Golden State Warriors: Recent Struggles Just a Bump in the Road
The Golden State Warriors have finally come back down to Earth. After their historic start to the season, the Warriors are beginning to look human again. Since winning 21 of their first 23 games, the Warriors have now gone on to lose three of their last five.
Should it be a cause for concern? Not at all, not yet anyways. It should just be considered a bump in the high road this team has been traveling so effortlessly this season.
The main reason for the recent losses was the lack of rhythm that they had maintained so well throughout their 16-game win streak. They haven’t been playing as smoothly on offense. The sloppy passes they are making now were little to none during their win streak. The same shots that aren’t falling were the ones that were putting the Warriors up by more than double digits during their dominant early season run.
There are many reasons as to why the Warriors have lost the games they have. It could be traced back to the loss of Andrew Bogut, who has been the cog of this team offensively and defensively.
His presence has definitely been missed, and it’s obvious the Warriors are a better team with him on the court. His player impact efficiency percentage, which determines a player’s impact to their team’s success, is higher than some of the league’s other top centers such as Marc Gasol, Deandre Jordan, Al Jefferson, and Tim Duncan.
The Warriors have also struggled getting David Lee back into the mix and playing well while he is on the court. Lee’s plus/minus for the season right now is at 0, a big difference from the team’s average of +8.9 points.
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The loss to the Los Angeles Lakers wasn’t as bad as many believe though. The Lakers are a bad team right now. There is no hiding it. Their 9-20 record is blatantly obvious to the whole NBA. They are a bad team, but they are certainly better without Kobe Bryant, who has been having one of his worst seasons of his career.
When the Warriors played the Bryant-less Lakers, everybody knew how the contest was going to go down. It was going to be a blowout, and the starters were likely only going to play up to three quarters. Well, that did end up happening, but it just wasn’t how everyone expected it to happen. The Lakers were able to take advantage of the sloppy play by the Warriors and go up by 10 points after the first quarter. That was all it took by a team without their star to gain some confidence and play well at home.
The loss to the Los Angeles Clippers was just another bump in the road. The Clippers are not a very good team either though. Before their matchup with the Warriors, the Clippers had only won four games against teams over .500, and one of those teams were the New Orleans Pelicans, who are 15-14. The Warriors committed 16 turnovers translating into 14 points for the Clippers.
These problems are issues the Warriors can fix. The Warriors still have the best record in the league, and they have that record for good reason. They have played extremely well through their first 28 games, and they have earned that record. It is a long season, and they still have a long way to go.
They have already showed this season that they respond well after losing two straight. After all, they did end up responding to the two-game skid with a franchise record 16-game win streak.