The Golden State Warriors are really, really good at basketball. After taking the league by storm last season en route to an NBA Championship, the Warriors have begun their title defense by completely rewriting the record books. Stephen Curry has become a one-man glitch in the Matrix, but that's not all the Dubs have to offer. Under Steve Kerr and his coaching staff, including current interim head coach Luke Walton, the Warriors have used their ridiculous assemblage of talent to steamroll the rest of the league. In the process, they've helped to redefine how basketball is played in the NBA.
Anatomy of a Champion
By the time the final buzzer sounded, the story was already working its way into NBA lore. Trailing two games to one in the NBA Finals, …show more content…
The concept traces back at least as far as the 1980s, when early advocates including Doug Moe and Don Nelson found success with innovative, perimeter-oriented lineups that had little use for traditional low-post players. Nelson in particular made a career of his distinctive Nellie Ball style, building a Hall of Fame coaching résumé over three decades with the Bucks, Warriors and Mavericks. Other teams have experimented with small-ball through the years with varying degrees of success, but nearly all of them shared a common weakness: poor defense.
The Warriors are having none of that. Though their small lineups put up video game numbers offensively, they do so without much trade-off defensively. Featuring lineups stacked with long, athletic defenders at almost every position, the Dubs are able to switch everything on defense without creating obvious mismatches, which can wreak havoc on their opponents' offensive schemes. The thing that makes it all work, however, is the utterly logic-defying Draymond Green. One of the best defenders in the league, Green possesses the exceedingly rare ability to guard all five positions on the floor.
The Small-Ball Death
Anatomy of a Champion
By the time the final buzzer sounded, the story was already working its way into NBA lore. Trailing two games to one in the NBA Finals, …show more content…
The concept traces back at least as far as the 1980s, when early advocates including Doug Moe and Don Nelson found success with innovative, perimeter-oriented lineups that had little use for traditional low-post players. Nelson in particular made a career of his distinctive Nellie Ball style, building a Hall of Fame coaching résumé over three decades with the Bucks, Warriors and Mavericks. Other teams have experimented with small-ball through the years with varying degrees of success, but nearly all of them shared a common weakness: poor defense.
The Warriors are having none of that. Though their small lineups put up video game numbers offensively, they do so without much trade-off defensively. Featuring lineups stacked with long, athletic defenders at almost every position, the Dubs are able to switch everything on defense without creating obvious mismatches, which can wreak havoc on their opponents' offensive schemes. The thing that makes it all work, however, is the utterly logic-defying Draymond Green. One of the best defenders in the league, Green possesses the exceedingly rare ability to guard all five positions on the floor.
The Small-Ball Death