GQ Curry has been smoked by every other rookie point guard in the league in head to head matchups now. Rodrigue Beaubois just completeley dominated the Spoiled Brat Chucker. Li'l Bobo is fierce. Donnie Nelson steals the draft again after Sam Presti nabbed the Pietrus-land compatriot.
Formula: [Production + Projection - Hype]
1. Brandon Jennings - playoffs!
2. Jrue Holiday - youngest player in the league.
3. Darren Collison - negative hype from Chris Paul really boosts him.
4. Rodrigue Beaubois - playoffs!
5. Ty Lawson - playoffs!
6. Eric Maynor - playoffs!
7. Jeff Teague - playoffs!
8. Tyreke Evans
9. Jonny Flynn - triangle fail.
10. Toney Douglas - look into it.
11. GQ Curry
12. AJ Price
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
Why Chris Cohan Won't Sell Before 2011.
If you're a Warriors fan, ask yourself this:
Do you want Larry Ellison's money going to Chris Cohan's pockets and David Stern's CV or do you want him getting a great deal and then spending like crazy on YOUR TEAM? Easy answer. Now imagine Ellison isn't the guy buying the team. Suddenly the money ain't so funny and you damn sure want every last penny salvaged from the undeserving Cohan-Stern network and poured DIRECTLY into team operations coffers for the immense rebuilding project Cohan's destructive tenure leaves in its wake.
This week, the Warriors' announced they had hired a respected professional sports M & A organization to handle the potential sale of their unprofessional NBA organization. The Galatioto Sports Partners group, which brands itself "The Sports Bankers," has overseen a number of pro team sales in recent years and most recently advised parties to the Charlotte Bobcats team sale.
Despite the sound and the fury of this announcement of... paying a retainer to a banking firm? ... the Golden State Warriors and the flagship whorebag radio mothpiece they fund heavily have already run creepy ads about Larry Ellison. The spot in question, which features a mannered sale demand and some predictable excuse-making about how difficult and drawn out these mega big business deals can be, delivers a familiar message to the fans still listening to KNBR and, in turn, listening for their reason to spend more money on this shit can team. Amounting to little more than the desperate season ticket sales push gimmick of all time, this "sale" prep announcement ad, of course, urges.......
Patience.
The Warriors demand that season ticket holders on the fence about renewing their tickets for another season of this crap house show lock in within the next two weeks, by April 12th. Apparently the Clippers, on the other hand, are letting their ticket holders wait until AFTER the draft lottery has taken place. In other words, the Warriors demanded that remaining invested fans hand over money for Rowell to put into interest-bearing accounts before they even know where the team will draft. Or before they trade that pick in a Maggette contract dump! Or before the Clippers even hire a new coach or sign Lebron James! The Clippers have EVERYTHING going for them now with another high draft pick, the best pick of last year's draft ready to go, millions to spend in free agency, and Mike Dunleavy gone. But there are no answers to a thousand all-too-familiar questions in Warriorland and we slobbering masses still enjoy the hell out of watching these final 15 games as Nelson shows that those injuries and youth never mattered, he can still manufacture exciting shit ball barn burners with D-Leaguers and has-beens and the Winning Shall Inspire. Buy tickets now!
And to top THAT,
WE'RE SELLING! YOU'RE FREE! CELEBRATE BY BUYING TICKETS NOW!!!!!
As many have by now figured out, the Warriors will still run the draft and the free agency period (in which they are complete non-factors) via Idiot's Consortium.
Robert Rowell says "Salary Protection Wins Championships."
Larry Riley says "Aw Shucks, we'll try like the Dickens not to suck."
Don Nelson says ~burp~ "Dammit, Willie, ante up."
Buy Tickets Now!
Chris Cohan's creepy, beady-eyed weirdo routine still has us poor fans in a strangle hold. As it turns out, Cohan had TWO agreements in place with Larry Ellison but backed out of both! He LIKED Ellison's bid price! He ACCEPTED Larry Ellison's bid price! And then, in a fit of idiocy, he sent Flunkster Dude and the PR moron brigade off to spam the forums and the airwaves to complain that Ellison was lowballing him! Warriors beatland missed this completely and ate the cookie: Ellison is interested! They skipped over the part Ric Bucher nailed on Gary Radnich's AM radio show: Cohan fucked up the sale already. TWICE. He had to cover up (through Rowell denial and Ellison baiting) by beating the winner of the stand off(s) to the punch.
Like the Monta Ellis trade Rowell offered the Memphis Grizzlies (diarrhea of the mouth) and the failed Amar'e Stoudemire trade(s) this past year, the Cohan Enterprise failed miserably when they actually stepped foot on legit NBA business territory. You know, the level above just efficiently stealing fans' money through media messaging and contract laundering (at least $20 million saved through various insurance-covered contracts and cash dumps this season).
Interesting side note, Monta Ellis was fined AND suspended last season. So he was suspended without pay for 30 games (~$3 million) AND THEN he had to pay $3 million to league-appointed charities as part of the team fine. So in effect, as NO ONE has ever discussed until now: Monta Ellis had $6 million taken away from him AND THEN was mercilessly slammed by the Warriors and the local fan community for two straight seasons. Thank god he just told Marc Spears he thinks he's better than Lebron. His agents are brilliant: adding that fuel to the Ellis Attitude Fire should get him dumped off right quick. Damage control spinning has already begun in earnest in Warriorland.
[Update: Suspension cash goes to charity/tax write-off for the team, of course. But the fine was never announced and may not in fact have been assessed once Ellis' Player's Union grievance stopped the official Warriors public patriarchal shaming dead in its tracks. Forum plant morons were still free to foment Monta hatred, which continues today. Ellis definitely played the season under VOID, fine, and further suspension threat. Rowell announced he would not be voided about the time Elis' Players' Union grievance was reviewed and Ellis' claim affirmed. Rowell of course spun it as an act of magnanimity on his part. Then Ellis was offered in a heavily publicized (by Rowell) trade that would have saved the team that $3 million. Likely to still happen after all of the other money laundering schemes Rowell's run on Crawford, Jackson, Belinelli trades, etc.]
All of which is to say, as We Believe! barely scratches the surface of the days-of-yore memory banks a mere 3 years after The Dallas Series: Chris Cohan is a gutless loser who can't close and, when he REALLY fucks up, broadcasts the fact by publicly smearing the OTHER side in whatever matter he just trainwrecked. That's a verb now. Update your wikisaurus. It's fucking Cohan's verb. It's the Cohan Verb Par Excellence.
Cohan the Trainwrecker.
And add this one to your lexicon, too: pulling a Cohan. Someone more clever than I can run down some preliminary mega fuck ups that shall from this day forth be called pullings of Cohans. But you all know exactly what they'll look like: fucking brutal. I've got a few real life Cohans pulled:
1. Chris Webber house visit and IMMEDIATE end of his Warriors tenure way back at the beginning of the Cohan ownership.
2. Lucked into the 2007 Playoffs, had the premier team marketing vehicle (and used it: We Believe!), but fucked it all up and were a laughing stock less than a year later.
3. Dumping Jason Richardson for strictly cash savings. $10 million TPE unused, playoffs missed. Remember the LOUD complaints fomr Nellie and co. about 48 games to makes the Western Conference playoffs that season? 48 wins both seasons since. Good thing they quit then instead of wasting good scotch on hard work the last two seasons. Oh and, to close the loop: Drafting Marco Belinelli and suggesting he'd replace JR.
4. Chris Webber signing and mega-publicity campaign to kill any shot at the 2008 playoffs.
5. 16 years. Make your own list. Pretty much any executive decision over that time qualifies.
Pulling a Cohan. The Warriors Way. Going on 20 years. That's a Fucking Dynasty.
David Stern hates you, NBA Warriors fans. He fucking hates you.
Upon this most recent fuck up of professional negotiating, David Stern realized he was about to lose a major gravy train and any shot at a new arena and new merchandise boon once Ellison paid the mere pennies in Oracle Scratch a comprehensive rebranding/uniform revision would cost. So he botched the entire affair on top of Cohan's bull shit and strong armed the Sports Banking firm hiring and announcement thereof that has dominated the largely-ignored Warriors media cycle this week. Oh yeah and Stephen Curry's ankle healed magically after Tyreke Evans' face got smashed. Hangover's are a bitch, and Steph Curry was HUNG THE FUCK OVER in Memphis in a recent ugly Warriors loss on the road.
Anyway, the sale timeline does not change at all. Chris Cohan is under no pressure to sell before the league knows for sure whether there will or will not be a player lockout attending CBA renegotiations next year. He wants to sell and has for some time, that much is clear. But he missed the Golden Opportunity and has systematically devalued the team since the 2007 playoffs. Since then, he's piled on contracts he immediately regretted (Maggette, Ellis, Biedrins, Jackson, Nelson) and hiked prices to rates that GUARANTEE you suckers just made him more money in the last two terrible seasons than he'd made in any two season period prior. Add the season ticket sales totals up from 2007-2009 and you're looking at one of the most percentage-profitable teams in the league. Perhaps THIS season ticket sales dropped. But it was sheer gravy train to this point and Rowell's canny cash dumps and vet minimum signings (paid by the league for the most part) result in no major cash hit whatsoever.
Cohan has a long-rumored IRS debt to worry about. Apparently, it's a major problem now. Never before. It dates to 1998 when the dipshit sold the cable company he bought with his inheritance and used shady tax shelters because, of course, he went bargain shopping on his financial advice. Not buying that it pressures him in sale-relevant ways. He's been peddling the team for years now. He's the classic fickle fucktard. No one takes him seriously at this point and what Stern fails to recognize is that, by publicizing this For Sale stuff NOW with a clear financial crisis on the horizon for the league and no guarantees that D League scabs will put butts in seats, he advertises an INCREDIBLE Clearance Sale on the Warriors.
If you're a halfway decent businessman or -woman, you're waiting until the team is so heinously devalued that you can have it for nearly free and you're not letting Cohan's bitchy reactionary PR shit dissuade you from letting him kill himself yet again. Stern wants mega millions for a good market? Boo-fucking-hoo. He let us waste away for going-on-20 years to this point, fuck him and the incompetent fat cat prick owners who got us all into this mess of complacent fan-screwing in the first place.
The low dollar point for the Warriors ain't now. This desperate last chance to entice someone into thinking they can run a draft and hire a coach ain't fooling anyone who matters. Nelson is still under contract, Maggette is totally untradeable, the draft pick is worthless, the core players are overpriced, hated, fighting with each other, lazy, flawed, out of position, or all of the above. Why pay for the last worst year of this team's Epic Failure? Why bail Cohan out of the ONLY money losing season in the last 5?! Let him squirm. Let the team plummet. Let the arena get another natural year closer to the inevitable end. Go in for the kill when the bleeding has already got this fucker on the mat.
This is simply a stupid time to buy from a fickle loser like Cohan. The Publicize strategy Cohan and Stern settled on ensures nothing at all in terms of timeline, it simply annoys existing bidders and highlights the desperation. Only one change matters as Cohan inflicts this ULTIMATE fan fuck over, the "I'm Selling" lie. Cohan has to give it up. All of it. The myth of competence, the snarky sense of entitlement, the cocky assurance and plausible deniability PR campaigns, all of it. Nothing changes for Warriors fans until one thing happens.
Let go, Chris Cohan.
Just let it go.
You cannot win, and you have not shown the world you're serious about selling.
You've merely reconfirmed for the umpteenth time that you are not worth treating as a legitimate business partner and that your irrational self-deluding knows no shame. You'll even exploit the dominant Warriors fan passion, the one that wats YOU out of our lives more than even Monta Ellis, for a few stray ticket sales.
Just let it go.
The tickets will sell themselves at that point.
Besides all this, the timeline predictions from folks like Tim Kawakami and Marc Spears make no sense based upon previous team sales. Perhaps this situation is different, and if Larry Ellison suddenly pays $500 million for the Warriors tomorrow, egg on my face. But a fast track sale doens't make a lot of sense for a supposedly important market that should be a near-crown jewel of the league instead of a national punch line. You do this right and you treat the most desirable bidder well. You don't drag his or her name around in desperate false bidding war talk pointing.
Teams that are selling in time for the upcoming draft and Free Agency signing period have been publicly for sale for months and years and have had sale discussions publicly vetted on a regular basis for some time.
The New Jersey Nets, for example, were known to be "unofficially" for sale or in preliminary, intermediate, or advanced discussions (who knows?) as early as Spring 2008. Frank Isola and Mitch Lawrence wrote up a comprehensive review of one significantly advanced potential sale scenario in October, 2008: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/basketball/nets/2008/10/27/2008-10-27_bruce_ratner_explored_nets_sale.html
The Nets were not officially sold until 2010. And not to the parties discussed in that article. But the public/league-mediated sale discussions DID produce a bonkers bidder. Major considerations: Odds-on lock for the #1 pick in a two player draft, TONS of cap room for this Epic Free Agent Market, and 100% Lebron mojo in the Brooklyn market with added public spectacle value in the person of longtime Nets shareholder and prominent ownership representative AND Lebron friend, phenomenally successful and now New York-brand-setter, rapper Jay-Z.
I'm a major Sinatra fan but I hand over New York naming rights fully to Jay-Z's sublime Empire State of Mind.
The Bobcats were "publicly" put up for sale way back in April-May of 2009, officially announced as such via typical circuitry in June after Bob Johnson hired an investment banker to manage the sale. He'd been meeting with said banker for months preceding the public announcements. The league and the team's ownership spent "some time" (nearly a year) trying to manufacture an operative market despite everyone knowing Michael Jordan was going to buy (and kill) the league's second-least valuable market franchise at the end of the day and he'd already devalued it to irretrievable depths while the owner ran for his life under a hail of operations losses. Michael Jordan's easy claim on the team following some perfunctory phantom competition news went down smoothly and quickly after the team took a major value hit. Losing and incompetence have a way of infecting even the sweet release of closure with their stink. Losers lose, I guess.
Wizards are SOLD as of now but that sale was already assured via Abe Pollin's sad passing and longstanding, strong relationships with minority owner Ted Leonsis. Leonsis had exclusive purchasing rights and used them. The Verizon Center is part of Wizards assets, their payroll is looking dandy for this FA class, Gilbert Arenas may still be voided in time for big signings, and the Wizards Shaun Livingston Tank Brigade is on its way to better lottery odds than the Warrior team that manufactured its lost season through bad player relations, lies, and false injury reports while Washington was legitimately dysfunctional in the wake of Pollin's passing and Arenas' Annual Solstice Day Shoot Out.
These things tend to look a certain way and take a certain amount of time when they're really going down. And when they're really working through the circuitry that engenders league approval, they involve, to be sure, firms like Galatioto Partners. But they also tend to have clear extenuating circumstances and acknowledged histories of development that do indeed draw the crazies from outside the NBA information exchange (say, Russia or China) with monster bids. They do NOT come when the team flexibility situation is at its worst and the next season is under the cloud of a player lockout that will make you no money in the immediate future. Ask any savvy 2010 Real Estate vulture and he or she will tell you, there are plenty of clearly hopeless situations still being clung to by irrational buffoons in deep, deep denial. You know when you're dealing with one and you don't waste your time with them. Their product is never worth OVERpaying for.
So the bull shit talk about Stern wanting the Warriors to go for a fat price is all hot air. A good businessman knows full well that desperation on the eve of no team play is the best time to pounce and that a complete restructuring of league contract rules is the time to arrive with major capital mojo and a major chance to take the lead amongst owners with all Don Nelson questions answered and paid for by the sucker you just cleaned out.
Chris Cohan isn't selling because he doesn't have the stones to admit when he's licked (we'd be done with him by now if he did). And Larry Ellison isn't buying because he'd be a complete idiot if he did right now. David Stern seems like he's due for retirement. Trying to fuck with Larry Ellison seems like a fine sign of his demented, overblown sense of importance. This play was a major fail. The new mega tycoon owners and Michael Jordan can safely stage his ouster now. Beautiful. Those poor players don't like sport coats anyway. So let them take them off and listen to mood music entering the arena again. PLEASE.
To wrap this up and get the weekend kicked off, a bit of recap and loose additional thoughts on the Week that Wasn't in Cohan Faux Sales Talks:
This team will try to make a bigtime trade in this offseason because it's worth zero right now. If they had any moment of "we won't just rent a big name" last offseason, it was in direct consideration of the rental not affecting sale price positively THIS offseason because ROWELL had already screwed the cap situation up so heinously with the then-in-house Stephen Jackson problem, etc. Even moving Biedrins and change wasn't going to fix the rest of the payroll enough to play on this FA market. But no one's listening since half the league is in on the 2010 FA pool (including the Sacramento Kings, who are about to boat race the Warriors hardcore. Are they for sale?! New arena!). So the Warriors will have to try again at the next trade deadline. Until then, they don't have any improvement of assets to point to and can only find new ways to make money while killing the product. Rowell's a clever thief. I'm sure Cohan's bottom line will be just fine. Most expensive concessions in the league, no outhouses, ramped up parking ticket prices MID SEASON, etc. They're the best in the business at stealing the fans' money, even in times of crisis. Cohan's kids won't starve. BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
What sort of moron would bail them out NOW to NOT PLAY on this FA market?! And what sort of a moron thinks the pieces on the roster make the Warriors a player in this S&T market?! Not Larry Ellison. Maybe the idiot accomplice best friend of Cohan and co., Mr. Fitness Club Lamorinda Mark Mastrov. Ugh. That would be a fucking disaster.
We've all accepted that this week's Big News only re-confirms that Cohan is being a stubborn moron about the price.
Like I said a while ago. Let's make it a fun game now! How much do you think he'll sell for?!
To reiterate, Bucher laid a solid gold egg many of you don't seem to want to acknowledge:
COHAN BACKED OUT OF AGREEMENTS TWICE!
Like heavily publicizing mega offers to Arenas and Brand (let that sink in for a moment) and then throwing $50 million at Corey Maggette, this staged public announcement is pure PR fodder. Cohan's no closer and this was the only way he could think of to troll Ellison's life since Larry ain't returning calls any more. Stern's job interview with Ellison is not off to a good start.
Stern and Cohan are on the brink of completely blowing this.
No Sale before 2011.
Do you want Larry Ellison's money going to Chris Cohan's pockets and David Stern's CV or do you want him getting a great deal and then spending like crazy on YOUR TEAM? Easy answer. Now imagine Ellison isn't the guy buying the team. Suddenly the money ain't so funny and you damn sure want every last penny salvaged from the undeserving Cohan-Stern network and poured DIRECTLY into team operations coffers for the immense rebuilding project Cohan's destructive tenure leaves in its wake.
This week, the Warriors' announced they had hired a respected professional sports M & A organization to handle the potential sale of their unprofessional NBA organization. The Galatioto Sports Partners group, which brands itself "The Sports Bankers," has overseen a number of pro team sales in recent years and most recently advised parties to the Charlotte Bobcats team sale.
Despite the sound and the fury of this announcement of... paying a retainer to a banking firm? ... the Golden State Warriors and the flagship whorebag radio mothpiece they fund heavily have already run creepy ads about Larry Ellison. The spot in question, which features a mannered sale demand and some predictable excuse-making about how difficult and drawn out these mega big business deals can be, delivers a familiar message to the fans still listening to KNBR and, in turn, listening for their reason to spend more money on this shit can team. Amounting to little more than the desperate season ticket sales push gimmick of all time, this "sale" prep announcement ad, of course, urges.......
Patience.
The Warriors demand that season ticket holders on the fence about renewing their tickets for another season of this crap house show lock in within the next two weeks, by April 12th. Apparently the Clippers, on the other hand, are letting their ticket holders wait until AFTER the draft lottery has taken place. In other words, the Warriors demanded that remaining invested fans hand over money for Rowell to put into interest-bearing accounts before they even know where the team will draft. Or before they trade that pick in a Maggette contract dump! Or before the Clippers even hire a new coach or sign Lebron James! The Clippers have EVERYTHING going for them now with another high draft pick, the best pick of last year's draft ready to go, millions to spend in free agency, and Mike Dunleavy gone. But there are no answers to a thousand all-too-familiar questions in Warriorland and we slobbering masses still enjoy the hell out of watching these final 15 games as Nelson shows that those injuries and youth never mattered, he can still manufacture exciting shit ball barn burners with D-Leaguers and has-beens and the Winning Shall Inspire. Buy tickets now!
And to top THAT,
WE'RE SELLING! YOU'RE FREE! CELEBRATE BY BUYING TICKETS NOW!!!!!
As many have by now figured out, the Warriors will still run the draft and the free agency period (in which they are complete non-factors) via Idiot's Consortium.
Robert Rowell says "Salary Protection Wins Championships."
Larry Riley says "Aw Shucks, we'll try like the Dickens not to suck."
Don Nelson says ~burp~ "Dammit, Willie, ante up."
Buy Tickets Now!
Chris Cohan's creepy, beady-eyed weirdo routine still has us poor fans in a strangle hold. As it turns out, Cohan had TWO agreements in place with Larry Ellison but backed out of both! He LIKED Ellison's bid price! He ACCEPTED Larry Ellison's bid price! And then, in a fit of idiocy, he sent Flunkster Dude and the PR moron brigade off to spam the forums and the airwaves to complain that Ellison was lowballing him! Warriors beatland missed this completely and ate the cookie: Ellison is interested! They skipped over the part Ric Bucher nailed on Gary Radnich's AM radio show: Cohan fucked up the sale already. TWICE. He had to cover up (through Rowell denial and Ellison baiting) by beating the winner of the stand off(s) to the punch.
Like the Monta Ellis trade Rowell offered the Memphis Grizzlies (diarrhea of the mouth) and the failed Amar'e Stoudemire trade(s) this past year, the Cohan Enterprise failed miserably when they actually stepped foot on legit NBA business territory. You know, the level above just efficiently stealing fans' money through media messaging and contract laundering (at least $20 million saved through various insurance-covered contracts and cash dumps this season).
Interesting side note, Monta Ellis was fined AND suspended last season. So he was suspended without pay for 30 games (~$3 million) AND THEN he had to pay $3 million to league-appointed charities as part of the team fine. So in effect, as NO ONE has ever discussed until now: Monta Ellis had $6 million taken away from him AND THEN was mercilessly slammed by the Warriors and the local fan community for two straight seasons. Thank god he just told Marc Spears he thinks he's better than Lebron. His agents are brilliant: adding that fuel to the Ellis Attitude Fire should get him dumped off right quick. Damage control spinning has already begun in earnest in Warriorland.
[Update: Suspension cash goes to charity/tax write-off for the team, of course. But the fine was never announced and may not in fact have been assessed once Ellis' Player's Union grievance stopped the official Warriors public patriarchal shaming dead in its tracks. Forum plant morons were still free to foment Monta hatred, which continues today. Ellis definitely played the season under VOID, fine, and further suspension threat. Rowell announced he would not be voided about the time Elis' Players' Union grievance was reviewed and Ellis' claim affirmed. Rowell of course spun it as an act of magnanimity on his part. Then Ellis was offered in a heavily publicized (by Rowell) trade that would have saved the team that $3 million. Likely to still happen after all of the other money laundering schemes Rowell's run on Crawford, Jackson, Belinelli trades, etc.]
All of which is to say, as We Believe! barely scratches the surface of the days-of-yore memory banks a mere 3 years after The Dallas Series: Chris Cohan is a gutless loser who can't close and, when he REALLY fucks up, broadcasts the fact by publicly smearing the OTHER side in whatever matter he just trainwrecked. That's a verb now. Update your wikisaurus. It's fucking Cohan's verb. It's the Cohan Verb Par Excellence.
Cohan the Trainwrecker.
And add this one to your lexicon, too: pulling a Cohan. Someone more clever than I can run down some preliminary mega fuck ups that shall from this day forth be called pullings of Cohans. But you all know exactly what they'll look like: fucking brutal. I've got a few real life Cohans pulled:
1. Chris Webber house visit and IMMEDIATE end of his Warriors tenure way back at the beginning of the Cohan ownership.
2. Lucked into the 2007 Playoffs, had the premier team marketing vehicle (and used it: We Believe!), but fucked it all up and were a laughing stock less than a year later.
3. Dumping Jason Richardson for strictly cash savings. $10 million TPE unused, playoffs missed. Remember the LOUD complaints fomr Nellie and co. about 48 games to makes the Western Conference playoffs that season? 48 wins both seasons since. Good thing they quit then instead of wasting good scotch on hard work the last two seasons. Oh and, to close the loop: Drafting Marco Belinelli and suggesting he'd replace JR.
4. Chris Webber signing and mega-publicity campaign to kill any shot at the 2008 playoffs.
5. 16 years. Make your own list. Pretty much any executive decision over that time qualifies.
Pulling a Cohan. The Warriors Way. Going on 20 years. That's a Fucking Dynasty.
David Stern hates you, NBA Warriors fans. He fucking hates you.
Upon this most recent fuck up of professional negotiating, David Stern realized he was about to lose a major gravy train and any shot at a new arena and new merchandise boon once Ellison paid the mere pennies in Oracle Scratch a comprehensive rebranding/uniform revision would cost. So he botched the entire affair on top of Cohan's bull shit and strong armed the Sports Banking firm hiring and announcement thereof that has dominated the largely-ignored Warriors media cycle this week. Oh yeah and Stephen Curry's ankle healed magically after Tyreke Evans' face got smashed. Hangover's are a bitch, and Steph Curry was HUNG THE FUCK OVER in Memphis in a recent ugly Warriors loss on the road.
Anyway, the sale timeline does not change at all. Chris Cohan is under no pressure to sell before the league knows for sure whether there will or will not be a player lockout attending CBA renegotiations next year. He wants to sell and has for some time, that much is clear. But he missed the Golden Opportunity and has systematically devalued the team since the 2007 playoffs. Since then, he's piled on contracts he immediately regretted (Maggette, Ellis, Biedrins, Jackson, Nelson) and hiked prices to rates that GUARANTEE you suckers just made him more money in the last two terrible seasons than he'd made in any two season period prior. Add the season ticket sales totals up from 2007-2009 and you're looking at one of the most percentage-profitable teams in the league. Perhaps THIS season ticket sales dropped. But it was sheer gravy train to this point and Rowell's canny cash dumps and vet minimum signings (paid by the league for the most part) result in no major cash hit whatsoever.
Cohan has a long-rumored IRS debt to worry about. Apparently, it's a major problem now. Never before. It dates to 1998 when the dipshit sold the cable company he bought with his inheritance and used shady tax shelters because, of course, he went bargain shopping on his financial advice. Not buying that it pressures him in sale-relevant ways. He's been peddling the team for years now. He's the classic fickle fucktard. No one takes him seriously at this point and what Stern fails to recognize is that, by publicizing this For Sale stuff NOW with a clear financial crisis on the horizon for the league and no guarantees that D League scabs will put butts in seats, he advertises an INCREDIBLE Clearance Sale on the Warriors.
If you're a halfway decent businessman or -woman, you're waiting until the team is so heinously devalued that you can have it for nearly free and you're not letting Cohan's bitchy reactionary PR shit dissuade you from letting him kill himself yet again. Stern wants mega millions for a good market? Boo-fucking-hoo. He let us waste away for going-on-20 years to this point, fuck him and the incompetent fat cat prick owners who got us all into this mess of complacent fan-screwing in the first place.
The low dollar point for the Warriors ain't now. This desperate last chance to entice someone into thinking they can run a draft and hire a coach ain't fooling anyone who matters. Nelson is still under contract, Maggette is totally untradeable, the draft pick is worthless, the core players are overpriced, hated, fighting with each other, lazy, flawed, out of position, or all of the above. Why pay for the last worst year of this team's Epic Failure? Why bail Cohan out of the ONLY money losing season in the last 5?! Let him squirm. Let the team plummet. Let the arena get another natural year closer to the inevitable end. Go in for the kill when the bleeding has already got this fucker on the mat.
This is simply a stupid time to buy from a fickle loser like Cohan. The Publicize strategy Cohan and Stern settled on ensures nothing at all in terms of timeline, it simply annoys existing bidders and highlights the desperation. Only one change matters as Cohan inflicts this ULTIMATE fan fuck over, the "I'm Selling" lie. Cohan has to give it up. All of it. The myth of competence, the snarky sense of entitlement, the cocky assurance and plausible deniability PR campaigns, all of it. Nothing changes for Warriors fans until one thing happens.
Let go, Chris Cohan.
Just let it go.
You cannot win, and you have not shown the world you're serious about selling.
You've merely reconfirmed for the umpteenth time that you are not worth treating as a legitimate business partner and that your irrational self-deluding knows no shame. You'll even exploit the dominant Warriors fan passion, the one that wats YOU out of our lives more than even Monta Ellis, for a few stray ticket sales.
Just let it go.
The tickets will sell themselves at that point.
Besides all this, the timeline predictions from folks like Tim Kawakami and Marc Spears make no sense based upon previous team sales. Perhaps this situation is different, and if Larry Ellison suddenly pays $500 million for the Warriors tomorrow, egg on my face. But a fast track sale doens't make a lot of sense for a supposedly important market that should be a near-crown jewel of the league instead of a national punch line. You do this right and you treat the most desirable bidder well. You don't drag his or her name around in desperate false bidding war talk pointing.
Teams that are selling in time for the upcoming draft and Free Agency signing period have been publicly for sale for months and years and have had sale discussions publicly vetted on a regular basis for some time.
The New Jersey Nets, for example, were known to be "unofficially" for sale or in preliminary, intermediate, or advanced discussions (who knows?) as early as Spring 2008. Frank Isola and Mitch Lawrence wrote up a comprehensive review of one significantly advanced potential sale scenario in October, 2008: http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/basketball/nets/2008/10/27/2008-10-27_bruce_ratner_explored_nets_sale.html
The Nets were not officially sold until 2010. And not to the parties discussed in that article. But the public/league-mediated sale discussions DID produce a bonkers bidder. Major considerations: Odds-on lock for the #1 pick in a two player draft, TONS of cap room for this Epic Free Agent Market, and 100% Lebron mojo in the Brooklyn market with added public spectacle value in the person of longtime Nets shareholder and prominent ownership representative AND Lebron friend, phenomenally successful and now New York-brand-setter, rapper Jay-Z.
I'm a major Sinatra fan but I hand over New York naming rights fully to Jay-Z's sublime Empire State of Mind.
The Bobcats were "publicly" put up for sale way back in April-May of 2009, officially announced as such via typical circuitry in June after Bob Johnson hired an investment banker to manage the sale. He'd been meeting with said banker for months preceding the public announcements. The league and the team's ownership spent "some time" (nearly a year) trying to manufacture an operative market despite everyone knowing Michael Jordan was going to buy (and kill) the league's second-least valuable market franchise at the end of the day and he'd already devalued it to irretrievable depths while the owner ran for his life under a hail of operations losses. Michael Jordan's easy claim on the team following some perfunctory phantom competition news went down smoothly and quickly after the team took a major value hit. Losing and incompetence have a way of infecting even the sweet release of closure with their stink. Losers lose, I guess.
Wizards are SOLD as of now but that sale was already assured via Abe Pollin's sad passing and longstanding, strong relationships with minority owner Ted Leonsis. Leonsis had exclusive purchasing rights and used them. The Verizon Center is part of Wizards assets, their payroll is looking dandy for this FA class, Gilbert Arenas may still be voided in time for big signings, and the Wizards Shaun Livingston Tank Brigade is on its way to better lottery odds than the Warrior team that manufactured its lost season through bad player relations, lies, and false injury reports while Washington was legitimately dysfunctional in the wake of Pollin's passing and Arenas' Annual Solstice Day Shoot Out.
These things tend to look a certain way and take a certain amount of time when they're really going down. And when they're really working through the circuitry that engenders league approval, they involve, to be sure, firms like Galatioto Partners. But they also tend to have clear extenuating circumstances and acknowledged histories of development that do indeed draw the crazies from outside the NBA information exchange (say, Russia or China) with monster bids. They do NOT come when the team flexibility situation is at its worst and the next season is under the cloud of a player lockout that will make you no money in the immediate future. Ask any savvy 2010 Real Estate vulture and he or she will tell you, there are plenty of clearly hopeless situations still being clung to by irrational buffoons in deep, deep denial. You know when you're dealing with one and you don't waste your time with them. Their product is never worth OVERpaying for.
So the bull shit talk about Stern wanting the Warriors to go for a fat price is all hot air. A good businessman knows full well that desperation on the eve of no team play is the best time to pounce and that a complete restructuring of league contract rules is the time to arrive with major capital mojo and a major chance to take the lead amongst owners with all Don Nelson questions answered and paid for by the sucker you just cleaned out.
Chris Cohan isn't selling because he doesn't have the stones to admit when he's licked (we'd be done with him by now if he did). And Larry Ellison isn't buying because he'd be a complete idiot if he did right now. David Stern seems like he's due for retirement. Trying to fuck with Larry Ellison seems like a fine sign of his demented, overblown sense of importance. This play was a major fail. The new mega tycoon owners and Michael Jordan can safely stage his ouster now. Beautiful. Those poor players don't like sport coats anyway. So let them take them off and listen to mood music entering the arena again. PLEASE.
To wrap this up and get the weekend kicked off, a bit of recap and loose additional thoughts on the Week that Wasn't in Cohan Faux Sales Talks:
This team will try to make a bigtime trade in this offseason because it's worth zero right now. If they had any moment of "we won't just rent a big name" last offseason, it was in direct consideration of the rental not affecting sale price positively THIS offseason because ROWELL had already screwed the cap situation up so heinously with the then-in-house Stephen Jackson problem, etc. Even moving Biedrins and change wasn't going to fix the rest of the payroll enough to play on this FA market. But no one's listening since half the league is in on the 2010 FA pool (including the Sacramento Kings, who are about to boat race the Warriors hardcore. Are they for sale?! New arena!). So the Warriors will have to try again at the next trade deadline. Until then, they don't have any improvement of assets to point to and can only find new ways to make money while killing the product. Rowell's a clever thief. I'm sure Cohan's bottom line will be just fine. Most expensive concessions in the league, no outhouses, ramped up parking ticket prices MID SEASON, etc. They're the best in the business at stealing the fans' money, even in times of crisis. Cohan's kids won't starve. BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
What sort of moron would bail them out NOW to NOT PLAY on this FA market?! And what sort of a moron thinks the pieces on the roster make the Warriors a player in this S&T market?! Not Larry Ellison. Maybe the idiot accomplice best friend of Cohan and co., Mr. Fitness Club Lamorinda Mark Mastrov. Ugh. That would be a fucking disaster.
We've all accepted that this week's Big News only re-confirms that Cohan is being a stubborn moron about the price.
Like I said a while ago. Let's make it a fun game now! How much do you think he'll sell for?!
To reiterate, Bucher laid a solid gold egg many of you don't seem to want to acknowledge:
COHAN BACKED OUT OF AGREEMENTS TWICE!
Like heavily publicizing mega offers to Arenas and Brand (let that sink in for a moment) and then throwing $50 million at Corey Maggette, this staged public announcement is pure PR fodder. Cohan's no closer and this was the only way he could think of to troll Ellison's life since Larry ain't returning calls any more. Stern's job interview with Ellison is not off to a good start.
Stern and Cohan are on the brink of completely blowing this.
No Sale before 2011.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Best 6th Man of the Draft Since Robert Rowell's Balls Dropped
It's looking like Jamal Crawford has about locked up the 2010 6th Man of the Year Award. Unless I've got the national media as snively about this as they sometimes seem and they go agenda vote on us all yet again as the reality of the GQ Curry Show Hype and Gimmicks Marketing Campaign smacks everyone in their self-righteous, one-month-of-college-basketball-discussing, nice-story-loving, pretty-mouth-infatuated faces.
Now seems like a good time to review the best 6th men drafted since Robert Rowell has worked for the Golden State Warriors (1995: "I've been here 9 years!"). Lied about that one, too.
Not every year features a great 6th man. In 2001, for example, no prototypical 6th man was really drafted. So I plugged Shane Battier into this list. It should make everyone feel better if they really think about it. But it will probably make them feel really bad after that if they REALLY think about it. Likewise, 1996 saw no real 6th man talent come to the podium for a clammy Stern handshake. But Todd Fuller and Kobe Bryant DID cross the stage that year a mere 2 picks apart!
If a player ever won 6th Man of the Year, I give him honorable mention in his draft year in the event another player has since passed him up for career bench role playing excellence. Mike Miller, Rookie of the Year in 2001 and 6th Man of the Year in 2006, however, does not beat out Jamal Crawford because then my awesome list would not be as funny. Or maybe it would. Mike Miller won Rookie of the Year after being drafted 5th. OK, you talked me into it. Co-6th Man Draftees of the Year for 2000. Once Crawford wins 6th Man of the Year, 2000 will forever live on as the Greatest 6th Man Draft Year In The History of The NBA Ever Since 1999 Unless 2009 surpasses it.
Year: Player (Draft Position) [Warriors Pick - Position]
1995: Jerry Stackhouse (3) HM: Corliss Williamson (13) [Joe Smith - 1]
1996: Kobe Bryant (13) [Todd Fuller - 11]
1997: Tim Thomas (7) [Adonal Foyle - 8]
1998: Antawn Jamison (4) [Vince Carter - 5, traded for Antawn Jamison - 4]
1999: Jason Terry (10) & Manu Ginobili (57) [Jeff Foster - 21, traded for Vonteego Cummings - 26]
2000: Mike Miller (5) & Jamal Crawford (8) [no pick]
2001: Shane Battier (6) [Jason Richardson - 5]
2002: Matt Barnes (46) [Mike Dunleavy - 3]
2003: Leandro Barbosa (28) [Mickael Pietrus - 11]
2004: Ben Gordon (3) [Andris Biedrins - 11]
2005: Nate Robinson (21) [Ike Diogu - 9, Monta Ellis - 40]
2006: JJ Redick (11) [Patrick O'Bryant - 9]
2007: Jared Dudley (22) & Rudy Fernandez (24) [Marco Belinelli - 18]
2008: DJ Augustin (9) & Jerryd Bayless (11) [Anthony Randolph - 14]
2009: ????????? (?) [Stephen Curry - 7]
Now seems like a good time to review the best 6th men drafted since Robert Rowell has worked for the Golden State Warriors (1995: "I've been here 9 years!"). Lied about that one, too.
Not every year features a great 6th man. In 2001, for example, no prototypical 6th man was really drafted. So I plugged Shane Battier into this list. It should make everyone feel better if they really think about it. But it will probably make them feel really bad after that if they REALLY think about it. Likewise, 1996 saw no real 6th man talent come to the podium for a clammy Stern handshake. But Todd Fuller and Kobe Bryant DID cross the stage that year a mere 2 picks apart!
If a player ever won 6th Man of the Year, I give him honorable mention in his draft year in the event another player has since passed him up for career bench role playing excellence. Mike Miller, Rookie of the Year in 2001 and 6th Man of the Year in 2006, however, does not beat out Jamal Crawford because then my awesome list would not be as funny. Or maybe it would. Mike Miller won Rookie of the Year after being drafted 5th. OK, you talked me into it. Co-6th Man Draftees of the Year for 2000. Once Crawford wins 6th Man of the Year, 2000 will forever live on as the Greatest 6th Man Draft Year In The History of The NBA Ever Since 1999 Unless 2009 surpasses it.
Year: Player (Draft Position) [Warriors Pick - Position]
1995: Jerry Stackhouse (3) HM: Corliss Williamson (13) [Joe Smith - 1]
1996: Kobe Bryant (13) [Todd Fuller - 11]
1997: Tim Thomas (7) [Adonal Foyle - 8]
1998: Antawn Jamison (4) [Vince Carter - 5, traded for Antawn Jamison - 4]
1999: Jason Terry (10) & Manu Ginobili (57) [Jeff Foster - 21, traded for Vonteego Cummings - 26]
2000: Mike Miller (5) & Jamal Crawford (8) [no pick]
2001: Shane Battier (6) [Jason Richardson - 5]
2002: Matt Barnes (46) [Mike Dunleavy - 3]
2003: Leandro Barbosa (28) [Mickael Pietrus - 11]
2004: Ben Gordon (3) [Andris Biedrins - 11]
2005: Nate Robinson (21) [Ike Diogu - 9, Monta Ellis - 40]
2006: JJ Redick (11) [Patrick O'Bryant - 9]
2007: Jared Dudley (22) & Rudy Fernandez (24) [Marco Belinelli - 18]
2008: DJ Augustin (9) & Jerryd Bayless (11) [Anthony Randolph - 14]
2009: ????????? (?) [Stephen Curry - 7]
Friday, March 12, 2010
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Warriors +/- per minute last 10 games & Season PER Update
Ellis' and Maggette's numbers suck (worse than all these guys but not NEARLY as bad as Raja Bell's!) but Ellis has played only 4 games in the last 13 and everyone knows Maggette is total shit. So here's a decent first impression of life without Monta. Now that Nellie and the team plan to roll forth with Tolliver and Williams and Hunter next year, you know how that will all work once Ellis and Biedrins are dumped and Curry's running the team all by his widdle wonesome. And Watson is surely about to be mishandled in Rowell sign and trade demands no team will ever meet.
"Hi [insert name of competent NBA executive here] it's me, Bobby Rowell!"
Click. Diarrhea of the mouth.
1. Watson (.076)
2. Hunter (.049)
3. Tolliver (-.022)
4. Williams (-.137, 5 games)
5. George (-.146)
6. Biedrins (-.153)
7. Morrow (-.177)
8. Turiaf (-.187)
9. Curry (-.198)
The Curry-Turiaf core is solid.
Season PER
1. Maggette - 21.27
2. Azubuike - 20.08 (there's SO MUCH HOPE!)
3. Randolph - 18.92 (SO MUCH!)
4. Williams - 18.76 (HOPE!)
5. Ellis - 16.62 (byebye)
Jason Richardson - 16.39
Rodrigue Beaubois - 16.33
Stephen Jackson - 16.11
15.00 is an average NBA player
6. Curry - 14.67 (they padded and padded but this is as high as he could get?!)
7. Watson - 14.64 (better start screwing with his time even MORE b4 he catches GQ!)
8. Morrow - 14.11
9. Bell - 14.02 (Player-coach. Savior. Veteran Savvy. 34. Bullshit.)
10. Marco Belinelli - 13.33 (Winner. He'll make more $ than Randolph next season.)
11. Biedrins - 13.13
12. Tolliver - 12.10
13. Turiaf - 12.08
14. Moore - 11.32 (brilliant addition)
15. Patrick O'Bryant - 10.98 (oops. How'd that get in there?)
16. Devean George - 10.76 (free and no whining to the Italian media.)
17. Hunter - 10.69
18. Radmanovic - 8.04 (really looking forward to seeing what he can do next season.)
19. Cartier Martin - 7.42 (30 minutes a game for 10 games was a really good call.)
20. Coby Karl - 5.21 (I liked him.)
"Hi [insert name of competent NBA executive here] it's me, Bobby Rowell!"
Click. Diarrhea of the mouth.
1. Watson (.076)
2. Hunter (.049)
3. Tolliver (-.022)
4. Williams (-.137, 5 games)
5. George (-.146)
6. Biedrins (-.153)
7. Morrow (-.177)
8. Turiaf (-.187)
9. Curry (-.198)
The Curry-Turiaf core is solid.
Season PER
1. Maggette - 21.27
2. Azubuike - 20.08 (there's SO MUCH HOPE!)
3. Randolph - 18.92 (SO MUCH!)
4. Williams - 18.76 (HOPE!)
5. Ellis - 16.62 (byebye)
Jason Richardson - 16.39
Rodrigue Beaubois - 16.33
Stephen Jackson - 16.11
15.00 is an average NBA player
6. Curry - 14.67 (they padded and padded but this is as high as he could get?!)
7. Watson - 14.64 (better start screwing with his time even MORE b4 he catches GQ!)
8. Morrow - 14.11
9. Bell - 14.02 (Player-coach. Savior. Veteran Savvy. 34. Bullshit.)
10. Marco Belinelli - 13.33 (Winner. He'll make more $ than Randolph next season.)
11. Biedrins - 13.13
12. Tolliver - 12.10
13. Turiaf - 12.08
14. Moore - 11.32 (brilliant addition)
15. Patrick O'Bryant - 10.98 (oops. How'd that get in there?)
16. Devean George - 10.76 (free and no whining to the Italian media.)
17. Hunter - 10.69
18. Radmanovic - 8.04 (really looking forward to seeing what he can do next season.)
19. Cartier Martin - 7.42 (30 minutes a game for 10 games was a really good call.)
20. Coby Karl - 5.21 (I liked him.)
Monday, March 8, 2010
Update: Collison TORCHES GQ Stat Pad Head-to-Head
See below.
Don Nelson pulled CJ Watson and put Curry in late with the Warriors cruising, Morrow and Williams firing. Ball game. Curry got smoked by Collison and coughed it up under light pressure when it counted most. Twitterverse agrees: Collison has passed up the Hot February Stat Pad month from Curry and is in second place for ROY since the other rooks are all going to the playoffs and their teams don't need meaningless bullshit like this irrelevant Griffin-Was-Out ROY trophy.
Too easy.
When Darren Collison plays 30+ minutes in a game, he averages (wait for it).....
10.75 assists.
That's over 24 games this season.
In 10 earlier Hornets games, he played under 10 minutes and often less than 5.
His season averages would be astronomical if you just scrapped the Byron Scott and Chris Paul games altogether.
Don Nelson pulled CJ Watson and put Curry in late with the Warriors cruising, Morrow and Williams firing. Ball game. Curry got smoked by Collison and coughed it up under light pressure when it counted most. Twitterverse agrees: Collison has passed up the Hot February Stat Pad month from Curry and is in second place for ROY since the other rooks are all going to the playoffs and their teams don't need meaningless bullshit like this irrelevant Griffin-Was-Out ROY trophy.
Too easy.
When Darren Collison plays 30+ minutes in a game, he averages (wait for it).....
10.75 assists.
That's over 24 games this season.
In 10 earlier Hornets games, he played under 10 minutes and often less than 5.
His season averages would be astronomical if you just scrapped the Byron Scott and Chris Paul games altogether.
More proof that nothing means anything in Nellie Ball
Since the All Star break, the Warriors have implemented their famous Rest-a-Vet strategy and declared all big money players broken or otherwise unfit for flight fare and those precious per diems while running the All D Leaguer rotation into the ground like it cost $45 million.
In the meantime, CJ Watson has returned to completely outclassing the Golden Child, GQ Curry, as the latter plays maximum minutes for maximum empty stats in a maximum empty season for a maximum empty team soon to play in a maximum empty arena. Check out the excellent fan blogger Adam Lauridsen on the Mercury News site and this harrowing State of the Season Ticket Holder address:
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/warriors/2010/03/07/why-im-not-renewing/
Watson was benched for a game after smoking GQ with 40 points in the Sacramento game and various other brilliant playing moments as Curry's All Star and ROY pushing faded away. He was clearly just fine when he came back (and remember, this guy's been playing with something missing in his elbow or broken or whatever since like last year- tough, hungry, good). And he's been great. Maybe Nellie created him as such, huh? Doesn't look like it. Nellie runs Watson less than 30 MPG and Watson puts up numbers in limited time that put Curry's near-48 MPG to shame by comparison.
These numbers are simply remarkable:
Stat: Watson // Curry
MPG: 28.6 // 44.4
PPG: 20.1 // 21.5
FG%: .542 // .455
APG: 3.9 // 7.7
TO: 1.4 // 4.5
RPG: 3.3 // 5.8
STL: 2.4 // 1.55
Curry's also been a 3 point chucking machine since the failed hype gesture Stern and the Warriors orchestrated at Anthony Morrow's expense in the All Star weekend 3 point contest. Watson vs. Curry 3PT shooting since the All Star break: Watson's 13-31 (.419), Curry's 25-69 (.362).
Annual reminder: The Warriors have shot 3 pointers at .410 (7.1/17.4) in their 17 wins. They've shot 3 pointers at .348 (6.9/19.8) in their 45 losses. And strangely enough, they've shot 3 pointers at .373 (25-67) in the three wins since the All Star break (Kings, Hawks, Pistons, all at home). So perhaps the stat doesn't tell us much. But then again, that works out to 22.3 attempts per game in those wins. The pace of games since the break has been ramped up considerably. Rowell and Nelson's ticket sales push of entertaining slop ball has been an abject failure in every way thus far. And no one is confused as to what Nelson preaches (if he even talks to the players any more at this point) when he bothers to work on game planning. Run run run, chuck chuck chuck. It's what they did for 24 games in Spring 2007, what they did against Dallas, and what they did in 2007-08. It's all they've ever done when they've stolen a few wins now and then during Nelson's pathetic return to the bench these last 4 years. This 3 point chucking should be very familiar to Warriors fans and it's ALWAYS been Curry's major tendency. So has a poor AST/TO ratio, incidentally.
The cost of Curry's individual 3 point chucking is points on the other end. Curry has taken 69 three pointers since the All Star break. Anthony Morrow has, as well, and made 3 more than Curry. One can argue that the percentage difference those three makes equate to (.406 for Morrow to Curry's .362) settles the matter: it's no big deal. But it is indeed a big deal when one considers that Curry has 200 FGA total since the All Star break to Morrow's 173 and that Curry is clearly shooting anything and everything in a broken system with no accountability and no legitimate team play in sight. That Morrow has been used a lot since the break is still significant, though. Curry has been run out with the full intention of taking all kinds of shots and racking up all the numbers he can while the team shuts down anyone and everyone they pimped as a core player this time last season. What's going on with Morrow getting all this run, too? He's the only guard available sometimes but CJ Watson and Reggie Williams look pretty OK. (Textbook Warriors: secure the D Leaguer they plan to sign for next season, get him on team payroll and in the locker room, and hide him off court so other teams don't invite him to their Summer team- they did it with Azubuike and Watson, too).
Here's the point:
Stephen Curry is #8 in the league for total FGA since the break. Morrow's 173 puts him in 18th. Last year, the Warriors finished the second half with Kelenna Azubuike's 315 attempts leading the team after the break. That was good for 83rd in the league. Al Harrington's 444 as a Knick were good for 20th. Ben Gordon took 483. Curry is currently on pace to take 564 shots in the second half. Morrow is on pace to take 487. They're being pushed as the future of this team, no doubt about it. But the play is no different-- scratch that, it's WORSE-- under the Nelson agenda now. Imagine putting Anthony Randolph on the floor to take all of his early clock bad shots. Imagine Kelenna Azubuike in there to fight for shots with Morrow and Curry. Don't imagine Monta Ellis or Andris Biedrins because they're still on the trade block come draft day. If they're both with the team for opening night next season, I'm not sure what I'll do or say. It will be an incredible change of course rivaled only by Bobby Rowell freaking out about me and others knowing him better than he knows himself and offering a combined, what, $100+ million to Stephen Jackson and Corey Maggette? Kelenna Azubuike may opt out of his deal. If he doesn't, he's trade bait. The team will market Curry and Morrow as but the latest annual future core while they fail to secure a solid roster besides the ticket sales talk points.
Calls from ticket representatives right now feature two names most prominently:
Stephen Curry and Anthony Morrow.
Moving on, and back to how Watson is better than GQ Free Pass in the Nellie Balll Shitwing Attack:
Watson has created 18 rebound opportunities off of 3 pointers since the All Star break. Curry has created 44. His quick clock chucks look pretty bad lately. No play development, no rebounders, no percentages in his favor apparently, and no wins. OK, 3 wins. 3-8 since the break. Watson played in those wins and missed one of the losses. So Watson's winning percentage is better than Curry's, too: .300 vs. .272. The Warriors' shoot-first, do anything else later long ball attack is of course the number one reason they lead the league in Pace and trail the league in rebounding. If the first guy down the court can always shoot as soon as he hits the 3 point line, which is the Nellie Ball play call all too often, the opposition that is already bigger than the Nelson shitwing roster just has to be there in time for the miss.
One team in the league gathers fewer total offensive rebounds per game than the Warriors. The Boston Celtics, however, run at a much lower pace. By the more appropriate measure, rebounding rate, the Warriors are simply record-settingly terrible. They're dead last in Offensive Rebounding Rate. And yet, the Nellie Ball mandate and the Curry natural chuck habit (more than 19 attempts in under 33 minutes per game over his Davidson career) continue to create easy rebounding and scoring opportunities for the opposition.
These things don't change. Giving the 70 year old Active Retirement $6 million man, Don Nelson, the most iso-happy volume chucker from a shitball Star Prop basketball "program," was like giving a dope addict a big bag of free smack. I'm borrowing the analogy from a fellow fan but it absolutely applies. Stephen Curry is naturally a Nellie Shit Ball player and even though he refused to work out for the team because the Star Prop marketing opportunities are bad and because the team is a laughingstock beneath his pedigree'd sense of entitlement as an Empty Gym, Garbage Time All Star, he's landed in the perfect place to be himself and avoid serious work on development at all costs.
As the numbers show, Curry isn't scoring any more points than Watson in the games. OK, ONE extra point. It's certainly not coming from penetration and challenging opposing defenders: Watson's getting to the line almost 6 times per game (.793) while Curry gets there only 3 times per game. Curry has a nice pretty FT% but his empty gym skills remain about the least relevant component of the NBA game. He's getting some assists but he's coughing the ball up at an alarming rate. And a look at his late game work as a distributor should give anyone who ever said "Rookie of the year" and "Stephen Curry" in the same sentence a heart attack as their game-watching and thinking habits are aired for the world to see.
Worse, actually watching any or all of the games lately reveals that he's simply clueless in the half court set now that the Screen-Roll play has been stopped after a 3 game run and his bounce passing and errant cross-court flings remain well below the NBA point guard standard. Hell, his careless work and inaccurate ankle passing aren't even NBA power forward caliber. He doesn't make chest passes or any other two handed, productive passes.
My "volume passing" moniker is still solid gold. Curry is a neurotic robot about heaving up court on the break after cherry picking some cheap/standard Nellie Ball defensive rebounds when the Warriors manage to dupe the opponent into slop ball running (the Atlanta idiots on the bench and in uniform were especially susceptible). So he looks for the easy CP first, heaves it no matter what kind of play is there, and often turns the ball over right then and there. Sheer idiocy. Matt Barnes can do the same thing. The difference with Matt Barnes was that he was strong. His laser outlet volume passing went out of bounds when he misfired (often: "My Bad"). Much easier turnover to mitigate. GQ's a weakling and his lobbish first and only option up court chuck is simply stolen and converted into easy points on the other end.
Can't deal with a double team, can't handle ball pressure (echoes of Marco Bustinelli), can't run half court offense, can't execute basic bounce passes, can't do anything but score and get some volume assists now and then. Baron Davis should have averaged 10+ APG under Nelson easily. But like Curry, he was content to get his points and get some gaudy overall numbers without really worrying about the real game play. Ka-ching. Pay the man. Robert Rowell knew damn well where Baron's "production" came from. Monta Ellis knows damn well "you don't really need a real point guard in Nellie Ball."
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/kawakami/2008/10/11/robert-rowell-q-and-a-on-monta-ellis-30-game-suspension/
CJ Watson is demolishing GQ Stat Pad on efficiency AND raw numbers. The most likely GQ Free Pass hypester retort is that it's Curry setting Watson up to succeed so much since the All Star break. That won't fly. By way of easiest, most glaringly anti-Rowell/Nellie roster construction example, I've seen Matt Barnes run the same full court break point guard role as well and better, for more WINS. Barnes is of course the guy who just stuffed Kobe Bryant and is now probably headed to the NBA Finals once Mike Brown shits his pants at zero hour for the final time in his Lebron coattail riding career. So in other words, Nellie Ball sets this sort of shit up any way. Ellis was this incredibly efficient short-minute break monster CJ Watson has turned into, once upon a time. Now he's out, too?
OK, I'm just rambling at this point.
It's time to face facts.
Stephen Curry is not a top shelf NBA point guard prospect.
He never was.
He might be a decent 6th man on an OK team.
But he seems entirely too self-centered, cocky, sloppy, and entitled to ever accept the role or ever successfully discipline his game to provide meaningful work in such a role. And as a starting point guard, he's the absolute worst in the league.
In the meantime, CJ Watson has returned to completely outclassing the Golden Child, GQ Curry, as the latter plays maximum minutes for maximum empty stats in a maximum empty season for a maximum empty team soon to play in a maximum empty arena. Check out the excellent fan blogger Adam Lauridsen on the Mercury News site and this harrowing State of the Season Ticket Holder address:
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/warriors/2010/03/07/why-im-not-renewing/
Watson was benched for a game after smoking GQ with 40 points in the Sacramento game and various other brilliant playing moments as Curry's All Star and ROY pushing faded away. He was clearly just fine when he came back (and remember, this guy's been playing with something missing in his elbow or broken or whatever since like last year- tough, hungry, good). And he's been great. Maybe Nellie created him as such, huh? Doesn't look like it. Nellie runs Watson less than 30 MPG and Watson puts up numbers in limited time that put Curry's near-48 MPG to shame by comparison.
These numbers are simply remarkable:
Stat: Watson // Curry
MPG: 28.6 // 44.4
PPG: 20.1 // 21.5
FG%: .542 // .455
APG: 3.9 // 7.7
TO: 1.4 // 4.5
RPG: 3.3 // 5.8
STL: 2.4 // 1.55
Curry's also been a 3 point chucking machine since the failed hype gesture Stern and the Warriors orchestrated at Anthony Morrow's expense in the All Star weekend 3 point contest. Watson vs. Curry 3PT shooting since the All Star break: Watson's 13-31 (.419), Curry's 25-69 (.362).
Annual reminder: The Warriors have shot 3 pointers at .410 (7.1/17.4) in their 17 wins. They've shot 3 pointers at .348 (6.9/19.8) in their 45 losses. And strangely enough, they've shot 3 pointers at .373 (25-67) in the three wins since the All Star break (Kings, Hawks, Pistons, all at home). So perhaps the stat doesn't tell us much. But then again, that works out to 22.3 attempts per game in those wins. The pace of games since the break has been ramped up considerably. Rowell and Nelson's ticket sales push of entertaining slop ball has been an abject failure in every way thus far. And no one is confused as to what Nelson preaches (if he even talks to the players any more at this point) when he bothers to work on game planning. Run run run, chuck chuck chuck. It's what they did for 24 games in Spring 2007, what they did against Dallas, and what they did in 2007-08. It's all they've ever done when they've stolen a few wins now and then during Nelson's pathetic return to the bench these last 4 years. This 3 point chucking should be very familiar to Warriors fans and it's ALWAYS been Curry's major tendency. So has a poor AST/TO ratio, incidentally.
The cost of Curry's individual 3 point chucking is points on the other end. Curry has taken 69 three pointers since the All Star break. Anthony Morrow has, as well, and made 3 more than Curry. One can argue that the percentage difference those three makes equate to (.406 for Morrow to Curry's .362) settles the matter: it's no big deal. But it is indeed a big deal when one considers that Curry has 200 FGA total since the All Star break to Morrow's 173 and that Curry is clearly shooting anything and everything in a broken system with no accountability and no legitimate team play in sight. That Morrow has been used a lot since the break is still significant, though. Curry has been run out with the full intention of taking all kinds of shots and racking up all the numbers he can while the team shuts down anyone and everyone they pimped as a core player this time last season. What's going on with Morrow getting all this run, too? He's the only guard available sometimes but CJ Watson and Reggie Williams look pretty OK. (Textbook Warriors: secure the D Leaguer they plan to sign for next season, get him on team payroll and in the locker room, and hide him off court so other teams don't invite him to their Summer team- they did it with Azubuike and Watson, too).
Here's the point:
Stephen Curry is #8 in the league for total FGA since the break. Morrow's 173 puts him in 18th. Last year, the Warriors finished the second half with Kelenna Azubuike's 315 attempts leading the team after the break. That was good for 83rd in the league. Al Harrington's 444 as a Knick were good for 20th. Ben Gordon took 483. Curry is currently on pace to take 564 shots in the second half. Morrow is on pace to take 487. They're being pushed as the future of this team, no doubt about it. But the play is no different-- scratch that, it's WORSE-- under the Nelson agenda now. Imagine putting Anthony Randolph on the floor to take all of his early clock bad shots. Imagine Kelenna Azubuike in there to fight for shots with Morrow and Curry. Don't imagine Monta Ellis or Andris Biedrins because they're still on the trade block come draft day. If they're both with the team for opening night next season, I'm not sure what I'll do or say. It will be an incredible change of course rivaled only by Bobby Rowell freaking out about me and others knowing him better than he knows himself and offering a combined, what, $100+ million to Stephen Jackson and Corey Maggette? Kelenna Azubuike may opt out of his deal. If he doesn't, he's trade bait. The team will market Curry and Morrow as but the latest annual future core while they fail to secure a solid roster besides the ticket sales talk points.
Calls from ticket representatives right now feature two names most prominently:
Stephen Curry and Anthony Morrow.
Moving on, and back to how Watson is better than GQ Free Pass in the Nellie Balll Shitwing Attack:
Watson has created 18 rebound opportunities off of 3 pointers since the All Star break. Curry has created 44. His quick clock chucks look pretty bad lately. No play development, no rebounders, no percentages in his favor apparently, and no wins. OK, 3 wins. 3-8 since the break. Watson played in those wins and missed one of the losses. So Watson's winning percentage is better than Curry's, too: .300 vs. .272. The Warriors' shoot-first, do anything else later long ball attack is of course the number one reason they lead the league in Pace and trail the league in rebounding. If the first guy down the court can always shoot as soon as he hits the 3 point line, which is the Nellie Ball play call all too often, the opposition that is already bigger than the Nelson shitwing roster just has to be there in time for the miss.
One team in the league gathers fewer total offensive rebounds per game than the Warriors. The Boston Celtics, however, run at a much lower pace. By the more appropriate measure, rebounding rate, the Warriors are simply record-settingly terrible. They're dead last in Offensive Rebounding Rate. And yet, the Nellie Ball mandate and the Curry natural chuck habit (more than 19 attempts in under 33 minutes per game over his Davidson career) continue to create easy rebounding and scoring opportunities for the opposition.
These things don't change. Giving the 70 year old Active Retirement $6 million man, Don Nelson, the most iso-happy volume chucker from a shitball Star Prop basketball "program," was like giving a dope addict a big bag of free smack. I'm borrowing the analogy from a fellow fan but it absolutely applies. Stephen Curry is naturally a Nellie Shit Ball player and even though he refused to work out for the team because the Star Prop marketing opportunities are bad and because the team is a laughingstock beneath his pedigree'd sense of entitlement as an Empty Gym, Garbage Time All Star, he's landed in the perfect place to be himself and avoid serious work on development at all costs.
As the numbers show, Curry isn't scoring any more points than Watson in the games. OK, ONE extra point. It's certainly not coming from penetration and challenging opposing defenders: Watson's getting to the line almost 6 times per game (.793) while Curry gets there only 3 times per game. Curry has a nice pretty FT% but his empty gym skills remain about the least relevant component of the NBA game. He's getting some assists but he's coughing the ball up at an alarming rate. And a look at his late game work as a distributor should give anyone who ever said "Rookie of the year" and "Stephen Curry" in the same sentence a heart attack as their game-watching and thinking habits are aired for the world to see.
Worse, actually watching any or all of the games lately reveals that he's simply clueless in the half court set now that the Screen-Roll play has been stopped after a 3 game run and his bounce passing and errant cross-court flings remain well below the NBA point guard standard. Hell, his careless work and inaccurate ankle passing aren't even NBA power forward caliber. He doesn't make chest passes or any other two handed, productive passes.
My "volume passing" moniker is still solid gold. Curry is a neurotic robot about heaving up court on the break after cherry picking some cheap/standard Nellie Ball defensive rebounds when the Warriors manage to dupe the opponent into slop ball running (the Atlanta idiots on the bench and in uniform were especially susceptible). So he looks for the easy CP first, heaves it no matter what kind of play is there, and often turns the ball over right then and there. Sheer idiocy. Matt Barnes can do the same thing. The difference with Matt Barnes was that he was strong. His laser outlet volume passing went out of bounds when he misfired (often: "My Bad"). Much easier turnover to mitigate. GQ's a weakling and his lobbish first and only option up court chuck is simply stolen and converted into easy points on the other end.
Can't deal with a double team, can't handle ball pressure (echoes of Marco Bustinelli), can't run half court offense, can't execute basic bounce passes, can't do anything but score and get some volume assists now and then. Baron Davis should have averaged 10+ APG under Nelson easily. But like Curry, he was content to get his points and get some gaudy overall numbers without really worrying about the real game play. Ka-ching. Pay the man. Robert Rowell knew damn well where Baron's "production" came from. Monta Ellis knows damn well "you don't really need a real point guard in Nellie Ball."
http://blogs.mercurynews.com/kawakami/2008/10/11/robert-rowell-q-and-a-on-monta-ellis-30-game-suspension/
CJ Watson is demolishing GQ Stat Pad on efficiency AND raw numbers. The most likely GQ Free Pass hypester retort is that it's Curry setting Watson up to succeed so much since the All Star break. That won't fly. By way of easiest, most glaringly anti-Rowell/Nellie roster construction example, I've seen Matt Barnes run the same full court break point guard role as well and better, for more WINS. Barnes is of course the guy who just stuffed Kobe Bryant and is now probably headed to the NBA Finals once Mike Brown shits his pants at zero hour for the final time in his Lebron coattail riding career. So in other words, Nellie Ball sets this sort of shit up any way. Ellis was this incredibly efficient short-minute break monster CJ Watson has turned into, once upon a time. Now he's out, too?
OK, I'm just rambling at this point.
It's time to face facts.
Stephen Curry is not a top shelf NBA point guard prospect.
He never was.
He might be a decent 6th man on an OK team.
But he seems entirely too self-centered, cocky, sloppy, and entitled to ever accept the role or ever successfully discipline his game to provide meaningful work in such a role. And as a starting point guard, he's the absolute worst in the league.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
The Chris Cohan Wikipedia Scandal!
Now that it's official- Larry Ellison isn't coming to save us all any time before the NBA lockout in 2011-12- the Warriors PR dweebs are back to policing the forums and scrubbing the public records. And padding hit count stats on the website of the fabulous Christopher J. Cohan Events Center at Robert Rowell's alma mater, Cal Poly San Luis Opublican.
The Cohan Wikipedia page has been totally shut down by Warriors operatives lately. It looks like this:
But this is not what it looked like as recently as last week.
For your viewing pleasure, the currently forbidden and under editorial review or whatever but still absolutely wonderful (thanks to you, the fans) Chris Cohan Wikipedia page:
I've never wiki'd in my life but you obviously have.
Go fix that mother up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Cohan
The Cohan Wikipedia page has been totally shut down by Warriors operatives lately. It looks like this:
Chris Cohan
Christopher J. Cohan is the current owner of the Golden State Warriors of the NBA. He assumed control of the team in 1995 and helped renovate the Warriors' arena (now known as the Oracle Arena).
Cohan founded Sonic Communications in 1977. It became one of the largest independently owned cable outlets in the country before he sold it in May 1998.[1]
References: Golden State Warriors 2009-2010 media guide
But this is not what it looked like as recently as last week.
For your viewing pleasure, the currently forbidden and under editorial review or whatever but still absolutely wonderful (thanks to you, the fans) Chris Cohan Wikipedia page:
Chris Cohan
Christopher J. Cohan is the current owner of the Golden State Warriors of the NBA. He acquired a 25-percent interest in the team in 1991; in 1995, he became sole owner; he sold 20 percent of the team to four Silicon Valley investors in 2005.
Cohan's tenure as owner of the Warriors has been highlighted with the longest playoff drought of any team in NBA history. From 1994 to 2007, the Warriors did not make the playoffs under Cohan. Under Cohan, the team has had nine head coaches and did not have a winning season until the 2006-2007 season, after Cohan rehired Don Nelson as head coach. The 2006-2007 season was highlighted by one of the most memorable upsets in NBA Playoff history when the eighth-seeded Warriors knocked off the heavily favored top-seed Dallas Mavericks in six games in the first round. The Warriors went on to lose to the Utah Jazz in the second round of the playoffs. Cohan was the guiding force behind a completely refurbished arena in 1997 (now the 19,596-seat ORACLE Arena) and the building of a modern practice facilities in downtown Oakland for the Warriors in 1998. Cohan has been intensely criticized for his unsuccessful ownership.[1]
The NBA granted Cohan and the Warriors the 2000 NBA All-Star Game for the second time since the team moved to Northern California (also 1967). The game was televised in over 290 countries around the world and the weekend was highlighted by Vince Carter's still-popular elbow dunk on All-Star Saturday and by the home crowd booing Cohan during half-time of the All-Star game.
Cohan and his wife established the annual Angela & Christopher Cohan Community Assist Award in 2001. The award is presented annually to the player on the Warriors roster who best embodies ownership's commitment to the community. Cohan and his wife also established the Warriors Foundation 1998. The non-profit foundation is dedicated to positively impacting the communities of Oakland and the greater Bay Area.
In 1989, Cohan made a $2.1 million donation to aid in the construction of a Performing Arts Center in San Luis Obispo, California. The venue, located on the campus of Cal-Poly San Luis Obispo, was later named The Christopher Cohan Center.
Prior to purchasing the Warriors, Cohan founded Sonic Communications in 1977. It became one of the largest independently owned cable outlets in the country before he sold it in May 1998.
Cohan graduated from Arizona State University in 1973.
Facts
In 1994 just moments after it was announced that the Warriors traded popular center, Chris Webber, Chris Cohan's truck was stolen from his driveway in broad daylight.
Chris Cohan sued his business partners to gain sole ownership of the Golden State Warriors in 1994. The Warriors were a popular, 50-win team at the time, and soon turned into a nationally ridiculed loser. Not only that, there was a long list of parties dragged into civil courtrooms by "Cohan the Contrarian" which included his stockbroker, life insurance agent, and primary attorney. Hard to believe, but all were longtime friends. One was the best man at Cohan's wedding and another a groomsman. Cohan was sued, too, for failing to pay his bills by his landlord -- the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Authority,[1]
In 2000, Cohan was booed at the NBA All-Star Game, hosted at the newly refurbished Oracle Arena. At the side of Cohan were NBA Commissioner David Stern and Cohan's own son. Soon after getting booed by his own crowd, Cohan and his wife ran away from their seats to avoid reporters.
In 2005, reports surfaced that Cohan rejected a blockbuster trade for Kobe Bryant and Smush Parker in exchange for Baron Davis, Andris Biedrins, Derek Fisher, and undisclosed draft picks. Reports from inside the organization say Cohan, in response to the rejection of the trade, stated, "What kind of f***ing name is Smush?".
References
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=aw-cohanwarriors101209&prov=yhoo&type=lgns http://blogs.mercurynews.com/kawakami/
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/02/10/SP74259.DTLL
I've never wiki'd in my life but you obviously have.
Go fix that mother up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Cohan
Rookie "Point" Guard Update & Stephen Jackson and Monta Ellis were right.
First off, Stephen Jackson is averaging a perfectly respectable 3.7 APG with Charlotte this season. Good number from a sometimes-facilitator. Reminds us that his career 3.2 mark was not only pumped up by 179 games (2.18 full seasons worth) under Don Nelson but is STILL 3.3 APG lower than his peak season with the Warriors. Stephen Jackson averaged 6.5 APG with the Warriors LAST SEASON.
Nellie Ball Shit Stats aside, let's have another look at our rookie PGs!
I scanned the rookie "point" guard cosmetics and decided a nice benchmark for a volume comparison would be 14/7 points/assists games. I just did. No particular reason at all. By that measure, your leaders:
1. Jennings - 20
2. Evans - 17
3. Collison - 14
4. Curry - 12
5. Flynn - 6
6. Lawson - 3
7. Holiday - 0
8. Maynor - 0
9. Teague - 0
10. Price - 0
11. Beaubois - 0
Monta Ellis this season - 14
(5 in 07-08, 1 in 08-09)
Stephen Jackson last season - 24
Stephen Jackson this season - 1
Stephen Jackson in 2007-08 - 6
Baron Davis last season - 25
Baron Davis this season - 20
Baron Davis in 2007-08 - 49
Nellie Ball Shit Stats aside, let's have another look at our rookie PGs!
I scanned the rookie "point" guard cosmetics and decided a nice benchmark for a volume comparison would be 14/7 points/assists games. I just did. No particular reason at all. By that measure, your leaders:
1. Jennings - 20
2. Evans - 17
3. Collison - 14
4. Curry - 12
5. Flynn - 6
6. Lawson - 3
7. Holiday - 0
8. Maynor - 0
9. Teague - 0
10. Price - 0
11. Beaubois - 0
Monta Ellis this season - 14
(5 in 07-08, 1 in 08-09)
Stephen Jackson last season - 24
Stephen Jackson this season - 1
Stephen Jackson in 2007-08 - 6
Baron Davis last season - 25
Baron Davis this season - 20
Baron Davis in 2007-08 - 49
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Otis Smith Wins. When will the Warriors retire Chris Mullin's number?
Great game against Orlando tonight, Nellie.
Way to leave it all on the floor (in Miami).
Darren Collison is taking control of the Rookie of the Year race second half.
Can he overcome Tyreke Evans' historic 20-5-5 pace?
PS, Warriors clinched a losing record for the season tonight.
Way to leave it all on the floor (in Miami).
Darren Collison is taking control of the Rookie of the Year race second half.
Can he overcome Tyreke Evans' historic 20-5-5 pace?
PS, Warriors clinched a losing record for the season tonight.
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