Warriors Show Signs of Life, Use 7-Man Rotation While Leaving Youngsters on the Bench

Of all the games I semi-watched Wednesday night, Warriors/Hornets was by far the weirdest. The Hornets have a shot at topping the West; the Warriors, with Baron Davis and Monta Ellis last season, were still left-field insurgents bubbling up from the bottom of the playoff seeding. So it came as a rather bewildering surprise that somehow, without Davis (traded) or Monta (moped-ed), the Warriors managed to keep things tight and only lose 108-103.↵
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↵Yes, they lost. They totally fell apart at the end, as Chris Paul had one of those “this is why you want Chris Paul” moments to seize control -- right when the Warriors fell apart. And yet up to that point, somehow, Golden State competed with one of the West’s best, who didn’t seem particularly sluggish or hampered themselves. How did they do it? Try 48 minutes of Stephen Jackson, usually playing the role of point guard, a healthy dose of Corey Maggette hitting the lane, Bidrins being Bidrins, and Azubulke contributing from the bench. Other than that, not much.↵
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↵Al Harrington, who is only ever so useful, is pissed and wants to leave, which means he’s not going that extra mile. Nelson only played seven guys at all -- okay, eight if you count C.J. Watson’s 23 seconds. That means that, on this crater-laden roster looking toward the future, the likes of Brandan Wright, Marco Bellinili, Anthony Randolph, and Marcus Williams didn’t even touch the hardwood. I know, the game was going well, it made a statement and sent a message of hope, however twisted, to the fans.↵
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But as Geoff Lepper tells us, Nellie knows this can’t continue:↵↵⇥“I told the subs that I’m not going to be able to play these guys this many minutes on this next road trip or for long periods of time, so we’re going to use our bench more as we move on,” Nelson said ... “I thought we needed to do that to have a chance to win this game.”↵↵So while we were expecting the Warriors to confound and amaze us with their motley, unknown bench, instead we got Nellie pushing his vets, tightening his rotation, and seeming even stranger for rolling out playoff basketball (other teams’ version) on Day One. It shouldn’t have worked, but it did. Since that’s what we always say about the Warriors, who knows -- maybe we’re entering a bizarro phase of this team, where Nelson inadvertently finds himself in a pissing contest with Larry Brown. With ill-advised threes, of course. The more normal things get out there, the odder they seem, I guess.↵
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↵Just go ahead and let the kids run wild til Monta comes back. At least then, Mullin (who?) will know if he can really part with Harrington.↵