Stephen Jackson Is Good For Basketball

I must admit, I find it hilarious to imagine David Stern sitting in his office, receiving news of this, and actually being relieved.


mortified

Jackson is the very personification of the "thug" image Stern hates with such vitriol, the image he works with such vigor and zeal to eradicate from the NBA.

And yet now Jackson is in the heretofore alien position of being good for the NBA. He's one of the key components on the franchise that's sweeping the nation by storm, making people care about the first two rounds of the playoffs, and stealing the concept of cinderella from the college ranks for a moment and lending it to the NBA.

The Warriors being successful is good for basketball, if only because it's now all too apparent that we have a fan base that's one of, if not the, best in basketball, not only in terms of quality, but in terms of quantity too. The Warriors are the unique Bay Area team that can truly appeal to the whole of the Bay Area. No A's/Giants, Raiders/49ers split. And if the Warriors are good for basketball, and Stephen Jackson is good for the Warriors, then Stephen Jackson is good for basketball.

Can you imagine the devastation of basketball fans everywhere if Stephen Jackson had to miss this series because of his legal troubles? Without considering the larger social implications involved with equal justice and the like (because, let's be fair, Stephen Jackson has hardly been the most upstanding of citizens, and he hardly deserves preferential legal treatment over anybody else), the Warriors deserve to prove they're not for real with the whole team on the floor. Thankfully they'll be allowed that.

Stephen Jackson, good for basketball. I generally like David Stern, but it's amusing to think of him having to chew on that one.

Writing About The Warriors Is Hard

When everyone else is doing it.

With better information, access, and, well, talent.

So I merely offer my humble perspective as a long time, long suffering, not bandwagoning fan of these Warriors.


And, with that in mind, let me tell you, last night was...frustrating. The final minutes, the final score itself in fact, are pretty reflective of how I felt going into this series. For some reason, we just don't match up well enough. I feel like we won't be tough enough on the boards, or hot enough with the shooting, or feisty enough on defense. Not all of those at the same time, mind you. Just one at a time, enough so that we'll be stuck in a state of perpetual almost.

That's how I felt last night. Like we were in a perpetual state of almost, or, if you prefer, couldn't quite. We couldn't quite stop Carlos Boozer well enough. We couldn't quite hit enough of the big shots. We couldn't quite close the deal. We couldn't quite stop Deron Williams.

couldn't quite hit that last shot>



You get the picture.

Maybe I'll be happily surprised, but, I dunno, I feel like we used all our magic during the Mavs series and, now, here we are, left with those same old Warriors.


Perhaps, though, I'm just putting too much stock into what was a disappointing Game 1. Still, it feels like we let a good opportunity slip out of our hands. And if the recent exit of the Sharks from the NHL playoffs is any indication, when you don't take advantage of opportunities to do the unexpected (go up 3-0, in the Sharks case), it becomes harder to take advantages of the opportunities to do what you're supposed to.

Game 2 is TONIGHT

This isn't going to be much of a substantial posts, since, hey, I don't post much anything substantial. But I am excited to see how the Warriors plan to pull out another one. There's been a lot of analysis over our shocking Game 1, but it really came down to 2 things:

1)Avery Johnson shot himself in the foot by trying to play to our style with his small lineup, which the Mavericks are ill suited to do as it puts an awkward strain on Dirk Nowitzki's game.

2)Uncharacteristically good defense by the Warriors.

Number 1 I don't expect to really happen again. I think Avery saw the disaster his game plan was in Game 1, but I find number 2 to be very, very interesting.

Here's the deal. The Warriors are notoriously bad defenders. But after seeing how they tried in Game 1, it looks, to me, like something they can repeat. They've always had the athleticism, and the speed, and the strength. They've just never put in effort. Baron Davis and Jason Richardson in most games are laughable on the non-offensive end of the floor. But they started hustling and moving around and all of a sudden turned into pretty solid defenders against Dallas. Ditto pretty much, well, everyone. Mickael Pietrus, the laziest player I've ever seen, looked inspired. He was a tenacious defender of Nowitzki. Harrington and Jackson muscled up on him too. This is what we need more of. It was a pleasure to finally see something like that out of this team.

So what I'm saying is that I think this team has the defensive talent, but a crippling lack of desire and effort, most, practically all, of the time. Can they keep up the effort defensively they showed in Game 1? I don't know. And if Avery Johnson lets the Mavericks play the ball that won them 67 games during the regular season, will it even matter? That, too, I don't know. But it does mean we're no typical eight seed (which I've always believed.) By no means are we better than the Mavericks, but we do have a very legitimate shot to win I think. Though, of course, Don Nelson doesn't think so:

"We were just lucky that first game. They didn't shoot very well, and we didn't either actually. But for whatever reason, we played a little bit better than they did," he said. "I think they'll do just fine the second game. They'll be dominant as they should be and they'll mop us up.

"We have a better chance to get hit by lightning than to win tomorrow night."

Gotta love Don.

Anyway, what I wanted to type next was, "And make no mistake, if the Warriors win this, it'll be the biggest franchise win of the last 10 years." Which, of course, it would, but, like, that's pretty much been the case for the last 4 or 5 wins, so I'll spare you readers that. Except not, sorta, as I already typed it. My bad.


Go Warriors.

If There Is A God He'll Give Me A Token Playoff Appearance

The last time the Golden State Warriors made the playoffs, or finished above .500 for that matter, I was 7 years old. My basketball fandom at the time involved asking my dad if Michael Jordan was chocolate and Larry Bird was vanilla while we watched the NBA on NBC (complete with Marv Albert's sweet beautiful voice and that fantastic intro music they used to play). (true story.)


i miss nba on nbc

I started truly appreciating the Warriors right around the time Latrell Sprewell decided it'd be a good idea to choke P.J. Carlesimo. The year before the incident I went to my first Warriors FanFest (I think they actually called it an "Open House" but I can't really remember and I don't think they really do it anymore) where a certain accident (I was supposed to play with the players on the court in one of those "HEY WE GONNA PLAY WITH THE KIDS" type games, but apparently they ran out of time for it) which resulted in a Latrell Sprewell autograph for me and tickets to my first Warriors game. (Against the Nuggets. We sat in the top row, and they lost. It was fantastic.)

Since then, I've been treated to, well, the Warriors. We drafted Todd Fuller ahead of Kobe Bryant. I was made to believe Jim Jackson was a superstar. Jason Caffey started for us. I've rooted for Cliff Rozier. For the latter half of the 90's Donyell Marshall was like our best player. We traded Antawn Jamison for Vince Carter on draft day only to see Vince Carter go light the league on fire. We traded Chris Webber for Penny Hardaway on draft day, ruining forever my chance at calling Lil Penny my own. To make a long story short, this has been a miserable franchise.


can't even find a proper todd fuller picture through image search. curse you.

Yet, here we are. Tonight, that could all end. We could finish above .500 with just a win over the lowly Portland Trailblazers. We could play a meaningful game in May. Jason Richardson deserves this. The fans of the Golden State Warriors deserve this. Hell, even Adonal Foyle deserves this.

Tonight is the single most important game in this franchise's last 12 years. In all of my meaningful years as a basketball fan, tonight, against the Trailblazers, means more than any of the rest of them. I'm about as nervous/excited/wtf? as you can be for a team that's trying to secure a meaningless 8th seed. I only wish I could watch this live. Curse you, Boston.

Go Warriors.


(And if that's not enough, the A's are about to face off against the hated Angels and the Sharks have Game 4 of their first round series with the Predators tonight. This very well may be the most loaded day of sports all year for me. Whoo doggy.)

I Lied, I'm Going To Talk About It

Oh lord it's so close I can taste it. I haven't gotten myself worked up yet because, well, they're the Warriors, and excitement at the end of an NBA season is so alien a feeling to me (NBA success? Warriors? What?) that I don't even think I could have identified it if I tried.

But here we are, with a legitimate chance at the playoffs. And I don't mean legitimate chance in the "Dear God it's been 12 years I have to convince myself there's a legitimate chance," kinda way, I mean legitimate chance in the "even Henry Abbott thinks we're a good team and have a shot" kinda way.

For a while I convinced myself I wouldn't be disappointed if we lost out on the 8th spot, but now I've done the 180, mainly because if we lose it, it'll be to the Lakers and Clippers. I hate both these teams, not just because of the whole NorCal-SoCal rivalry deal, but because, well, the Lakers are the Lakers, and the Clippers strike me as a team so very much like the Warriors, only one who got their taste last season. I want that taste. Warriors fans deserve that taste. The Clippers do not deserve to double dip here.


could it be, could it really, really be?

Have I reason for optimism? Sure, I think. Jason Richardson's gone back to being Jason Richardson finally, Baron Davis has only to stay healthy for four more games, Stephen Jackson hasn't seemingly had one of those "I'm gonna shoot 1 for 8" nights in a while, and the rest of the Andris Biedrins/Monta Ellis/Al Harrington/Matt Barnes rotation continues to be pretty productive. We've got Minnesota, Sacramento, and Portland in 3 of our 4 remaining games, so I don't feel unabashed in saying we very well should go at least 3-1. The other game is against Dallas, whose number we've inexplicably had as of late. 3-1 should be expected, 4-0 can be hoped for within reason.

I know, it's the 8th seed. We'll probably get trounced by the Mavs (though it's amusing to see everyone write about how we'd give them a series. Something tells me it wouldn't quite work that way. We're still the Warriors. They're still the Mavericks. You can't stress that enough, I think.)

But,

The playoffs, yes, the playoffs, fellow Warriors fans, are in sight. There may very well be a light at the end of the tunnel. And if they don't make it, my how entertaining a post I will give you.