Most people are counting the Golden State Warriors out in the first round against the Los Angeles Clippers.
In fact, no one in the ESPN staff picked them to come out of the first round, and mostly the same goes for our staff (predictions will be out soon).
There is at least one guy that is publicly saying anything goes when it comes to these two teams, though, and his name is Reggie Miller. Rusty Simmons of San Francisco Chronicle has details:
“I give the Warriors a chance, because it’s a rivalry between these two teams,” TNT analyst Reggie Miller said. “They hate one another. Any time you hate a team, you can throw out who’s hurt and who’s not playing, because it becomes personal. “David Lee and Blake Griffin can’t stand one another, and I love it. Good. You’re not supposed to like them. Go out and kick his behind.”
It’s certainly understandable. Even with Andrew Bogut (fractured rib), the Clippers were likely favored to win the series. Without him, most believe there is virtually no chance. That doesn’t mean the Warriors feel the same way, and Andre Iguodala expressed as much:
“Warriors swingman Andre Iguodala said: “All of those guys have that L.A. about them, where they want to live in the spotlight. They want to go out there and show what they can do on the court. … “They have a chippiness about them. They try to get you out of your game. We’ve got a group of guys who aren’t going to back down, but we won’t let it affect our psyche.”
While we’re on the subject of the Warriors, Rick Barry chimed in on what he has seen out of Stephen Curry this season, from Tim Kawakami of Mercury News:
-Q: Al Attles said you would know all about the choice a great player has to make between trying to get your teammates involved and taking over a game offensively. Do you see similarities in what Curry’s going through now with that nightly choice?
-BARRY: If there’s one thing to nitpick about him, sometimes he takes extremely difficult shots and the shot selection sometimes is a little questionable. But it’s hard to question a guy who shoots the way he does, and sometimes the most questionable shots go in. So it’s ‘no-no, oh, great shot.’ He’s become a really outstanding player. Obviously an All-Star player. Now the big thing is can he sustain this over a period of time. Can he maintain this level of performance, year after year, season after season? That remains to be seen. But I see no reason he can’t, as he can stay healthy, and he did that this year as opposed to years past with his ankle.”
MOREY CHIMES IN ON HOWARD, TANKING, AND VALUE OF PUBLIC FORUMS:
During an interview with Jim Rome of the Jim Rome Show, general manager Daryl Morey made a bold prediction about Dwight Howard, explained why he thinks tanking is a great strategy, and what he gets out of visiting public forms:
“The center, who has just returned from an ankle injury, will make his playoff debut as a Rocket on Sunday against Portland, and the GM is expecting big things. “I think he’s going to have the best playoffs of his career,” said Morey.
I do actually think going the route of a really heavy rebuild and dipping really high in the draft, I do think that actually is the most optimal strategy,” said Morey. “But you know we had a lot of very good players when Tracy and Yao went out so there are a couple things. Number one, we didn’t think we could get that (high of a pick) even if we wanted. Two, you know Kevin McHale well, you don’t know myself as well, [but] we’re really competitive people and our owner (Les Alexander) is an unbelievable competitor. He’s owned the team 22 years [and] we’ve won 19 of those years. So just the whole idea of adopting that strategy was just really dead on arrival. It was my job to explore it and sort of consider it, but that was pretty DOA when I talked to ownership, Kevin and myself.”.
“If you look at other industries, often the die-hard fans and the crowd does have a lot of ideas and you are stupid to ignore them,” said the analytics guru. “Now do we reject 99 percent of what we read? Sure, but every once in a while, there’s a die-hard fan, a smart fan, a poster who can give you an idea. We’re just looking for the best idea, we don’t really care where they come from.”
QUOTE OF THE DAY:
Pau Gasol killed two birds with one stone with this particular comment, from Serena Winters of LakersNation:
Pau on bro Marc: “I like him better than any other guy out there in the center position,” pauses w/ a smirk, “Not going to name any names”
OTHER NEWS FROM AROUND THE LEAGUE: