Courtesy of Golden State Worriers, this pretty much drives home my point:

Let me begin by saying Vlad has the physical tools of a good NBA player. He’s 6-10 and used to have a three point shot.  He could wake up tomorrow and turn it all around.  And he wouldn’t be the first player to repair his image amid Warriors chaos.  Odds are against it, though.  My last post dealt with some fairly objective Anthony Randolph stats, but my Radman doubting has a subjective attribution: Fringe NBA hopeful Paul Shirley used to constantly joke about Vlad’s apathy and lack of work ethic. This can be dismissed as uninformed NBA gossip, but Vlad hasn’t improved since 2003 (this is where subjectivity meets cold, hard evidence of suck). 

Phil Jackson used to call Vlad a ’space cadet,’ and it’s not hard to see why.  Passes fly into the stands with alarming frequency, so much so that Vlad cranked out ‘the worst turnover rate at his position’ last year, according to ESPN’s John Hollinger.  In the past, Vlad’s shooting offset some his spacey ways. But it’s been awful of late.  He plays decent perimeter defense, which would be a plus….expect he’s always playing power forward or center for us.  Expect him to keep getting bludgeoned by the Joakim Noah’s of this world.  For all the hate directed at Maggette (yes, he sometimes drives me crazy too), I wonder how Vlad Rad escapes criticism.  He can’t shoot, can’t pass, can’t run, can’t jump, can’t block, can’t steal, can’t defend the 4 position.  And is rumored not to care or work hard. 

Predictably, this earns him a starting spot upon arrival.  What the hell am I missing here? Am I misreading his PER of 9?  Should I be hypnotized into lauding Vlad whenever he slobbers all over his mouthpiece like a horse chewing an apple?

I’m not trying to deliver a cliche, ‘That guy’s a bum!’ argument.  I just think management sends a bad message when they play someone who can’t contribute and probably doesn’t care.  Since the Warriors coaches are supposedly so intent on rearing Randolph like a child, I’d like to know what the lesson is here.  At least the impotent Mikki Moore looks like he wants it.  And that’s the sad state of Warrior Land positivity: At least the comically washed up player playing over the young talent looks concerned, unlike the apathetic starter who might be even worse.

Some bitter, semi-related post Bulls game thoughts….

I don’t even know why I care anymore. I don’t know why any of you care anymore.  I guess I just love basketball and I love the Bay, and I can’t not watch the flashy car wreck on my TV.  Perhaps it’s because some primal part of me loves to yell at Don Nelson through my TV.  My intellectual curiosity pushes me towards finding the ‘why’ behind the badness.  I suppose it’s happening because people in large organizations subconsciously work within whatever pattern solidifies.  Maybe the pattern of needlessly alienating and trading promising players set in awhile ago. Of course this isn’t a conscious goal of Warriors management, but it sure could be subconscious. I’m grasping at straws here, because so little makes sense.  My intellectual curiosity is no match for Warrior Land madness.

Following this team is like watching a friend stab himself, and then seeing the friend turn the knife on you. Does the Warriors organization hate its fans? Why else would a team mired in a lottery season play Mikki Moore over Anthony Randolph?  Ticket revenue is down 22%, and the coach/es insist on starting the two worst players in the rotation and playing ESPN’s #6 ranked sophmore a meager 22 minutes per night. Then we have to listen to mumbled paternalistic Gary St. Jean sermons about how Anthony Randolph must ‘earn his minutes.’

Well the Warriors sure are earning their losses. They’re earning them every time Vlad Rad plays minutes at center. They’re earning them every time they start Mikki Moore in a real life NBA basketball game.  It’s apt to say they’re ‘earning them’ because the Warriors coaching staff is losing games while employing inherently losing strategies.  The path of regular basketball knowledge (i.e. least resistance) would win games that ‘all SG’ lineups lose.  Losing like this takes effort.  The Warriors are giving up games using bizarre strategies, not backed by basketball metrics.  And they’re doing this night after night, to the detriment fan interest.  Doing the same ineffective thing over and over again is one definition of madness.  They might have to create a new word for what ever the hell this is.

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 19th, 2009 at 8:43 pm and is filed under Miscellaneous. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.