The 2022-23 Golden State Warriors week-in-review: 11/21-11/27
The Warriors go undefeated on the week with their starters playing, Klay Thompson and Jordan Poole trend up, Steve Kerr finds a stable second unit, and much more.
Is anybody on the injury report?
Andre Iguodala has still yet to play a game but the rest of the team was healthy last week, save for some load management “injuries” on Monday night.
Who did the Warriors play last week?
The Warriors played the New Orleans Pelicans on the road, the Los Angeles Clippers and Utah Jazz on the road, and then the Minnesota Timberwolves on the road.
How did the Warriors do this last week?
The Warriors went 3-1.
How did that happen?
11/21/22: The Warriors lose to the Pelicans, 83-128.
You can read my full recap here.
Here are the Warriors’ substitutions from this game:
1st Q:
12:00 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Kuminga/Lamb/Looney: 0-0, tie game.
6:37 — Jerome/DiVincenzo/Kuminga/Lamb/J. Green: 4-12, Warriors lead.
5:02 — Jerome/DiVincenzo/Moody/Kuminga/J. Green: 7-17, Warriors lead.
4:27 — Poole/Jerome/Moody/Kuminga/J. Green: 7-22, Warriors lead.
3:31 — Poole/Jerome/Moody/PBJ/J. Green: 9-23, Warriors lead.
2nd Q:
12:00 —Jerome/Rollins/Moody/Lamb/J. Green:: 16-35, Pelicans lead.
9:32 —Jerome/Rollins/Moody/Kuminga/Lamb: 23-41, Pelicans lead.
9:09 — Poole/Rollins/Moody/Kuminga/Lamb: 23-42, Pelicans lead.
6:40 — Poole/Moody/Kuminga/Lamb/J. Green: 28-46, Warriors lead.
3:39 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Moody/Kuminga/J. Green: 33-54, Warriors lead.
3rd Q:
12:00 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Jerome/Kuminga/J. Green: 41-65, Pelicans lead.
7:23 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Moody/Kuminga/J. Green: 53-77, Pelicans lead.
7:05 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Moody/Lamb/J. Green: 53-79, Pelicans lead.
4:34 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Moody/Kuminga/Lamb: 58-87, Pelicans lead.
4:03 — Jerome/Rollins/Moody/Kuminga/Lamb: 58-90, Pelicans lead.
4th Q:
12:00 — Jerome/Moody/PBJ/Kuminga/Lamb: 65-97, Pelicans lead.
7:22 — Rolins/Moody/PBJ/Kuminga/Lamb: 73-114, Pelicans lead.
3:33 — Jerome/Rollins/PBJ/Kuminga/Lamb: 79-118, Pelicans lead.
The Warriors started the week with a miserable,load-management loss to the New Orleans Pelicans on the road. This was the Warriors’ fourth back-to-back of the season and the second time that they’d rested their core veterans — Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, Draymond Green, and Andrew Wiggins — against the Pelicans in a road game in New Orleans.
The outcome of this game was pretty much guaranteed when the Warriors announced that Steph Curry would rest and it only took a single quarter for the Warriors to roll over, which made me feel bad for the people who spent their hard-earned money to attend this game.
At the start of the second quarter, the Warriors trailed by 18 points. They did briefly cut the Pelicans’ lead to 15 points on three separate occasions before the end of the half but each time, the Pelicans responded almost instantly and pushed their lead to 20+ points. The first half did at least provide one highlight for the Warriors before things well completely apart:
During the third quarter, the Pelicans pushed their lead to over 30 points. Kevon Looney, who played just five minutes in the first half, did not play in the second half because Steve Kerr didn’t want to throw out his starting center, who was already questionable to play before tipoff, for unnecessary minutes in a guaranteed loss.
The low-stakes environment of a blowout gave rookies Patrick Baldwin Jr. and Ryan Rollins some extended minutes. Rollins was mostly invisible when he wasn’t turning the ball over (five turnovers, four shoot attempts, and no assists) and although Baldwin Jr. only made one of his four attempts from deep, he did drive to the hoop twice and finish with a level of fluidity and assertiveness that his body wasn’t capable of during college:
Not much else stood out as a positive from Monday night’s game; Jordan Poole scored 26 points, but only really looked assertive when the game was out of reach; Jonathan Kuminga made four threes, but on 12 attempts and was just 2/8 on two-point field goals; Moses Moody had three turnovers and just two made shots in 32 minutes; Donte DiVincenzo missed all five of his shot attempts in 19 minutes; JaMychal Green scored 10 points and made the third-most field goals of any Warrior with uh... four makes — you get the picture.
11/23/22: The Warriors beat the Clippers, 124-107.
For the first time in nearly 10 years, I went to a Warriors’ game in the Bay Area. The last time I went to a game at Oracle Arena — Game 4 of the 2013 Western Conference Semifinals against the San Antonio Spurs — I was 19 years old. Lower-level tickets were still pretty easy to buy for under $200 dollars. Since 2013, I’ve gone to two Warriors games, a 2014 blowout of the Knicks at Madison Square Garden, and a frustrating loss without Steph Curry to the Wizards this past March in Washington D.C.
Wednesday night’s game was far more satisfying than my last in-person Warriors experience. For obvious reasons, I didn’t take notes during the game, and instead I enjoyed the view (Row 9 in Section 105) and conversations with Friend of the Substack, Omar. Some observations from that game:
I’ve never had seats so close to the court and it felt different. The speed and size of NBA players are brutally apparent up close and the physicality of both teams was striking. The Warriors looked small-ish against a Clippers team consisting of mostly wings, but they built a lead as high as 8 points towards the end of the first quarter thanks to a crisp start by Klay Thompson.
A revamped second unit centered around the two-man game of Jordan Poole and Draymond Green pushed the Warriors’ lead from three points to 7 and got as high as 12 points without Steph Curry. It’s felt like ages since the Warriors’ bench actually wins its minutes, let alone survives them.
Anthony Lamb played solid second-quarter minutes and seeing him in person made me understand why Steve Kerr plays him minutes over some of the Warriors’ younger players. Lamb was incredibly supportive of his teammates on the bench, but what was more striking was his intensity, focus, and relentless motor. Lamb does not take possessions off and he plays like a man who believes that every possession could make or break his NBA career.
The solid play of Lamb and the Warriors’ other bench players made up for the putrid shooting of Jordan Poole, who tried and failed to shoot himself out of a slump. Poole’s shot selection got more erratic as the game went on and his defense, particularly against Marcus Morris Sr., was quite rough.
I came to watch the Warriors (although, really it was Steph Curry I was most excited to see) but what I was treated to instead was the Andrew Wiggins show. Wiggins scored 16 points in the second half and shot 4/5 from three to cap off a 31-point night where he shot 12/18 from the field and 6/10 from three. I’ve never seen Wiggins shoot so confidently or look so eager to shoot from three. Wiggins’ shooting percentages, particularly on catch-and-shoot threes are absurd (more on that later), but it’s not like he’s taking complete softball threes from a standstill. Wiggins isn’t taking Kyle Korver-style movement threes, but he is firing more and more shots coming off of screens or jogging into a catch and he looks damn good doing it. Late in the game, Omar and I found myself ironically, and then unironically imploring Wiggins to shoot the ball every time he had the ball in his hands. Wiggins hit two threes and had a fastbreak dunk in the early minutes of the fourth quarter that helped put the Clippers away for good and generally looked the part of one of, if not, the best player on the floor. Wild.
11/25/22: The Warriors beat the Jazz, 129-118.
Here are the Warriors’ substitutions from that game:
1st Q:
12:00 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 0-0, tie game.
4:33 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/J. Green/Looney: 27-14, Warriors lead.
3:34 — Curry/DiVincenzo/Poole/Kuminga/J. Green: 29-18, Warriors lead.
2nd Q:
12:00 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/Lamb/D. Green: 37-23, Warriors lead.
7:57 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/Lamb/Looney: 44-31, Warriors lead.
7:17 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Thompson/Lamb/Looney: 45-33, Warriors lead.
6:22 — Curry/Thompson/Kuminga/Lamb/Looney: 48-41, Warriors lead.
3:35 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 50-43, Warriors lead.
0:08 — Curry/DiVincenzo/Thompson/Wiggins/Looney: 59-49, Warriors lead.
3rd Q:
12:00 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 59-51, Warriors lead.
6:22 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green: 74-71, Warriors lead.
5:05 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/Wiggins/J. Green: 76-71, Warriors lead.
2:37 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Thompson/Kuminga/J. Green: 89-79, Warriors lead.
4th Q:
12:00 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/Kuminga/D. Green: 97-86, Warriors lead.
7:58 — Curry/Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/D. Green: 107-98, Warriors lead.
7:24 — Curry/Poole/DiVincenzo/Thompson/Looney: 110-98, Warriors lead.
4:29 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 121-106, Warriors lead.
1:29 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green: 126-113, Warriors lead.
Going up against one of the surprise teams in the West, the Warriors opened Friday night’s game with focus and scored 22 points in less than six minutes before the Utah Jazz called their first time out. Draymond Green finished the first period with 7 assists and from the opening possessions of the game, he was looking to find his shooters. Here are two such examples:
By the end of the period, the Warriors led 37-23 and they’d padded their lead late in the quarter with solid minutes from Donte DiVincenzo and Jordan Poole.
In about five minutes without Steph Curry, the Warriors’ 14-point lead shrank to just 7 points. Back-to-back threes by Lauri Markannen cut the Warriors’ lead to four points but a few minutes later, Steve Kerr brought Andrew Wiggins and Draymond Green back into the game to close the half with the starting lineup. This play below exemplifies the chemistry of the league-best starting lineup:
That same Warriors’ starting lineup actually lost their lead at the 7:26 mark of the third quarter after the Jazz, who shot 4/26 from three in the first half, hit as many threes in the first five minutes of the period. The shooting and offensive fireworks of Kelly Olynyk, a longtime favorite of mine whose salary is only a Ryan Rollins short of James Wiseman, played a big role — the Amish-looking stretch-five scored 11 in a three-minute burst. Steve Kerr turned to the Nickname lineup of Curry/Poole/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green to try and jumpstart the Warriors’ offense. Within a few minutes, the Warriors led again. Andrew Wiggins hit a three and was fouled in the process, Jordan Poole hit a deep three in transition, and then Klay Thompson, who had shot 0/4 from deep in the first half, hit back-to-back threes. The second of those threes was quite hilarious:
In the final minute of the period, Klay added two more threes, and the Warriors took an 11-point lead into the fourth quarter. That lead got as high as 13 points during the Warriors’ non-Steph Curry minutes — Jordan Poole scored 7 points in the early part of the period in his pick-and-roll dance with Draymond Green — and stood at 9 points when Steph came back into the game. Curry proceeded to hit back-to-back threes, and a finger roll that followed a Donte DiVincenzo three put the Warriors up 19 points with about five minutes left in the game. The Jazz did not roll over down nearly 20 points. Instead, they scored on five straight possessions to cut the Warriors’ lead to ten points with a little less than three minutes left, but Curry hit a three at the 2:32 mark to push the lead to 13 points, and about a minute later, a layup gave him 33 points on the night and effectively put the game away.
11/27/22: The Warriors beat the Timberwolves, 137-114.
Here are the Warriors’ substitutions for this game:
1st Q:
12:00 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 0-0, tie game.
5:33 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/D. Green/J. Green: 28-17, Warriors lead.
3:39 — Curry/DiVincenzo/Poole/Kuminga/J. Green: 37-17, Warriors lead.
2nd Q:
12:00 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/Lamb/D. Green: 47-27, Warriors lead.
8:39 — Poole/Thompson/Wiggins/Lamb/D. Green: 51-38, Warriors lead.
8:34 — Poole/Thompson/Wiggins/Kuminga/D. Green: 51-38, Warriors lead.
7:13 — Poole/Thompson/Wiggins/Kuminga/Looney: 57-38, Warriors lead.
5:20 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/Kuminga/Looney: 64-40, Warriors lead.
3:46 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/Kuminga/D. Green: 68-43, Warriors lead.
0:39 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/Kuminga/Looney: 74-53, Warriors lead.
3rd Q:
12:00 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 76-56, Warriors lead.
5:26 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/D. Green/J. Green: 96-72, Warriors lead.
4:12 — Curry/Poole/Thompson/Kuminga/J. Green: 100-76, Warriors lead.
3:41 — Curry/DiVincenzo/Poole/Kuminga/J. Green: 100-77, Warriors lead.
1:43 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Kuminga/Lamb/J. Green: 104-71, Warriors lead.
4th Q:
12:00 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/Lamb/D. Green: 109-89, Warriors lead.
8:25 — Curry/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 114-98, Warriors lead.
8:02 — Curry/Thompson/Wiggins/D. Green/Looney: 115-98, Warriors lead.
3:25 — Poole/DiVincenzo/Moody/Kuminga/J. Green: 127-108, Warriors lead.
The Minnesota Timberwolves seem to be a favorite punching bag of the Golden State Warriors for a variety of reasons; Andrew Wiggins has a chip on his shoulder about being traded by them; Steph Curry seems to delight in taking advantage of Rudy Gobert in pick-and-roll situations; Draymond Green smells the weakness in Karl-Anthony Towns and enjoys bullying him — that’s been the case for years — but now with Gobert alongside KAT, Draymond has additional motivation in the form of the man he rightly believes stole several of his Defensive Player of the Year awards.
All of this is to say, it was hardly surprising that the Warriors opened their matinee game in Minnesota with a 47-point first quarter. The Timberwolves’ jumbo frontcourt had a target pained on their back in that first quarter:
The Warriors’ 20-point lead at the end of the first period might have gotten into the 30s if not for the explosive offense of Timberwolves’ bench guard, Jaylen Nowell, who scored or assisted on all 10 of his team’s points in the three final minutes of the period and then played a big role in keeping his team within striking distance in the early second quarter. Transition defense was a big problem for the Timberwolves as the Warriors piled on easy points by simply... outrunning their opponent down the floor and by the time Steph Curry checked back in at the 5:40 mark — that’s quite late in the quarter! — the Warriors led by 24 points. What was most notable about the final stretch of the first half was that Jonathan Kuminga played big minutes alongside the Warriors’ starters. These two plays were especially nice:
Kuminga’s solid play continued into the third quarter. The Warriors pushed their lead as high as 28 points in the period and Kuminga came in with the team comfortably running away with the game. Here are two more solid Kuminga plays from that quarter:
Although the Warriors entered the third quarter with a 20-point lead, the Timberwolves got within 13 points by the 5:45 mark of the period. Steph Curry was sloppy and bricky during the first minutes of his fourth-quarter stint and after he missed a floater, Anthony Edwards came down and hit a pull-up three to put the Timberwolves within 10 points and the Warriors took a timeout. On the very next possession, Curry nearly turned the ball over, only for him to get the ball with the shot clock winding down and hit a bailout three. After an ugly pick-and-roll layup attempt by Rudy Gobert, Klay Thompson hit a three-point shot to put the Warriors up by 16 points. Gobert lost the ball on the very next possession, which turned into a dagger transition three by Klay, which led to a Timberwolves’ timeout and the beginning of garbage time. You can see that play, as well as Draymond Green delighting in Rudy Gobert’s failures, below:
What lineups played a lot last week?
Before we dive into the lineups, let’s do some house cleaning to contextualize some numbers and how the Warriors have performed over the course of the whole season as opposed to just this past week: league-average ORTG in the NBA is currently 112.5, which is the highest ORTG in league history.
Below is a screenshot from Cleaning the Glass that shows all of the Warriors’ five-man lineups that have played at least 20 possessions of non-garbage time together (positive ones are highlighted in green):
The Warriors’ starting lineup and Nickname Lineup are both getting better as the season progresses. Last week, those lineups had cumulative net ratings of +26.9 and +4.9, which have since increased to +28.0 and +5.3. You’ll probably notice a new lineup has entered the Warriors’ five-most used lineups of the season: Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/Lamb/D. Green now has three games under its belt as Steve Kerr’s primary second unit after a variant of that lineup opened the fourth quarter against the Houston Rockets last Sunday. That lineup struggles to score, but it’s been excellent on defense and seems to be accomplishing Draymond Green and Steve Kerr’s goal of slowing the game down and using more set plays in the Warriors’ minutes without Steph Curry.
Here are the Warriors’ five-man lineups that played at least four minutes this past week (positive ones highlighted in green):
Outside of the Warriors’ starting lineup and their new second unit, very few non-garbage time lineups played significant minutes together this past week. Let’s ignore the lineups with Ryan Rollins or Moses Moody in them — the presence of either player signifies that it came during the Warriors’ atrocious loss to the Pelicans on Monday night. The most interesting numbers come from the Poole/DiVincenzo/Wiggins/Lamb/D. Green lineup, which became the Warriors’ fourth-most used non-garbage time lineup for the entire season by virtue of playing... in just three games together. That should give you a sense of how much Steve Kerr has tinkered with his rotations in search of lineups he can trust. Two other lineups of note:
Curry/Poole/Thompson/D. Green/J. Green had a +126.4 net rating in a tiny sample size this past week and is now up to +78.3 in 23 possessions together this season. That lineup is getting most of its run in first and third quarters when Jordan Poole and JaMychal Green sub in for Andrew Wiggins and Kevon Looney.
The starters with JaMychal Green had a +27.3 net rating in five minutes together this past week, all of which occurred in just one game. That lineup is still negative on the season — -6.5 net rating in 31 possessions per Cleaning the Glass — but I expect its performance to improve in a larger sample size.
Here are the Warriors’ 25 most-used three-man lineup combos from this past week (positive ones highlighted in green):
The Warriors’ starting lineup and three-man combos that include its variants were excellent this past week. That’s no surprise. Where these combos get interesting is in the Jordan Poole-centric combos. You should be able to spot which of those combos played big and ugly minutes against the New Orleans Pelicans. But the positive ones, which came in second-unit minutes, are also pretty easy to spot because of their positive net rating and low ORTG.
Out of curiosity, I wanted to see how some of the Poole/DiVincenzo-led three-man combos fared over the course of the season. Only 11 such combos exist and I’ve linked to them here. Poole/DiVincenzo/D. Green (+2.1 net rating with a 93.3 ORTG) and Curry/DiVincenzo/Poole (+21.9 net rating with a 120.8 ORTG) are two of three positive combos in that list and the only ones that played any minutes this past week. I’m intrigued by the success of the Curry/DiVincenzo/Poole trio and if Steve Kerr’s current substitution patterns hold, that three-guard combo should continue to get second and fourth-quarter minutes.
The success of that three-guard combo made me want to check in on the Warriors’ most notable guard trio of Curry/Poole/Thompson. Through last week, they had a cumulative net rating of -8.7 and a 106.0 ORTG, but a stellar last three games (+45.7 net rating with a 145.7 ORTG) bumped their season-long net rating to a -0.3 net rating with a 112.1 ORTG. That’s a very welcome trend.
Here are the Warriors’ 20 most-used two-man lineup combos from this past week (positive ones highlighted in green):
As has been the case for the other lists, combos that plated a lot in the Warriors’ blowout loss to the Pelicans have a negative rating. One exception, surprisingly, is Poole/J. Green, who managed a +5.6 net rating together in four games. That duo has Poole’s third-best net rating, -3.2 with a 104.2 ORTG. Last week, I noted that there wasn’t a single Poole duo that had a positive net rating and thankfully that’s no longer the case — Poole has positive net ratings with Draymond Green (+0.5 net rating with a 110.3 ORTG), and Steph Curry (+0.2 net rating (113.2 ORTG). I’ve linked to Poole’s two-man combo numbers here. At the time of writing, Poole’s worst two-man numbers — at least among rotation players — are with Anthony Lamb and Kevon Looney, both of whom have been part of various second-unit and load-management minutes with him.
On the season, Poole has a non-garbage time net rating of -6.8 per Cleaning the Glass. Remove James Wiseman from those minutes and it’s merely a -3.0 net rating. Apply the same Wiseman on/off filter for Poole’s minutes with Steph Curry and the non-garbage time net rating of that duo is actually +7.1 with a 121.7 ORTG, so that’s another welcome trend.
James Wiseman watch:
In order to preserve my own sanity, I didn’t watch any of James Wiseman’s G-League games this past week. With that said, my internet friend, FNQ, did, and in his job, he was tasked with watching Wiseman. I’ve quoted some of his observations, which you can find on RealGM.com and I’ve linked to here, below:
Regarding Wiseman’s performance against the G-League Ignite:
As for the screening - the numbers dont bare out the original claim [that it would help the Warriors if Wiseman made contact on his screens] in any way. He does make contact sometimes, though the split still heavily favors the slip (about 70/30). It's not a bug, its a feature - just like in the NBA, they're doing it to get him involved offensively because its his best contribution point at this time. And it does create a huge advantage, because he's explosive out of the slip due to his size.. now maybe he has less success with that at the NBA level, but I really doubt a NBA defender is going to hedge on him over helping on Steph or Poole. But that segues into..
the Ignite game. I saw a post early saying they watched the 1st half and had an issue with Wiseman's rebounding positioning or something of the like. Look, as a Warriors fan, how could *anyone* watch the Ignite game and not be happy with Wiseman? Boggles my mind. He went up against Eric Mika, a guy known as a tough rebounder and paint scorer (think Tyler Hansborough who got therapy for his anger). He not only held his own with the guy, he was pushing him around a fair bit too. He still has a tough time on quick caroms and securing the ball cleanly on the first stab, but the SCW were actually + as rebounders with Wiseman on the court, and a heavy negative without him.
What he did well:
- fought for rebounds, both loose contested and positionally
- challenged shots well without fouling (and despite claims, didnt jump out of position much at all)
- finished well for the most part - he missed a dunk (foul) because he cocked it back, then corrected and did that quick dunk the rest of the game
- good hands (for him)
What he didnt:
- he had 4 bad plays that stuck out: a bad TO in the 1st (cross-court pass inbetween 2 Ws); jumping out of position in the 2Q (check highlights, more on that later); and 2 consecutive plays in the late 4th where he faced up a midrange jumper and then immediately followed up with a TO
- conditioning - remember that Q2 out of position jump? He's gassed. He's gassed so easily and early. Ran the numbers back from the last 4 games, and there's a trend where he loses position more, and jumps out of position more, after the 4 minute mark of his shifts. Someone called it out earlier (great call) that they might be working on his conditioning down there, and I'd wager its true
- didn't take over. He's still a former #2 pick and you'd like to see more dominance based on that. He's clearly progressing but he's still only scratching the surface
Overall though.. the criticism doesn't match what's happening. He may be a rough fit for a team that requires BBIQ/quick reactions/confidence but this is a talented guy who'd be a great buy low for someone, if the Warriors went that route. But my bet is that they know that too
Regarding Wiseman’s performance against the Stockton Kings:
Kings game was much worse. Whereas the first 4 games showed linear progression, which is great, the Kings game was a roller coaster with a bit more down moments than up.
The good:
- still rebounding well, high-pointing more than before
- showed some good passing out of the post ups
- his midrange spot-up jumper (even in-key) is looking better than before
- did well on FTs
- finishing well around the rim
- he learned after being floated over twice, adjusted and then blocked a shot at its high point the 3rd time. Kings never tried it again after that
The bad:
- he's still late to attack defensively on 1 on 2 situations. Additionally, he has his hands OUT instead of 1 hand up and the other hand out. Its a small thing, but it does a lot to bother shooters. But he needs to know when its time to leave home and try and suffocate the drive, hoping that someone else picks up his man behind him
- he took a few more out of rhythm shots in this game. Deep contested 3s, a couple pullup midranges.. those aren't good plays
- two separate plays he lost visibility on his man because of an off-ball screen and it resulted in easy buckets for the opposition
There's not a lot of volume for the bad in terms of unique reasons, but the first point is the one that happened WAY more than anything else and is why it was a step backwards for him. Its not even so much a step backwards, as it was the Kings seeing something that he was doing in other games and repeatedly attacking it. Right now he's playing defense like Nemo, where he stays home almost to a fault forcing the driver to make the shot. But just like last year, I think fans are going to react based on the results, not on how the defender is acting
About that Kings’ game... you may have seen on Twitter that Wiseman’s counterpart at the center position, Neemias Queta, scored 38 points and grabbed 18 rebounds to Wiseman’s 14 points and 10 rebounds. You can see some of Queta’s highlights, some of which come at Wiseman’s expense below:
I find FNQ/CDM Stats’ insight valuable so I queried him this on RealGM:
I have not been watching Wiseman's G-League games. But a question regarding the screen discourse: is Wiseman actually forcing defenses to gravitate toward him when he rolls from the slip? In his last NBA stint, I was concerned about how frequently he'd clog the paint after rolling to the hoop. It felt as if Wiseman's rim runs often turned into him trying to seal for a post-up. Given his inefficiency in the post -- he's had the worst PPP in the post of any NBA player in both of his NBA seasons -- I don't think him sealing is optimal. And at a certain point it felt like his teammates stopped trusting his ability to catch the ball when they'd hit him on the roll, which seemed to compound the issue of him slipping --> sealing.
This is his response, which is mostly to the above section that is bolded:
They're trying, but because he's so long, one explosive jump out of the slip and he's already halfway to the basket. Depending on how the PnR handler handles the whole situation - gets to the right spot, makes the correct type of pass - then he usually has either his man entirely beat, or sometimes settles on posting up a mouse. They dont usually give it to him there, but when they do he's been somewhat effective, surprisingly more as a passer to the perimeter than anything.
I'd expect we see it a lot when he returns, which is probably why he'll play more with Poole than Curry. With Curry, he'll need to become more adept at securing the ball quickly and making decisions quickly with it.. otherwise he's probably best left as an off-ball screener who hugs the corner 3 area, taking his man (presumably a big) with him, or if he leaves Wiseman alone, he's definitely got range out to there. Embracing his perimeter ability might be the best way to use him as a weapon w/the starters
Take that for what you think it’s worth. I don’t think much of his ceiling or what he’ll be at the peak of his rookie contract, which in turn makes me skeptical that it’s worth investing this much time acclimating a player who is unlikely to be useful this season or the next. The flip side to that is we’ve seen other players, like, say, Marquese Chriss, who’d never played the 5 before his Warriors’ stint, make sense of the Warriors’ system pretty quickly. Anthony Lamb is another player who has shown a pretty intuitive understanding of the Warriors’ system in his brief time with the team. These quotes about and from Lamb in a recent Marcus Thompson article for The Athletic made me think about the Wiseman situation:
Lamb said he grasped the Warriors’ scheme while watching their 2022 playoff run. He already saw the wisdom in setting screens for Curry further out, giving him room to come off the pick into the 3. He already understands the spacing and how to keep from bringing his defender in the way. Lamb knew he’d be a good fit with the Warriors because how they played made sense to him. He’s averaging 20.1 minutes so far this season because he was right.
[...]
“Once you understand it, you can’t forget it,” Lamb said. “But it’s just understanding, like, what we want to get to. Once you get that, the whole game opens up. Because they’re gonna make the right reads off of all the stuff we want to do. … Steph can get his shot whenever he wants, but he’s still gonna make the right play so we can get open.”
One last Wiseman stats dump, this time on his on/off net ratings compared to his G-League teammates:
Stray thoughts and observations:
As covered exhaustively above, Jordan Poole is trending upwards. His three-point shooting is still far-below average (31.0%), but his restricted area finishing is up to 65% (he shot 66.2% in that zone last season), and his mid-range jumpers are back to 40.9%. Here are some other weird Poole stats: on 2.9 attempts a game, Poole is shooting just 26.2% on pull-up threes, and on 4.0 attempts a game, he’s shooting 34.5% on catch-and-shoot threes. Last season, those percentages were 34.2% and 37.9% respectively. I was shocked to find this out, but Poole actually has the highest points-per-possession of any Warrior with 1.24 PPP on 1.2 such possessions a game per NBA.com. That ranks in the 92nd percentile and is 0.11 PPP higher than Steph Curry (81st percentile) and .24 PPP higher than Andrew Wiggins’ 55th percentile on ISO’s. Where Poole has struggled this season is as a pick-and-roll ballhandler. In four possessions a game, Poole is getting 0.68 PPP as the PNR ballhandler and he’s shooting just 32.8% from the field in those possessions. That’s good (bad?) for a 19th-percentile outcome.
Speaking of pick-and-rolls, here are some more numbers on the Warriors’ various PNR ballhandlers: Steph Curry has a 1.28 PPP on those possessions, which is the best of any player who has at least five such possessions a game. In smaller sample sizes, the other Warriors who have at least one PNR ballhandling possession a game fare quite poorly: Andrew Wiggins has a 0.41 PPP with a 24% FG, which is in the 3rd percentile, while Donte DiVincenzo has a 0.47 PPP and an astronomical TOV% of 46.7% on these possessions. DiVincenzo’s TOV% rate is the worst in the league among players who run at least one pick-and-roll a game and is 11.0% worse than the next ranking player. Joy.
DiVincenzo’s PPP numbers made me curious about the Warriors’ stats on drives. I’ve provided a screenshot below and the URL is linked here.
Unsurprisingly, DDV is shooting poorly on drives when he actually does drive. It’s encouraging to see Draymond Green, Jordan Poole, and Steph Curry get good outcomes on their drives, but the poor finishing of Andrew Wiggins and Klay Thompson is jarring and their current percentages are about 10% lower than they were last season.
I’ve been tracking what type of shots Klay Thompson and Donte DiVincenzo take all season because I’m a little concerned about their reliance on the three-ball, so here’s an update. DDV is taking 73.2% of his shots from deep this season, a +1.8% increase from where he was last week, and Klay had a +1.7% increase in his share of threes and -a 0.2% decrease in his share of shots from 0-3 feet since last week. Klay, is, however, now shooting 40% from three and 38.8% on 7.9 catch-and-shoot attempts a game. Klay Thompson has now put together a week of excellent basketball that’s been market by good and patient shot selection. Otherwise, Klay is pretty much the same guy as he was earlier in the season, albeit a more in-shape version.
Speaking of catch-and-shoot threes: a blistering week from three has Andrew Wiggins up to 48.1% on 5.6 attempts a game. I’m getting close to the point of wanting Wiggins to shoot 10 threes a game just to see what happens. Wild. Remember how we were just marveling at Wiggins’ bad numbers on drives? Well, that’s had little impact on his finishing in the restricted area (73.1%) or his efficiency on layups (59.4%). As Wiggins is firing more threes than ever, he’s also taking fewer mid-range jumpers. Last season, mid-range shots accounted for 17.7% of all of his shots and he converted those at a 37.2% clip. This season, mid-range jumpers are down to 14.7% of his shots and he’s hitting them at a 41.5% clip.
While JaMcyhal Green has been giving the Warriors better minutes as of late, his three-point shooting is worse than ever. JMG’s 3.7 attempts per-36-minutes is the lowest 3PA rate he’s had since the 2017-18 season and he’s shooting just 20% from deep. He is, at least, finishing at a 70.2% rate in the restricted area and he’s got the second-highest PPP on the team — a 74th percentile 1.48 PPP — on cuts, just behind Steph Curry.
I was surprised to see Jonathan Kuminga has the lowest PPP on the team for cuts: 1.07 PPP. As far as I can tell, that is the only play type that Kuminga has enough possessions in to qualify for in NBA.com’s tracking data. Last season, Kuminga had a solid, but not spectacular 1.35 PPP on cuts, but what was most impressive and intriguing to me was his 84th-percentile PPP in the post as a rookie. This season, Kuminga doesn’t even have enough possessions to qualify.
Something to keep an eye on: Draymond Green is playing the second-most minute of his career at the center position. What’s surprising is that the Warriors are barely treading water with him at the 5 (+0.8 net rating) while his +19.8 net rating at the 4 is a career-best. The Warriors have been better on the defensive end with Draymond at the 5 than the 4 — that’s been the case for three of his last five seasons — but the Warriors’ 110.7 ORTG with him at the 5 ranks in the 36th percentile compared to the 130.3 ORTG of lineups with Draymond at the 4. My guess: Jordan Poole’s struggles are playing a role in the poor offensive performances of these lineups. To that point, 72% of Dray’s minutes at the 5 have occurred with Poole on the court and the Warriors have a 110.4 ORTG in those minutes. As Poole breaks out of his slump, I expect the Warriors’ offense to get better with Draymond at the 5. But I do worry about the Warriors putting too much strain on Draymond’s body this early in the season. An unfortunate byproduct of the Warriors’ 3-7 start — they’ve had to trim their rotation and go all-out just to get to .500.
Something else I noticed when chasing down a hunch: Cleaning the Glass is categorizing Draymond Green as the Warriors’ center when he shares the court with JaMychal Green. I think I’d have those two players flipped. Correcting those positional distinctions would go a long way to making the numbers for JMG at the 5 look better — Cleaning the Glass has those lineups at a -17.9 net rating and a porous 125.7 DRTG. But put Draymond next to JaMychal and things get interesting. The Green-squared lineups have a net rating of just -0.5 in 99 possessions together, but I think there’s some noise there around three-point shooting. Somehow, lineups with the Green/Green frontcourt are allowing teams to take 45.4% of their shots from three, which is in the 0th (is that a word???) percentile and teams are making 36.7% of their threes against those lineups, which ranks in the 40th-percentile. But the flip side to that is quite encouraging — the Warriors give up 21.3% of opponents’ shots at the rim (100th percentile) and they only make 44.4% of their shots at the rim, which also ranks in the 100th percentile. At some point, I’d imagine things to normalize in both rim and three-point shooting frequency/accuracy and the net ratings of these lineups to trend more positively.
A Steph Curry update:
What’s in store for the Warriors this next week?
The Warriors play the Dallas Mavericks (9-10 record) on the road on Tuesday night and then finish the week out with home games against the depressing Chicago Bulls (8-11 record) and Houston Rockets (5-14 record) on Friday and Saturday night.
My prediction for the week:
The Warriors go 3-0.