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.
Warriors haymaker Stephen Jackson is againtalking 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.
FanHouse previews a player to watch from each NBA team in advance of the 2009-10 season.
Point forward. The final frontier.
These are the voyages of the... okay, that joke ran out of gas before it even started (much like the Warriors' playoff hopes. Hey-O!). The point is, the point forward position, the true point forward position is essentially the Holy Grail. Long rumored, we have specific evidence to support its existence (Magic Johnson), and often imitated (LeBron James), but no one has seemed to find it in years.
The optimists around the Bay Area like to say that the Warriors' 29-win season in 2008-09 was primarily the result of too many injuries and a very young roster.
The pessimists say that last year's significant step-back-- from 48 wins the season before -- was mostly the result of poor management decisions that yielded a mismatched roster with too much overlap on the perimeter and not enough bulk on the interior.
The goal in 2009-10 is to figure out which side was right.
The NBA career of forward Brandan Wright has not gone according to plan. The UNC product, acquired by Golden Sate as a lottery pick during the 2007 draft in exchange for Jason Richardson, has played rarely for the Warriors, stuck outside Don Nelson's infamous tunnel vision.
His 2009-10 season has another more immediate challenge now: Yahoo!'s Marc Spears reports that a shoulder injury suffered during Friday's practice could put Wright under the knife, and off the court for up to six months.
Warriors general manager Larry Riley cleared his late morning and early afternoon schedule on Tuesday and sat down to do a series of one-on-one interviews with Bay Area beat writers and columnists.
He addressed all sorts of issues, ranging from Stephen Jackson's trade request to which position Anthony Randolph is going to play this year to the general direction of the team.
And, of course, he answered several questions about the perception that he is little more than Don Nelson's surrogate.
OAKLAND -- As last season wore on, Warriors coach Don Nelson and rookie forward Anthony Randolph finally began to find some common ground and move past the acrimony and tension that had marked November and December.
Randolph thought he should be playing more, and Nelson thought Randolph should be working harder. Things reached a low point in December when Nelson declared he was putting Randolph "on ice" until Randolph began to show a glimmer of a work ethic. Randolph's response, in essence, was to say that he "was going to continue to work hard."
Things eventually thawed between the two, and Randolph would make some nice strides in the final months of the season. And from the looks of it, both men want to pick up where they left off – not go back to Square 1. Maybe that's why Nelson is getting mom and dad involved.
It's trophy time in the NBA, and the FanHouse crew has submitted its ballots. Find out which players deserve to take home the hardware and which ones don't, in our NBA Awards series. Next up: Rookie of the Year.
Coming into the season, most projected the rookie of the Year race to be fairly hotly contested between Derrick Rose and Michael Beasley, the top two picks in the NBA draft. But it wasn't: while Beasley spent time learning to contribute coming off the bench, Rose became one of the leaders on a team that made its way back to the playoffs. As such, the young Bull was our unanimous choice for Rookie of the Year honors.
Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.
Denver needed a win to clinch the Northwest title over Portland. Sacramento, fresh off a disappointing last-second loss to the Spurs, provided the muse. The Kings actually stuck around for three quarters and change. Then, J.R. Smith happened.
Smith scored 45 points, 23 of them in the fourth. In total, he shot 11-of-18 from 3-point range, blowing out the fire emanating from his hand by the end of the joint. In the last eight minutes of the game, Smith helped the Nuggets turn a six-point lead into a 20-point victory. The Northwest belongs to Denver.
Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.
Suddenly, Dallas' offense is clicking like a metronome. That bountiful output to (virtually) eliminate Phoenix on Sunday hardly shocked -- it was Phoenix -- but pitching two 60-point halves on Utah ... even away from Salt Lake ... name me impressed. The Mavs racked up 130 points. The Jazz, only 101.
Dirk Nowitzki and Jason Terry did the damage, with 31 and 21 points respectively. Deron Williams tried to shoot the Jazz back into it, but 5-14 from the field didn't quite cut it. Josh Howard is still struggling with consistency on offense, but seven steals always help. Always!
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.
FanHouse previews a 
FanHouse 
The NBA career of forward 
Warriors general manager 
OAKLAND -- As last season wore on, 
It's trophy time in the NBA, and the FanHouse crew has submitted its ballots. Find out which players deserve to take home the hardware and which ones don't, in our 
Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." 
Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." 
