Pargomania...?

For a team that seemed comprised almost exclusively of little guys just four months ago, the Warriors sure ran out of 'em quick. Corey Maggette and Kelenna Azubuike were traded away; the blink-and-you-missed-him Raja Bell signed with the Jazz; the Warriors decided not to match reasonable contract offers to Anthony Morrow and C.J. Watson. All five of these players play small forward or smaller in a sane universe, and their departures stripped the returning non-big depth chart down to Curry, Monta and Reggie Williams. To compensate, the Warriors have added a promising three in Dorell Wright, a charming novelty act in Jeremy Lin, and a pretty useless vet in Charlie Bell. Today, the Dubs added another piece: 31-year-old journeyman Jannero Pargo has agreed to a two-year contract worth $2.4 millon in full.

The way to look at this signing is to ask yourself the following question. Let's say you've just signed a player to an 80-million-dollar contract, thereby signaling that you're serious about competing in the near future. Your cap situation is decent... you aren't likely to sign any max players in the near future, but you're in no danger of triggering the luxury tax, either. In that scenario, which would you rather have?

Lin-demonium!

Say this for the new ownership regime: they ain't apathetic about PR. Recent Harvard grad, native Palo Altan and lifelong Dubs fan Jeremy Lin is now a Warrior, making him the league's first full-blooded Asian-American in over 60 years. Lin is the poster child of a heavily-linked Youtube clip, a raucous GSOM campaign and an e-mail a fan sent to new owner Joe Lacob, an e-mail to which Lacob promptly responded.

Let's start here: no, Jeremy Lin is not going to be as good as C.J. Watson. CJ is an efficient scorer, a tremendous ball-handler, a canny defender... he's an above-average NBA player. DraftExpress deemed Jeremy Lin just the 95th-best prospect in the 2010 draft, for reasons that a good Summer League performance doesn't magically erase. Lin is dreadfully small for the NBA game, and rates as neither an elite shooter nor an elite passer. If the front office thinks Lin can fill CJ's shoes, it's a dumber front office than even the most jaded among us give them credit for.

Now, the front office probably doesn't see Lin as the backup point guard, so much as an end-of-the-bench fan favorite who'll sell a few marginal tickets and get the franchise some positive press. And seen in that light, this is a tremendous signing, a savvy PR move without any real cost. Lin is an intensely likeable and entertaining player, and a guy who may spark new fan interest in the Bay Area's massive Asian-American community. Ain't nothing wrong with a great story.

But let's just hope everybody remembers that it's a story, and that the odds of Lin ever becoming a good NBA player are remote. The Warriors are coming out of a long sojourn in the wilderness, and the last thing they need to do is to fall in love with a narrative that minimizes the importance of wins and losses. Great stories are good; competitive basketball is better. And this team still needs a backup point guard.

See Ya, C.J.

The other half of last season's underrated backcourt bench tandem has just flown the coop. C.J. Watson is Chicago-bound, in a sign-and-trade that nets the Warriors a second-round pick and a trade exception worth $3.5 million or so. The Udoh pick was silly, the Lee trade was heartbreaking, the Morrow loss was needless... but make no mistake, superfriends. This, right here, is the dumbest move of the offseason.

When you factor in his miniscule turnover ratio, his solid scoring and his stellar showings by plus-minus (a team-best +6.7 net plus-minus last season, a +2.47 two-year adjusted plus-minus that places him in the league’s top fifty), it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that C.J. Watson is one of the best backup point guards in basketball. The guy records steals by the bushel without getting called for fouls... he takes tremendous care of the ball... he drives rarely, but with precision. C.J. Watson is a winning player, something that can't be said of many Warriors. And now he's gone.

The Warriors had the money to keep him. They also badly need someone to back up Curry, and to help out at the two if Monta gets hurt and/or Reggie gets called into action at the three (Charlie Bell should not be in any team’s rotation at this point in his career). Simply put, there was no bigger no-brainer this offseason than matching a two-year, $7 million dollar offer to C.J. Watson. I don’t know what the current ownership complexities are, and I don’t really care. This is an absolutely moronic decision, far dumber than letting Morrow go. Teams don’t get better by punting away good players on cheap contracts.

Congrats to C.J., who will probably help a scary-looking Bulls team nudge past the 60-win mark. The Warriors Twitterverse will be far quieter without you, young man, and the win column will be a couple notches emptier, too.

Out Of Ammo

While we were looking elsewhere, the deathbed-ridden front office let Anthony Morrow slip away to the New Jersey Nets, declining to match a three-year $12 million offer that seemed more than reasonable. This was not a crippling error, but it was an error, and it robs the franchise of one of its most likeable and statistically fascinating players.

The two recently departed Anthonys were a delightful study in contrasts. Randolph was all athlete; Morrow is all gym rat. He's not fast, long, strong or explosive, but he worked his way into an NBA career all the same. The speed and precision of his jumper, the running floater that he converts an improbably high percentage of the time... these are testaments to a shit-ton of good old-fashioned hard work. The kid wasn't supposed to get here, and he seems excited and grateful during every second of every game, whether or not he's on the court. No Warrior has ever been easier to root for than Anthony Morrow.

And no NBA player has ever shot like this. If he can keep his accuracy where it's been, sometime in November, Anthony Morrow will officially become the best three-point shooter in NBA history. His career percentage stands at .460... that's the equivalent of a guy shooting friggin' .690 from two-point land. A guy like that will help you win games even if he can't do anything else, and Morrow rebounds his position well and almost never turns it over. His net plus-minus totals in his two Golden State seasons were +3.1 and +4.1, and adjusted plus-minus suggests that warn't no fluke. He's a limited player, but a good one, and he and Courtney Lee will make a dynamite offense/defense combo at the two in New Jersey. Don't be surprised if Morrow sees the postseason before the Warriors do.

The mantle of "hardworking undrafted swingman" now falls to Reggie Williams, who seems poised to carry it well. The upcoming Warriors season should be a better one, but the absence of Anthony Morrow will hurt, both on the stat sheet and in the heart. Fare thee well, marksman.

FREEDOM

Our collective sixteen-year fever is about to break -- Chris Cohan has sold the Golden State Warriors. A lot of fans are up in arms about the specifics of the sale, believing Larry Ellison to be a white knight that Cohan cruelly cast aside. Don't get caught up in that stuff, people. Ellison clearly bungled the negotiations, and is a douchebag besides... plus, the sixth-richest man in the world is not guaranteed success in a league with a salary cap. He shan't be missed.

The new ownership group of Joe Lacob and Peter Guber contains at least one douchebag its own self; if you like showbiz tales, "Hit and Run", the account of Guber and Jon Peters's idiotic demolition of Sony Pictures, will amuse you to no end. But we're getting a hands-off-gasbag vibe from Guber here. Lacob's the key guy, and as a (not-for-long) minority Celtics owner and a longtime Dubs season ticket holder, he passes at least an initial sniff test.

We'll have to see about these new fellas, but the story of the last fella is complete. And for Warriors fans, it's a story with a particularly unhappy ending.

Chris Cohan made out like a bandit here. He bought the team for $119 million, and sold it for $450 million sixteen years later... that is a nice tidy profit. Not all of Cohan's business ventures have panned out, and you certainly can't say he rates well on customer satisfaction, but for his purposes, ownership of the Golden State Warriors was a massive, massive success. He and Rowell soaked a loyal fanbase something fierce.

I don't know that any useful lessons spring from that. Cohan might've had a shorter and less successful reign if fan interest hadn't been so unconditional, but unconditional love is part of what makes the Oracle crowds what they are. Would we all trade the unparalleled quality of Warriors fandom for a better team? Would a 54-28 team playing 80% full arenas be more or less satisfying than the "We Believe" squad? We are all too loss-riddled to know.

All we know is that the games shall continue, and the circle shall turn; a centimillionaire jagoff is catcalled off the stage, and two more centimillionaire jagoffs enter to wild applause. A man that destroyed a movie studio is now being hailed as the savior of a basketball team. If you feel like Charlie Brown running towards another Lucy-held football, you're not the only one. But we may just get that kick off yet, and damn, it'll feel sweet if we do.

Fare thee well, Chris Cohan. You have plagued my leisure time for sixteen years, and I have only the vaguest sense of what you look like.

Hellos: Gadzuric, Bell & Dorell

While Warriorland is seeing its share of activity these days -- the team's sale draws nigh, a marksman departs, an iffy draft pick grows ever iffier -- the tide of roster moves seems to have slowed for the moment. As such, it's a good time to greet the newly acquired Dubs, alphabetically and analytically. We'll stick with the three small-money guys tonight, and address the $80 million man tomorrow.

Charlie Bell
'09-10 Per 36: 10.3 PTS (48.6 TS%), 2.9 REB, 2.3 AST, 1.2 TO, 0.9 STL, 0.3 BLK, 3.0 PF
PER: 7.92 Win %: .334 WS/48: 0.060 2YR Adj. +/-: -1.21

Charlie is, it's safe to say, not the Bell many Warriors fan hoped to see slotted behind Monta this season. He's not entirely bereft of offensive skills -- he makes about 36% of his threes, and passes pretty well for a notional shooting guard -- but he's no kind of threat, and has to excel defensively to justify playing time. And while he's been an excellent defender at points in his career, he's now 31 and struggling with knee issues... plus/minus data doesn't suggest that he helps on that end anymore, either. There's nothing in the statistical record to suggest that he's a viable NBA rotation player. Charlie is salary cap ballast, and nothing more... every minute he gets over a young player is a minute wasted.

Dan Gadzuric
'09-10 Per 36: 10.1 PTS (44.0 TS%), 10.5 REB, 1.4 AST, 1.7 TO, 1.0 STL, 1.5 BLK, 7.2 PF
PER: 10.50 Win %: .408 WS/48: 0.077 2YR Adj. +/-: +1.67

Only a handful of NBA players scored both less often and less efficiently than Charlie Bell last season; scarily enough, Dan Gadzuric was one of them. He's the more useful guy, though, and not just because his contract is expiring. Gadzuric is a horrible offensive player, but a pretty good (if foul-prone) defender, and rebounds his position passably. While he'll be a below-average backup center, he won't be the worst one in the league, and his presence means Andris Biedrins will have a nice long leash with which to rediscover himself.

Dorell Wright
'09-10 Per 36: 12.3 PTS (56.7 TS%), 5.7 REB, 2.2 AST, 1.3 TO, 1.3 STL, 0.8 BLK, 2.3 PF
PER: 14.56 Win %: .502 WS/48: 0.137 2YR Adj. +/-: +6.20

Now this guy can play! Wright doesn't score often, but his efficiency's about average (thanks in large part to a recently-developed three-point shot), and he rebounds well (5.7 REB/36 is actually the worst mark of his career) and passes well for a small forward. Best of all, he's a genuine defensive asset, a guy who creates a lot of positive plays without drawing whistles, and whose plus-minus numbers check out just fine.

The Warriors of recent vintage have been overloaded with guys who 1) are too small for their positions, and 2) score and don't do much else. Dorell Wright's a welcome antidote. He 1) is a 6' 9" 210-pound small forward, and 2) rarely scores, because he's usually too busy doing other stuff. It's heartening that the Warriors have him, and even more heartening that they went to the trouble of going and getting him. His signing is a step away from Nellieball, which is a step in the right direction.

Two Wrights Make This Less Wrong

...maybe I take it back, lame-duck chickenheads. The signing of Dorell Wright to a three-year, $11 million contract is a good one, and helps to answer some of the questions the Lee trade created.

Wright scores efficiently and rarely, he can score from distance (39.5% last year), and he's an actual by-God decent defender, with good length for a three. You could not design a more well-suited small forward for the needs of this team. I love Anthony Morrow like a sharp-shooting brother, but he's not as good as Dorell Wright, and he's not as good of a fit. Best of all, Dorell came cheaply enough so that re-signing CJ still looks like a strong possibility.

It'd be a stretch to call this a masterstroke. Wright is no star, and his arrival doesn't begin to erase the pain of Randolph's departure. But you can at least see a semblance of a plan starting to take shape here. If CJ re-signs, the rotation shakes out thusly:

PG: Stephen Curry, C.J. Watson

SG: Monta Ellis, Charlie Bell

SF: Dorell Wright, Reggie Williams

PF: David Lee, Brandan Wright, Ekpe Udoh

C: Andris Biedrins, Dan Gadzuric

There's more size, health, consistency and (potentially) defense here than there was last year. I don't think it's a playoff team... this lineup screams "38 wins", and far less than that if the league's worst coach manages to stick around another year. And the Warriors will now be spending more money for less upside, which is a ridiculous trade for a bad team. Still, the signing of Dorell Wright fills a hole and stops the bleeding. Good move.

To Morrow: Never Die

To the recently traumatized citizens, the news that the New Jersey Nets have signed Anthony Morrow to a three-year, $12 million offer sheet provides a brief respite from the darkness. We got off easy! In a world where Kyle Korver gets $20 million, giving his fellow marksman $12M is an absolute no-brainer, and it should come as no surprise that the Warriors are expected to...

...not match?!

Trading talent and treasure for an overrated "All-Star" is one thing -- it's stupid, but at least you can make out the simian logic involved. Letting a cheap and valuable commodity go as a result? This would be the dumbest move in a summer that has already boggled the mind. For fuck's sake, you lame-duck chickenheads, match the offer. Do not piss another asset down the toilet.

Goodbyes

Before we give Mr. Lee a closer look, let's take one sorrowful glance at the fellas we just gave up.

I vividly remember Kelenna Azubuike's first game... he was hastily called up the day of the DunMurphy Dump, as the not-yet-Steve-and-Al'ed Warriors needed warm bodies to fill out the bench (they also called up the comically overmatched Renaldo Major, whose only NBA game was one to forget). 'Buike played all forty-eight minutes, scored twenty-eight points and grabbed seven rebounds, and forged a stable career for himself on the spot. With a (large-nostriled) nose for the rim, a three-point shot that ranged between good and great, and a willingness to mix it up on defense and on the boards, 'Buike was a consistently solid player throughout his Warriors tenure, and a hot start to the '09-'10 season suggested he had the potential to be more than solid. A freak knee injury during Brandon Jennings's 55-point outburst changed all that... Azubuike won't be ready in November, and there's no guarantee that he'll ever recover the explosiveness that made him effective. But he gave this franchise 205 games of good lunchpail basketball (career per 36: 15.0 points, 6.0 rebounds, 55.7 TS%), and should be remembered as a good Warrior.

It won't be at all difficult to remember Ronny Turiaf. While he only played 2,568 minutes in a Warrior uniform, less than many players log in a single season, Ronny endeared himself to fans and teammates with some fierce rim protection, nifty passing, empassioned towel-waving and impressive hobo-bearding. One of the nicest and most likeable players in the league, Ronny at times risked getting more credit than he deserved for his Warriors efforts... his middling rebounding totals prevented him from being a huge asset. But an asset he was, as the Dubs performed better with him than without him in each of his two seasons in Oakland. The Knicks just got a fabulous bench piece and a ray of Martinique sunshine. Here's hoping they treat him well.

The previous gentlemen may have been my favorite two Warriors. Nevertheless, it is much more painful to say goodbye to Anthony Randolph than to either of them. Neither 'Buike nor Ronny was long for the Bay Area; conversely, the Warriors had control over Randolph for three more seasons, with a strong chance of retaining him for longer than that. 'Buike and Turiaf were fun to watch, but Randolph was downright magnetic: whether he was soaring or crashing, he was a spectacle that commanded your attention. Most importantly, while the former two were complementary pieces, AR was a lottery ticket, the Warrior with the greatest potential of all. Two comparisons will suffice.

Disaster Strikes

UGH.

Okay. Look.

The Warriors' big trade today -- Randolph, Turiaf and Azubuike (plus possibly others?!) for David Lee -- has the contours of a trade that makes sense. If you have a bunch of middling players, the best possible outcome is to trade several of them for a pretty good player. Azubuike and Turiaf, as fond as we Worriers are of them, are the exact kind of short-contract spare parts that should be moved for value. And while we'd personally love to cradle Anthony Randolph to our misery-wracked chests until the end of time, there is an argument for trading a high-upside, high-risk guy for a known commodity.

The problem is, the known commodity that is David Lee is known to... how do we put this politely... not help NBA teams win basketball games.

The 2009-10 New York Knicks were outscored by 4.1 points per 48 minutes when David Lee was on the court, and by 2.8 points per 48 minutes when he wasn't. To reiterate: this year's Knicks team played better without David Lee. The previous year? Same deal: the '08-'09 Knicks were outscored by 3.4 per 48 with Lee, and by only 0.7 per 48 without him. In the two years before that, Lee's net plus-minus was positive, but considering he was subbing for a gravy-addled Eddy Curry, that ain't saying all that much.

The more grizzled Warriors fans among you may remember a gentleman by the name of Troy Murphy. By many production-based metrics, Mr. Murphy is a borderline superstar: Dave Berri's Wins Produced, for example, rate him as one of the league's twenty best players. This, of course, is ridiculous, for Troy Murphy's teams are always bad, especially so when he plays... his gaudy rebounding totals stem from the fact that he selfishly pads his own stats, to the detriment of the Pacers' D and even the team's rebounding.

Well, David Lee is better than Troy Murphy. But the two share the same category: both guys boast gaudy counting stats that exemplify weaknesses as much as strengths. When Lee took the floor for the Knicks in the last couple seasons, they rebounded worse as a team and defended much worse. His individual stats suggest he's a borderline All-Star; his team results suggest that the Knicks might've improved upon their 29-53 record if he'd simply stayed home.

This is the exact type of player that the Warriors don't need. In fact, this is the exact type of player that the Warriors just dumped for Charlie Bell and Dan Gadzuric. On a shitty roster with only one healthy three and several high-upside young fours, why, exactly, would you dump $30 million worth of Corey Maggette and then trade real talent for $80 million of David Lee?

This is pointless. This is counterproductive. This is ridiculous. This team is now paying $33 million -- about 57% of the salary cap -- for Monta, Biedrins and Lee, three players whose teams failed to win 30 games last year. This is not how you build a team, nor how you sell one. If the Warriors' next owner looks at a trade like this and smiles, then run for the hills, people... a new day will not be dawning anytime soon. This shit is downright shameful.

Tomorrow, we will take one last look at Anthony Randolph, a player who possesses more upside than any current Warrior (yes, Curry too). Next week, we will embark on the ugly process of examining this newly Lee'd and freshly directionless franchise.

Worrying doesn't even begin to cover it at this point. Is www.goldenstatemourners.com available?

Disaster Looms

Do not do this, Warriors. Just don't do it. Do not fucking trade Anthony Randolph, Kelenna Azubuike and Ronny Turiaf for David Lee and then sign David Lee to an $80-million deal.

People: call your friends and neighbors, your local representatives, your mail carriers, your travel agents. Sound the alarms... let hell roll through the streets of northern California. May the very skies shudder as we bellow these three truths:

1) The proper move after dumping an overpaid, no-D scorer is not to acquire an even more overpaid no-D scorer.

2) Now is no time to swell the payroll.

3) Rebuilding teams should not punt on Anthony Randolphs.

We're at the edge of a cliff here, folks. Here's hoping LeBron accidentally announces he's joining the Knicks, because this has Webber Dump: The Sequel written all over it.

Stay tuned.

Catchup: The Udoh Pick

We Worriers are not big college basketball fans. Any sport that requires you to get to know an entirely new set of elite players every season is for suckers, and at the risk of Marxing out on the subject, it's hard to get jazzed about a multi-billion-dollar entertainment industry whose performers don't get a dime. Is the first weekend of March Madness fun? Sure. Does that one weekend a great sport make? Not from where we're sittin'. College hoops, no offense, but we're just not that into you.

Another thing we're not into: talent evaluation by online amateurs. Projecting an NBA prospect's potential from afar isn't as patently ridiculous as doing the same for a prospective NFLer or MLBer, but it's still pretty damn ridiculous. It's not that a fan can't speculate about John Wall's ability to play the point or DeMarcus Cousins's personality; it's that far too many people claim certainty on these subjects, when they have no idea what they're talking about. The transition into the world's strongest basketball league is a complicated one, and no, VonteegoDownToKokomo44, you don't know what's going to happen. Give them indignant capital letters a rest.

With all that said, let's do a by-God EXPERT ANALYSIS of the Warriors' latest draft pick!!!