In 3 games against the Rockets in the playoffs last year, they went to the "death lineup" (Curry, Thompson, Iguodala, Durant, Green) for a total of 56 minutes. They scored 141 points, we scored 137 points. Not a big difference.
It’s foolish to make trades to defend Cousins this year. He’s disruptive to GSW’s normal offense, sucks in their defense, not showing the passing/picking that he should, and might not regain full explosiveness this year, and will be gone next year. He’s not a threat. There is no systemic problem between us and them. They simply have more offensive fire-power and we have to play nearly perfect...and win the turnover battle big, which is our strong point against them.
Good point on the turnovers. The downside of the pass-heavy offense is high risk of turnovers. With Harden and Paul running things on our side, we have no excuse to lose the turnover battle.
Provide the context @durvasa. Why only 56 minutes? Who were we running out there against them last year? What's different this year? You know. You're too smart. Finish the story.
This. I welcome the Warriors playing Cousins. Whether the Rockets win is more about how the Rockets play than the Warriors. Also health isn’t only an equation on the Rockets side, the Warriors have to worry about it as well.
56 minutes in 3 games is about 20 minutes per, which is what you said they would do. Also, with Cousins and his disruptive ego on the roster, there will be more pressure on Kerr to use him more and the death lineup less. Anyway, the burden is on you, I'm afraid. Where's your evidence that we can't handle their death lineup when at full strength? We dealt with it fine in the playoffs last year. +4 over 56 minutes is not a huge margin.
Nice come back. The entire league is copying our defense against them. We have no systemic problem defending them, nor scoring against them. But they have superior shooters, by a big margin.
Also, @basketballholic, I guess your argument is that we weathered the death lineup storm in the playoffs last year by going small (not playing Capela), and we are somehow less capable of that this year because of the loss of Ariza. Ariza was a valued piece last year, but he is not totally irreplaceable. Need to see how we do down the stretch with Rivers and Shumpert -- both solid defenders.
Not to mention we no longer have to match them. We can stay big with PJ, Faried and Capela, since PJ can guard Durant. PJ takes Durant, and Faried/Capela can easily hold down Iggy and Green. There is a possibility we are in the process of seeing that we can make the Death Lineup unplayable. Iggy is just not the threat he once was.
Unyielding arrogance is typically either a manifestation of deep-seated insecurity, a lack of mental agility to process new data objectively, or narcissism that causes a reflexive, defensive rejection of any information that might damage one's own self-image. Of course, only one of those three leads one to invent multiple internet persona to defend oneself against strangers. 3-0 this year. 8-5 in two years. 7-3 with Harden and Paul both healthy. Up 15 at some point during the game in all but one loss. Sometimes this **** just isn't that hard.
"To extrapolate from this win that we, with this current roster, have a chance to beat the Warriors in a 7-game playoff series....is foolishness. UTTER FOOLISHNESS!" -you know who, busting out the all-caps admonishment
Now 'holic has another excuse for Cousins sucking last night, and he can also claim he'll be ready by the playoffs. #ContextMatters
