The birth of the Warriors' death lineup
The crowd buzzes. The sideline scrambles. And the four gold-clad guys on
the court, watching the whole frantic scene unfold, try not to laugh.
“I love it,” Green says, a devilish smile creeping up his right cheek.
“I relish it. I see Dre come in, and I’m like, ‘Here we go. Now it’s
on.’” Rotations change, so Iguodala is not always the last one in.
Sometimes it is Curry or Thompson or Green or Harrison Barnes. No matter
the order, when those five reunite, they turn giddy, and their
opposition antsy. Coaches desperately send wings to the scorer’s table,
bigs to the bench.
“There’s a panic,” Green says. “It’s like they’re thinking, ‘I have to
get somebody out of there. I have to get somebody in there. I have to do
something.’ The reactions we get are pretty funny.” The Warriors call
their feared five the Small Lineup because no member stands taller than
the 6'8" Barnes. The Internet terms them the Death Lineup because no foe
survives their speed and spacing on one end, their strength and
switching on the other.
Traditionally, a team’s best lineup is the group that starts. The
Warriors typically deploy their killer quintet to close, whether
quarters, halves or games. They often call on it to negate an
offensive-minded post player who can’t cover on the perimeter, or to
match a stretch forward who won’t venture inside anyway. Golden State’s
coaches compare their mighty-mite unit to a trump card and a turbo
boost, to Mariano Rivera and Usain Bolt. They don’t like to use it for
more than 15 minutes per game. That would be like pitching Rivera for
three innings or making Bolt run a mile. Green and Barnes, tenacious as
they are, can only wrestle behemoths for so long.
But those 15 minutes are a marvel. All the qualities that distinguish
the Warriors are amplified: the fast breaks, the high screens, the
split cuts, the penetration, the movement, the flow. Golden State’s
rollicking five-piece band shot 53.5% from three-point range this
season. It defended better than the tight-fisted Spurs. And it outscored
opponents by 47.0 points per 100 possessions, the highest rating for a
lineup with at least 100 minutes together since such figures were
recorded. The next most productive group to log as many minutes this
season was a Cleveland crew with plus-24.2 net points. You can argue the
Dubs boast the best team ever—and the best lineup ever.
(SI.com)
No comments:
Post a Comment