[Mick]

The Warriors are making me wonder how they won a title last year. Were Porter and Payton *that* important?  Maybe age is hitting the core players harder and faster than I anticipated. Whatever the explanation, the team does not have the special sauce anymore. I don’t know why Crowder would want to be on this team if his goal is to win a title. Maybe the Nuggets, who could use a glue guy to sub for Porter and Gordon.

Actually...yeah, the second-teamers are an issue. Tim Kawakami of The Athletic had a really good article on it recently.  Porter, Payton, Bjelica, Kuminga, Damion Lee, Toscano-Anderson, Iguodala and Moody (last year) had a 23.7 WS (win share, roughly equivalent to baseball's WAR statistic) whereas this year's backups of DiVincenzo, Kuminga, Green, Lamb, Moody, Jerome and Wiseman have a collective WS of 8.5. 

Prorated for an 82 game season, that indicates a 10 game drop-off. They won 53 games last year, and are on track to win 42 this year.

Second issue is that Poole, Looney and Wiggins have dramatically underperformed compared to last year.

Third issue is that they really miss Mike Brown, particularly on the defensive coaching side.

Fourth, the Draymond punch of Poole didn't help matters.

Fifth, GP2 has rejoined the Warriors.

[Mick]

The Warriors are making me wonder how they won a title last year. Were Porter and Payton *that* important?  Maybe age is hitting the core players harder and faster than I anticipated. Whatever the explanation, the team does not have the special sauce anymore. I don’t know why Crowder would want to be on this team if his goal is to win a title. Maybe the Nuggets, who could use a glue guy to sub for Porter and Gordon.

Actually...yeah, the second-teamers are an issue. Tim Kawakami of The Athletic had a really good article on it recently.  Porter, Payton, Bjelica, Kuminga, Damion Lee, Toscano-Anderson, Iguodala and Moody (last year) had a 23.7 WS (win share, roughly equivalent to baseball's WAR statistic) whereas this year's backups of DiVincenzo, Kuminga, Green, Lamb, Moody, Jerome and Wiseman have a collective WS of 8.5. 

Prorated for an 82 game season, that indicates a 10 game drop-off. They won 53 games last year, and are on track to win 42 this year.

Second issue is that Poole, Looney and Wiggins have dramatically underperformed compared to last year.

Third issue is that they really miss Mike Brown, particularly on the defensive coaching side.

Fourth, the Draymond punch of Poole didn't help matters.

Fifth, GP2 has rejoined the Warriors.