{"id":115210,"date":"2024-12-31T10:49:39","date_gmt":"2024-12-31T15:49:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=115210"},"modified":"2024-12-31T10:49:39","modified_gmt":"2024-12-31T15:49:39","slug":"stephen-curry-warriors-very-average","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/12\/31\/stephen-curry-warriors-very-average\/","title":{"rendered":"2-Time MVP Laments &#8216;Very Average&#8217; State Of Warriors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Golden State Warriors are a shell of themselves. Once a mighty title-contender that struck fear into the hearts out their opponents, they&#8217;re now what face of the franchise <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/c\/curryst01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Stephen Curry<\/a> calls &#8220;very average.&#8221; With that being said, the Warriors haven&#8217;t tucked their tail between their legs, but they&#8217;re definitely not the big dogs on the block anymore. This has led to the two-time MVP openly lamenting the state of his team, with the most recent occurrence following a blowout loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers.<\/p>\n<h2>2-Time MVP Stephen Curry Laments &#8216;Very Average&#8217; State Of Warriors<\/h2>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re just very average,&#8221; Curry begins, trying to come up with the right words to describe his team&#8217;s situation. &#8220;I think we understand that better days can be ahead and we&#8217;re not in that big of a hole&#8230; We can make up a lot of ground pretty quickly.&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Steph Curry: \u201cWe\u2019re just very average.\u201d <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/xHGSBRqP3D\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/xHGSBRqP3D<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/anthonyVslater\/status\/1873980787621847554?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">December 31, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a tough, tough task. But that fine line between losing hope and confidence and understanding one good week (and) you&#8217;re kind of back in it, that&#8217;s where we are.&#8221;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Steve Kerr: \u201cI feel better about our young group than I ever have.\u201d Reiterated he thinks Kuminga is \u201cturning a corner,\u201d TJD is making a \u201cleap,\u201d Podziemski\u2019s all-around glue game and a hope Moody \u201ccan get healthy and on a run.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/anthonyVslater\/status\/1873903599396491296?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">December 31, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It is an emotional roller coaster for sure,&#8221; he admits. &#8220;It&#8217;s frustrating that you&#8217;re losing games for all different types of reasons. But as the calendar flips into the New Year&#8230; it&#8217;s literally right there to turn the corner to having a positive momentum and something you can kind of hold onto as an identity of how we win basketball games.&#8221;<\/p>\n<h3>All Hope Isn&#8217;t Lost&#8230; Yet<\/h3>\n<p>Curry&#8217;s comments hit the nail on the head.<\/p>\n<p>Statistically, the Warriors are average. Among the league&#8217;s 30 teams, they rank 18th in points per game (111.5), 17th in three-point percentage (.359), 11th in opponent&#8217;s points per game (110.6), and 14th in net rating (+1.0). Record-wise, the Warriors are average. Among the 15 teams in the Western Conference, they&#8217;re now 10th at 16-16. Curry is a first-ballot Hall of Famer but they have several rotations players who are, well, average.<\/p>\n<p>Yet, if the regular season ended today, Golden State would be in the Play-In Tournament and have a chance at clinching a playoff berth. Notably, the Warriors are just 5.0 games behind the Houston Rockets, who are third in the West at 21-11. So, while this torrid stretch has them on their heels, they can be cautiously optimistic about how the rest of the season turns out.<\/p>\n<p>They just need to figure out the right formula.<\/p>\n<h3>The Cam Johnson Solution<\/h3>\n<p>In the beginning of the season, their depth and defense helped them get off to a 12-3 start.<\/p>\n<p>However, their extended rotation and constant role changes have left the team without a firm identity on offense. The only real constants have been Curry being the focal point of the first unit, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/h\/hieldbu01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Buddy Hield<\/a> getting his shots off in the second unit, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/w\/wiggian01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Andrew Wiggins<\/a> playing like he&#8217;s still the third option even when he needs to be the <em>sous chef<\/em>. Once a team that ran like a well-oiled machine, the Warriors now have a patchwork offense without an ideal solution.<\/p>\n<p>For Warriors head coach Steve Kerr to continue running his preferred system, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/k\/kuminjo01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jonathan Kuminga<\/a> would have to suddenly morph into <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/t\/thompkl01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Klay Thompson<\/a>. That&#8217;s just not happening. At this point, their best bet may be to target Brooklyn Nets forward <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/j\/johnsca02.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Cam Johnson<\/a>. Though the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/12\/29\/nba-rumors-nets-multiple-first-round-picks-cam-johnson\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">asking price is pretty high<\/a>, he&#8217;s the best 3-and-D player that&#8217;s known to be available.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Golden State Warriors are a shell of themselves. Once a mighty title-contender that struck fear into the hearts out their opponents, they&#8217;re now what face of the franchise Stephen Curry calls &#8220;very average.&#8221; With that being said, the Warriors haven&#8217;t tucked their tail between their legs, but they&#8217;re definitely not the big dogs on [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5008,"featured_media":115231,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[25,1608,6,62,3,4721],"tags":[1781,4774,48],"class_list":["post-115210","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-warriors","category-basketball","category-nets","category-nba","category-news","category-trade-rumors","tag-cam-johnson","tag-rumors","tag-stephen-curry"],"modified_by":"Quenton S Albertie","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115210","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5008"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=115210"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":115232,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115210\/revisions\/115232"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/115231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=115210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=115210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=115210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}