FanHouse Warriors

PHOENIX -- The Warriors played basketball like five individuals wearing the same uniform on Friday, instead of like an NBA team that was anywhere near capable of playing as a cohesive unit. As a result, they were run off the floor by a Suns team that shared the ball to get easy baskets, led by a 20-assist performance from Steve Nash.

Besides the fact that Nash had more assists than the entire Warriors team did, there was something else that was interesting about this one, and that was the way that Don Nelson chose to use - or not use -- one of his most athletic players in Anthony Randolph.

When the Suns and the Warriors get together, it's always a good time -- uptempo basketball at its finest. Both teams are coming off of close first games of the season, but with decidedly different results.

Golden State blew a 10-point halftime lead at home to fall to the Rockets, while Phoenix got an "old white guy shot" from Steve Nash in the closing seconds to get his team a road win over the Clippers.

What happens tonight is as much of a mystery as Don Nelson's distribution of minutes, but it's likely to be a lot of fun either way. So join us beginning at 10PM EST by following @NBAFanHouse, or simply read on to follow along below.

Don Nelson insisted again on Thursday, like he's been insisting since the start of training camp, that he's excited by his young Warriors team and that he is having fun coaching it.

But that's not the way it looks. Nelson has grown increasingly short with the media in the past year or so and his pregame press conferences are littered with one-word answers and uncomfortable silences.

One day after the Warriors lost to the Rockets 108-107, a radio host on the team's flagship station opened his program by saying it sure seemed like Nelson's heart wasn't in it anymore.

For the Houston Rockets, the word rocketship took on a whole new meaning on Wednesday.

Thanks (or no thanks) to a broken cable that has closed the Bay Bridge, the Rockets were faced with two choices to get from their hotel in San Francisco to Oracle Arena in Oakland to play the Warriors.

They could either take a different bridge, which would have made it a three-hour bus ride or, they could go by ferry.

Knowing that most NBA players like to arrive on the second (i.e. last) of two buses that take teams to games, guess what mode of transport they chose?

Warriors coach Don Nelson has gone out of his way to compare rookie Stephen Curry to a young Steve Nash. That's a nice comparison and one any young player would likely take.

But Curry's already got a mentor, thank you, and it's tough to argue with his choice: Chris Paul.

Curry and Paul, both from North Carolina, go back a few years. But this summer their friendship grew, the result of spending nearly a month working out together at various venues in the South.

OAKLAND, Calif. -- When Warriors coach Don Nelson let it be known early Thursday that he was going to start Corey Maggette at power forward instead of Anthony Randolph, you could almost hear a collective groan among fans in the Bay Area.

"Not this again," seemed to be the refrain.

Randolph is considered the Warriors' brightest young star and figured to be a shoe-in to start at at the four this season. But now that Maggette's the man -- at least for now -- it's only natural to wonder whether Randolph is back in Nellie's doghouse, a place Randolph spent a good chunk of his rookie season.

Before he was named head coach of the Cavaliers in 2005, Mike Brown twice had the honor of coaching Stephen Jackson: once as an assistant with the Pacers, and before that, as an assistant with the Spurs.

Jackson's time in Indiana wasn't exactly that of a model citizen, but he was fine in San Antonio, and even got himself a ring as a contributor to the Spurs' championship in 2003.

Maybe Brown, based on this past experience, sees something in Jackson that at this point, most of the rest of us do not. That has to be the reason that Cleveland is interested in trading for Jackson, and freeing him from the unpleasant situation that he's created for himself in Golden State.

SACRAMENTO -- It's probably a little early to say that Warriors rookie Stephen Curry is having trouble shooting the ball at the pro level. After all, he hasn't played a regular-season game yet.

At the same time, Curry has begun to assemble his professional body of work -- with a full summer league behind him and six exhibition games. And if that's all you've seen of him, it certainly seems fair to ask: "Is this guy really a good shooter?"

On Saturday, Curry again struggled from the field, going 3-for-9 in Golden State's 101-94 loss to the Kings. Unfortunately, it was just the latest in a string of bad shooting performances.

Warriors haymaker Stephen Jackson is again talking to Yahoo!'s Marc Spears about the injustice of it all, in which "it all" is a $30-million extension from a bad team who has apparently broke its promise to stop sucking. Clearly, in the grand scheme of the Golden State's familiar foray into bleakness, Stephen Jackson is the victim, according to Stephen Jackson.

But he's also a cause, and not because of this latest impetuousness. The very fact that Jackson is considered the Most Valuable Warrior -- or even a valuable Warrior -- helped get Golden State into this mess.

OAKLAND, Calif. -- Stephen Jackson was at it again on Wednesday, speaking his mind and bringing down the verbal hammer.

This time the nails were Kobe Bryant and his teammates.

One day after he gave up his Warriors' captaincy and took shots at his coach and his organization's front office, Jackson went in another direction. Asked to elaborate on what happened Friday night against the Lakers and Kobe Bryant -- which led to his two-game suspension -- that's exactly what Jackson did.

"Basically, to beat a dead horse, (Bryant) was just playing dirty," Jackson said. "He was getting favoritism out there. I'm not saying the refs were cheating. I'm not saying that at all. I think he was getting away with stuff that I couldn't get away with. And I didn't think it was fair.