Can the Warriors Be Contenders?

The Warriors have beaten many good teams at home this season, and have had many of their loses come by 3 points or less. In many other games they were also played out the game closely until the final few minutes before they lost. So the question is, do the Warriors have the potential to get back into the playoffs and maybe make some noise?

The Warriors have a very well put together team. The front office has done a good job of getting the right players to complement their stars. It reminds me a bit of the Spurs. Let me explain. The Spurs have both Parker and Ginobili who can drive to the lane and either create their own shot or draw in the defense and pass out to an open shooter. Duncan is a great jump shooter and is great around the paint. Then around these three main players they have Blair and Jefferson. Blair is going to be stationed under the basket and, along with grabbing the rebounds, is going to finish any play when he gets the ball in the paint. Jefferson is not the player he once was, but is still a great 3 point shooter. Off of the bench they have 3-point threats in Gary Neal and Matt Bonner, a defensive specialist in Kawhi Leonard and a great backup center in Splitter. All of these players complement the Spurs main three, which is why the Spurs are able to play so well.

The Warriors have a very similar team. In Ellis and Curry they have two guards capable of getting to the lane at will, and either finish or draw in the defense and pass out to an open shooter. Both of these players can also shoot the lights out of the ball. They have a great power forward in David Lee, who can finish around the rim or step back for a jumper. They then have Dorrell Wright who is a great 3 point shooter, even though he is not having a great year shooting so far.  And starting at center they have either Biedrins or, after last night’s game, Udoh. Both of these centers are capable of finishing around the rim and can rebound and play a little bit of defense, similar to Blair on the Spurs. They have a huge spark off of the bench in Nate Robinson, followed by two great shooters in Klay Thompson and Brandon Rush, both of whom are shooting over 45% from 3 so far. Kwame Brown is a serviceable back-up center.

So after that we can see that these two teams are both very similarly built. They have great guards who can light up the scoring and draw in the defenses, a great 3 point threat at small forward, as well as two more great shooters off of the bench, a power forward who can finish around the rim or step back for a jumper, a center who can get the put-backs and finish around the rim, followed by some role players off of the bench. So then why are the Spurs at the top of the conference and the Warriors at the bottom? This question is most easily answered by defense. While the Warriors are probably the better offensive team, their defense is usually non-existent. Both of their starting guards are 6 ft 3, Wright is not a great defender, and David Lee isn’t a great defender either. All of their main bench players are scorers and don’t play defense very well. The Spurs can win games even when they go cold from the field because they have capable defenders. The Warriors usually get into a shoot out to get the win.  If Jackson can instill some defense into this team, they may become the next coming of the Spurs. But due to the fact that they are a bit undersized and just don’t seem to want to play defense, I don’t think they will become contenders.