Wonderful Warriors
PARIS (George Eddy's International Show) - The best team in the NBA today is the Golden State Warriors with a 21-2 record and a franchise-best 16-game winning streak which includes ten straight wins away from home!
Even their highly confident new coach, Steve Kerr, probably didn't imagine such a flamboyant start to the season. Former coach, Mark Jackson, who helped build and improve the team is surely biting his own tongue thinking about what might have been but the owner of the team said he couldn't get along with his co-workers and had to be let go.
Kerr hit the jackpot by preferring to coach the Warriors instead of the Knicks which wasn't that tough a decision when you compare the two rosters and their salary cap situations. Golden State plays a resolutely modern style built around the brillant and youthful tandem of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson, two superstar teammates who genuinely like each other which is a key because they spent alot of time together in the last year between the Warriors and Team USA!
Golden State plays quick and uptempo with 3 or 4 three point shooters on the court at all times which provides spacing for Curry's drives and kicks towards Thompson who is shooting 43% from 3pt. range and averaging 21.3 points a game. Curry scores at a 23.2 ppg pace and is the best shooter and one on one player in the league considering his height and small frame, which in the modern-day NBA are no longer a disadvantage as long as you possess exceptional quickness and technique like Stephen.
I have already written in length about his incredible journey from high school phenom that didn't recieve scholarship offers from the big schools to leading scorer in the NCAA at Davidson and on to the top of the NBA totem pole thanks to his drive, work ethic and perseverance. His baby face makes him even more likeable!
This young tandem is the best guard duo in the NBA today, bar none, and even compares with all-time great tandems like Walt Frazier-Earl Monroe, Jerry West and Gail Goodrich, or Isaah Thomas and Joe Dumars more recently. I am old enough to have seen those tandems play hundreds of times and I can say that Stephen and Klay most ressemble West and Goodrich because of their mastery of scoring, shooting and passing to each other and to their teammates.
Let's talk about their teammates who are a nice mix of youth and experience who fit in well with their roles. A good example is André Iguodala who is content in being a defensive, glue-type player after having been a big scorer in the past. Austalian center Andrew Bogut is their leading rebounder and rim protector but he's had a history of injury problems. Golden State will only go as far as Bogut's fragile body or Curry's fragile ankles will take them so Kerr has a big responsability to keep their minutes down and their rest and recuperation up the way one of his mentors, Gregg Popovich, does with his Big Three in San Antonio! Other key pickups to the roster have been Harrison Barnes, Mareese Speights and Draymond Green while waiting to see when David Lee can finally make a comeback.
Kerr preaches defense and protecting the ball the way his other mentor, Phil Jackson, does as well as hitting the open man which produces a spectacular and exciting brand of basketball. Kerr refuses to hear talk about his team challenging the Bulls' record of 72 wins from '95-'96 because his Bulls were 41 and 3 at one point that season. Kerr says "if we win 20 out of our next 21 games then you can come and talk to me about the record". Record or not, the wonderful Warriors must at least be considered as potential candidates for their first NBA title since 1975!
George Eddy
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