto other shooters or, worse, back to him if he got the ball back.
The Warriors also committed 25 fouls in the game that led to 27 freethrow points for the Trail Blazers. The defense seemed a step late most of the night and, for a player of Lillard’s caliber, that is often the only opening he needs to make them pay.
MORE 4 FOR PASCHALL » With Draymond Green (flu-like symptoms) out for the second straight game, Paschall again got the start at power forward.
And, again, he played well, finished with 22 points on 11-for-21 shooting (0 for 3 from 3-point range), 13 rebounds, two assists and a steal in 42 minutes. With double-digit points in the last six games, he’s broken through the rookie wall.
Kerr has said he prefers to play
Paschall at the 4 because it gives him more space. When Paschall plays with Green, a 26.8% 3-point shooter, he has less room to do what he does best: get to the rim.
With Green on the court, Paschall shoots 41.8% overall and gets to the line 1.2 times per game. When Green is off the court, Paschall shoots 53.4% overall and gets to the line twice as much, 2.4 times, per game.
At 6-foot-6, 255 pounds, Paschall has the size to play both forward positions. The tricky thing with him is that he may be better off guarding perimeter players than banging bodies in the front court. Long-term, the Warriors may be better off pairing him with a floor-spacing combo forward off the bench — the kind of player they currently don’t have on the roster.
MAN IN THE MIDDLE » Willie Cauley-Stein started his third straight game at center. After starting 33 games, he was briefly supplanted by Omari Spellman, but, after that experiment to juice the offense didn’t work, Kerr returned to Cauley-Stein.
He’s played well since returning to the starting unit, totaling 20 points on 9-for-10 shooting and 12 rebounds in the last two games. On Monday, he had 12 points on 6-for-10 shooting, seven rebounds, three blocks and three assists in 32 minutes.
He also came up with a key block on Lillard’s layup with 41.5 seconds left that preserved Golden State’s lead, however for only a few moments. In overtime, he blocked another Lillard shot and finished an alley-oop to give the Warriors a six-point lead with 3:03 left, although they were outscored 16-5 the rest of the way.
With the Warriors facing Rudy Gobert’s Jazz tonight, followed by the Pacers’ Myles Turner-Domantas Sabonis frontcourt and Joel Embiid’s 76ers, Cauley-Stein should continue to be introduced as a starter for the next three games.