[h2]
Denver 119, Warriors 112: Pietrus is valuable, hurt and not worth much $$ all at once[/h2]
By Tim Kawakami
Saturday, March 29th, 2008 at 9:36 pm in
NBA,
Warriors.
I'm not saying the Warriors would've won this game if Mickael Pietrus wasn't still out with a groin injury, though they sure needed somebody other than Al Harrington, Matt Barnes or Kelenna Azubuike playing forward vs. the Nuggets tonight.
And I'm not trying to be too dubious about the healing properties and pain threshold of someone who is not me.
Only Pietrus knows how much he's hurt and if he can give it a go for a team that could assuredly use him.
But the Warriors are deep into Urgent/Panic WIN WIN WIN Mode now. They could've taken a huge leap by winning in Denver tonight, and instead suffered a knife shot to the gut.
They almost had enough. They played weirdly, but one more push in the late stages of the third quarter might've been enough.
Yet they didn't have Pietrus, and, at this critical juncture, the void was noticeable-he could've bumped J.R. Smith, he could've grabbed a few rebounds, he could've run into Kenyon Martin, he could've maybe hit a few shots.
Pietrus might've stunk right alongside Harrington and the rest, but in the NBA, it's always good to have extra guys to run in and out to see who's stinking and who's not.
Conclusion: That's exactly why Pietrus is valuable to the Warriors when he plays but also why he's not worth very much money (because he's so frequently not there when it counts).
Willis Reed, he ain't.
Again, I'm not trying to be overly cynical, but let's put it this way:
* This is who Pietrus is. When Pietrus is hurt, he usually takes about 2 or 3 games longer than any other Warrior mainstay would in a similar circumstance. He's right at 3 games longer right now, by the way.
He has now missed 11 games this season for various reasons-all valid enough-but that's 2 more than Stephen Jackson has missed, and
that includes Jackson's 7-game suspension to start the campaign.
Pietrus has missed 5 more games than Andris Biedrins has missed, and, yes, Biedrins had an appendectomy in the middle of the season.
That's not a good stat. That's about normal for Pietrus' career, too.
* Pietrus has now missed the Warriors' last four games and they're 2-2 in that span, with another humongous game tomorrow night at Oracle, which is the second back-to-back of this No-Pietrus timeframe.
They need bench minutes. (Baron Davis, Jackson and Monta Ellis all went for more than 44 minutes tonight, while Dallas was resting in the East Bay for tomorrow's Monster Game Part II.)
The GSWs need live bodies, especially because Don Nelson is getting very stingy with Brandan Wright once again and because Azubuike's a decent player but he's hardly a guy who looks steady shooting the ball in important moments. Or any moment, actually.
They do need Pietrus. (He's +64 on the season, sixth-best on the team, while Azubuike's a -30.) And Pietrus isn't there now.
I'll be very interested to see if he'll find a way play tomorrow against Dallas-which now is your classic Must Win. If Pietrus can't make it back for that one, well…
You think Jackson, limping on a bad toe most of the season, would be missing games with Pietrus' injury? Baron? Biedrins, who came back two weeks after an appendectomy?
I doubt Baron and SJax are look at Pietrus and saying to themselves: There's a teammate we can count on!
* This is why the Warriors didn't give Pietrus a large or even medium deal last summer and why it'd be crazy for anybody else to do it, either.
If you try to build something around him, you just never know what you're going to get, and again, I do expect to get ripped for being cruel and flinty.
But Pietrus and his agents often complain that they should be getting large money because of his vast talents. They say MP just needs more time on the floor to prove his greatness. Except he can't always get on the floor, can he?
This is one of the reasons the Warriors are in 9th place in the West for the first time in a long time… and it's the main reason Pietrus hasn't and probably won't be getting $30 million any time soon.
--OK, now some rapid-fire on the people who actually played tonight and the goings-on:
* I still think the Warriors have the inside edge on the 8th spot in the West, but now it's an edge over plunging Dallas, not Denver.
If the Warriors lose tomorrow, then I'll have to change my mind again: The Warriors will be on the outside looking in on both teams.
In my warped rankings, the GSWs are only ahead of Dallas and in a virtual tie with Denver for now because they have Dallas at home tomorrow when Dallas doesn't have Dirk Nowitzki and because they have Denver one more time at Oracle.
But it's cloudy now. Very, very cloudy.
* Man oh man Harrington (0-for-4, 2 points in 15 minutes) was horrible.
Here's a theme: That was playoff horrible! (Monta was in Playoff Tight Mode, too, for large doses tonight.)
I always say Nelson should play Wright as soon as Harrington misses a couple and grabs a few people instead of defending them… but Don almost always chooses to go other ways.
He just won't play Wright with Biedrins (obviously his best game since the surgery, 17 points and 17 rebounds), so if Biedrins is going well, Wright doesn't see the floor.
Nellie prefers Austin Croshere, Matt Barnes… just about anybody except Wright when Biedrins is playing. I understand: Two non-shooters messes up his spacing. But…
How would a guy, like Wright, with length and explosive jumping ability have changed those Denver shots? Would a different kind of finisher helped around the rim? I would've been curious to see. But not Nellie.
* Yes, I'll repeat: If Biedrins plays like this for the rest of the way, it's a nice gain for the Warriors-presence in the middle, a finisher on the pick-and-roll, etc…
But it's not that much of a gain because Wright was doing some of those things and now he won't play.
* It sort of feels like the Warriors are going to have to count on Azubuike (3-for-15 in playoff-tight shooting) for key stretches in the remaining 10 games and into the potential playoffs… and I don't know if Warriors fans should be too good about that.
He's key because he can defend larger wings and Monta and Baron can't and, as I think I've noted, you just never know what MP will be or if he's available.
* Yeah, Kenyon Martin went for 30 and shot it great tonight, but Allen Iverson was 4-for-20, so it's not like the Warriors were prenaturually unlucky. Sometimes it just works that way.
* The Warriors, as we know, are a gut-it-up team after suffering big losses. This is probably the biggest one yet.
They have to beat Dallas tomorrow. They should beat Dallas, even with tired legs. I don't think Baron will let them lose.
And then they'll be in a three-way for 7-8-9 with Denver and Dallas, all three teams at 45-28… and Denver has a home-and-home with Phoenix on Monday-Tuesday.
Good stuff. I thought the Warriors were in. And now it's a three-way coin toss, if such a thing is possible.
@ Pietrus always taking more time off forinjuries. Dude should be ashamed of himself, Baron and Stephen Jax gutted out for the team when they had injuries.
