I was finally ready to write about my impressions of the NBA draft and, specifically, the Golden State Warriors, but now none of that matters. In less than twenty-four hours, any opinions on the Warriors draft have been made irrelevant. Anthony Randolph is now a footnote on this off-season. If he turns out to be great and wins rookie of the year, more power to him. If he is a bust and ends up bouncing a ball of his foot with Patrick O’Bryant in the D-Leagues, that’s too bad. The bottom line on Anthony Randolph is that he is not a point guard. And a point guard is what the Warriors now need.
When Baron Davis opted out of his contract at the last minute late on Monday, it was a shock. It’s not often you see someone walk away from $17.8 million. When it was announced the next day that Davis has verbally agreed to join the Clippers, that was rug swept out beneath the entire franchise. In less than 24 hours the Warriors went from a team looking to rebound from a late season collapse to a franchise in turmoil.
Now all this doom and gloom speech might be a little over the top, but Warrior, fans like myself, have earned our pessimism. After a decade of poor management, awful personnel decisions, atrocious coaching, and some bad luck, the Warriors saddled with an overpaid, under performing roster that had no chance for success. But then something amazing happened, the Warriors made a trade for an all-star player, still in the prime of his career. When they made the Jackson-Harrington for Dunleavy-Murphy swap two years later, it was like they were a different team, a team that could do no wrong1. It was Baron Davis who lead the Warriors to their first playoff appearance in 12 years, and it was Davis who was virtually unstoppable against the Mavs in the Warriors shocking upset2. Davis followed up his amazing playoff performance with what might have been the best season of his career and led the Warriors to their first winning season in decades. Ironically, this season will be marked by the Warrior’s late season collapse and them missing the playoffs. The swan song for Baron in a Warrior uniform will be the second to last game of the season, where Davis sat out the entire second half.
Along with the doom and gloom of Warrior fans, there has been a fairly large amount of hyperbole concerning this deal. Chris Broussard of ESPN made a couple statements in which he seems to be swept up in the moment and not thinking clearly. First he says that the reason Baron is going to LA is $65 million, and that the Warriors didn’t come close to matching this. If Tim Kawakami is to be believed, the Warriors offered 2 years, $28 million, on top of the $17.8 million Baron would have made this year. This would put Davis at $45.8 million over the next three years, which is more money per year than his 5-year, $65 million with the Clippers, and Davis would only be 31 when the deal was over, meaning if he stays healthy, he could have another big payday. The bottom line is Davis left because he wants to play in LA. It’s his home town, and there’s little doubt in anyone’s mind that when Baron’s through with basketball he wants to move into entertainment. He’s already produced a documentary and has a Screen Actor’s Guild card. The second exercise in hyperbole by Broussard is that the addition of Davis and the return of Brand makes the Clippers a definite playoff team. Let’s not forget that this team only won 23 games last year, hasn’t actually resigned Brand yet, and is losing Corey Maggette, and, assuming Brand does come back, Baron Davis, Elton Brand, and Cuttino Mobley aren’t quite Ray Allen, Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett. It took 50 wins to make the playoffs in the west last year. Looking at the teams in the west the Lakers will probably be even better with Bynum back, the Hornets, Spurs, and Jazz should be just as good as last year, the Suns and Mavs might regress, but shouldn’t drop out of the playoffs, and the Rockets and Nuggets both will still be talented. Combine those 8 with Portland, who should be dramatically improved with Greg Oden playing for them, and the Clippers have a lot of work to do to be a definite playoff team.
The other end of the hyperbole spectrum is all of us doom and gloom Warrior fans. The guys at Golden State of Mind said: “Take away Baron Davis and Chris Mullin and Robert Rowell are quite possibly fielding the worst team in the league.” This is quite an overstatement. Losing Baron hurts, but this is still a team that won 48 games last year. Assuming they resign Biedrins and Ellis, they should also have plenty of cap space to get one of the big name free agents. Tim Kawakami said this roster right now for the Warriors is a 32 win team. I think this is more in line with reality, and picking up an Arenas or a Maggette can go a long way to change that.
This has been a wild 24 hours for the Warriors. Baron Davis is going south, now the question the Warriors must face is which direction are they going in?
1Alright… so there was the Patrick O’Bryant draft in there.
2Shocking to everyone but me, who watched the Warriors beat the Mavs 4 previous times that season.
Edit: The Warriors reportedly offered Elton Brand $20 million more than the Clippers inital offer. The plot thickens.
Post a Comment