The Wild West Game: The Nuggets Narrowly Beat the Warriors 124-120

The Nuggets and Warriors, who along with the Lakers and Suns are the highest scoring teams in the NBA, played the kind of up tempo game that folks like Carlos Boozer, Tim Duncan, Bruce Bowen, Antonio McDyess, Kevin Garnett, Chuck Hayes, and Yao Ming are so good at slowing down in the playoffs. With Kenyon Martin back out with an injury again, and this time just a hamstring and not a damaged knee, we have been told, with Nene just back from thumb surgery and playing limited minutes, with Melo focusing more on offense and less on defense again, and with Camby alone not being enough to slow a run and gun team down, the Nuggets gave in to the temptation to allow the Warriors to dictate the pace and the flow of the game. Had either one of the superstars Allen Iverson or Carmelo Anthony not had the scoring touch, the Nuggets would have lived to regret being unable to slow the pace and being without Kenyon Martin.

For the third time in the last 5 games, the Nuggets came away with a very close win. The Warriors, who live and die with the three point shot, were unable to hit three point shots when it was most critical to do so, in the 4th quarter. The Nugget’s record of 18-11 is not that bad for a team that has been one of the more banged up teams in the League, and for a team that can’t deploy strategies that would allow them to win over the best teams in the NBA. Allen Iverson and Linas Kleiza are the Nuggets playing a little better this year than last year, and it is those improvements which are the most important reasons why the Nuggets are winning the close games that they mostly lost last year.

The game was close from start to finish. The Nuggets led 71-64 at the half, and 102-97 at the end of 3 quarters. The Warrior’s defense is as simplistic as the Nugget’s offense is, and they don’t usually bother with double teams. Carmelo Anthony took advantage of his holiday away from being double teamed, and he took what the defense was giving to him, which was almost everything, and made a lot of easy, short jumpers.

Allen Iverson was repeatedly hacked by increasingly desperate defenders, but the referees and Iverson made the Warriors pay, as Iverson made 13 of 15 free throws. Melo was 8/8 from the line, and even Linas Kleiza, the most improved Nugget from last year, got to the line a lot, and he was 8/8 from there as well. Altogether, the Nuggets were 33/37 from the line, whereas the Warriors were just 18/23. Simple math tells you that if the Nuggets had hit a more usual 80% of free throws instead of the 90% that they did hit, or 4 fewer, then this game would probably have been won by the Warriors. So the fact that Iverson, Kleiza, and Melo were a combined 29/31 on free throws is more important than it might seem, as is the fact that Camby, who has been mostly horrible at free throw shooting this year, was able to make 3/4 of them in this game.

It is the Nuggets who are guilty of leading the NBA in committing fouls, but in this game, at least, they were able to avoid an excessive number of them, while Iverson, Kleiza, and Anthony were able to draw fouls. On the other hand, though, Carmelo Anthony did get into foul trouble, which cost the Nuggets about 7 minutes of Melo playing time.

The Nuggets led by 5 with 5 minutes to go and by 6 with 3 minutes to go. But then the Warriors, who made the majority of their threes in the first half, and fell on serious hard times in the 2nd half, decided to start driving the ball to the hoop for layups. Two of those, along with a Baron Davis block on Carmelo Anthony, made it 118-116 Nuggets with about 2 minutes left. Then center Andris Biedrins blocked Anthony on a mini-jumper, and then a tired Iverson badly missed a three. Baron Davis put in a little jumper, so now the Warriors had tied the game at 118 with 1:25 to go, and the Nuggets were down to just luck again as their only strategy.

And luck is exactly what they received. Iverson made a little 9-footer, and then Baron Davis lost it to Anthony Carter. Then Anthony sunk two free throws after he was fouled on a layup by Stephen Jackson, so now it was 122-118 Nuggets with 53 seconds left.

But Davis made a nice 21 footer, and Melo missed a 12 footer, and the Warriors called timeout with 21 seconds to go down by only 2 points. The Nuggets were saved when Stephen Jackson missed an open look 3-pointer with 11 seconds left, and Camby was there for the rebound. Camby then made not one but both free throws to ice the game for the Nuggets, which was yet more luck for the Nuggets, considering how much trouble Camby has had at the line this season. Since the Nuggets were up by only 2 when Camby was intentionally fouled, the Warriors would have been able to send the game into overtime had Camby missed one of the free throws and had the Warriors then hit on a three. But Camby calmly sunk both free throws, and the Nuggets put yet another close game in the win column, with even more assistance from good luck.

The Warrior’s all guns blazing style works very well on offense but, unfortunately, there is no defensive version of it that works. The Warriors are generally unable to make anyone miss much, not only because they lack great defenders who make shooters miss without fouling excessively, but also because they lack the clutch rebounding and blocking that can prevent easy late scores in the paint. The Warriors are the NBA’s 3-pointer maniacs, the team that can beat anyone if enough threes go in, but lose to anyone if they don’t. Instead of getting uptight like the Nuggets do these days about their frequent lack of aggressive and smart defending, the Warriors just jack up another three. Their fans love the “don’t worry, be happy” style, simplistic though it may be.

Don’t feel sorry for the Warriors, because the Nuggets are worse off, since they no longer really have a style. You don’t know anymore how well the Nuggets are going to play on offense in a given game. In the early part of the 2006-07 season, the Nuggets had a run and gun offense similar to that of the Warriors, even though they never had anywhere near the 3-point shooting potential the Warriors do, with only J.R. Smith and Linas Kleiza available to shoot 3’s in those days. The brawl in New York, the mega suspensions, and the gradual banishment of J.R. Smith from the lineup brought the run and gun wildness to a gradual end, to be replaced by the all Iverson all the time offense in some games, and with the Carmelo Anthony and Allen Iverson score as much as possible while passing as little as possible offense in others. The Nuggets now are in a fantasy world if they think they are a true run and gun team, or if they are wild in a good way on offense. No they are wild mostly in a bad way, as they lead the NBA in turnovers.

The Nugget’s offense is so simplistic that it really should not be called a style at all, especially since, if Anthony or Iverson are not hitting shots, the offense collapses completely, whereas, for example, with a motion offense featuring a lot of picks and rolls, and passing to the open man on the perimeter, players who are not hitting shots can simply give up a few shots they might otherwise take to teammates who are making shots.

For example, for the Spurs, some nights Tony Parker and Michael Finley might be hitting, whereas other nights Manu Ginobili, Bruce Bowen, and Brent Barry might be the ones to get the job done. The smartest, best managed teams have offensive schemes in place that allow for some flexibility in who takes the most shots. The Nuggets have almost none of this critical flexibility, so they live and die mostly based on whether Carmelo Anthony and Allen Iverson have the shooting touch or not. Linas Kleiza, though improved from last year, is simply not experienced or good enough yet to make up for a severe Melo or Iverson shooting slump, Camby and Najera are inconsistent. Kenyon Martin can’t stay healthy, Nene is an unknown quantity, and J.R. Smith is mostly benched.

An offense featuring a lot of isolation plays is nothing more than Russian roulette with a gun where, if the star player who is supposed to make all the buckets starts missing, your team has just shot itself in the head. Would any truly good coaching staff put an offense like that on the court in the NBA and expect to be competitive in the playoffs? Of course not.

Despite the apparent insanity of their offenses, the Nuggets thanks to Anthony and Iverson have been able to just about keep up with the Warriors in terms of point production, while developing some defensive presence that the Warriors couldn’t care less about. The trouble is, neither the Warriors nor the Nuggets have an offense that has enough variety in it to be able to beat a good team in the playoffs, such as the Phoenix Suns or San Antonio Spurs. Last year, Dirk Nowitzki and the Dallas Mavericks choked when the Warriors started hitting a lot of threes. Inexperienced Dallas Coach Avery Johnson could not figure out a way to slow the games down enough or to reduce the number of wide open threes, many of which were made off of picks and rolls.

But when the victorious Warriors went on the play Utah, a team most thought was not quite as good as the Mavericks, they met up with one of the better defensive and overall coaches in the League, Jerry Sloan, Sloan had his squad slow down the games, kept everyone calm, focused, and on plan, and kept the number of open threes attempted by the Warriors within reason. When these simple but crucial steps were taken, the Warriors were easily defeated by the Jazz.

Meanwhile, the Nuggets were just as easily defeated by the Spurs, whose Coach Greg Popovich did not have to do much of anything out of the ordinary to shut down the Nugget’s offense, since the Nuggets themselves were helping to shut the Nuggets offense down, by running an offense featuring two star players in a lot of isolation scoring attempts, and by making roster and motivation blunders that directly led to the complete collapse of their 3-point shooting potential. But simplistic offenses and lack of 3-point shooting both spell certain and quick doom in the playoffs.

In summary, the Warriors and Nuggets are fun to watch, but until and unless one of them gets extremely lucky, as in once in 100 years lucky, their simplistic offensive schemes and inconsistent defensive efforts will lead to inevitable early outs in the playoffs to teams with full scale offensive and defensive strategies and players.

But considering that both the Nuggets and the Warriors have been winning some lucky games lately, maybe this is the 100th year for one of them.

ALERT STATUS PROBLEMS
As of December 27, 2007

The Nuggets are under an unusually dangerous and damaging alert status, so the following update is provided.

INJURIES & SUSPENSIONS
1. Kenyon Martin injury 19 Points
1. Steven Hunter injury 4 Points

UNEXPECTED AND SEVERE PLAYER PERFORMANCE PROBLEMS
There are none at this time.

BAD OR INADEQUATE COACHING
1. George Karl over relies on his starters and won’t play the non-starters enough: 5-20 Points. The severity varies depending on the circumstances, mainly Karl’s beliefs and moods, and whether the other team is playing well enough to take advantage of the Nuggets playing with not enough breathers, with too many fouls, and so forth. Karl will normally be in the 5-15 range, but it could spike to as much as 20 in the event of the benching of a major player such as Kenyon Martin. The current points reported are for the use, or should I say the misuse, of the reserves for the most recent games, with the most weight being given to the game being reported on here. The bad use of reserves score for this game is 11 points.

2. Lack of adequate offensive schemes: 10 Points. This would be up to 20 points, except that Iverson reduces the damage. Another way of describing this is that the team has failed to decide whether it wants Melo alone, Iverson alone, Melo and Iverson together, or neither of them to be firstly responsible for scoring enough points to keep the Nuggets in the game. If it were neither, I call the name of that strategy the "share the wealth" strategy.

INTENSITY, HUSTLE, AND HEART
1. The Nugget’s intensity, hustle and heart is lacking: 0 Points. It’s not anywhere near bad as some fans think it is.

TOTAL PROBLEM POINTS: 44, which constitutes YELLOW ALERT.

YELLOW ALERT (40-54): Minor damage is occurring to the season. The entire season is under medium threat. Beating quality teams is much more difficult and will be pretty rare. About 1/2 of all wins against good teams will now be losses. Beating mid-level teams is a little more difficult. About 1/4 of games that would be wins agsinst mid-level teams will now be losses. Beating low level teams is still relatively easy, but no longer almost a sure bet. A good team has become in between a good team and a mid-level team when it is under this alert.

We are in yellow alert with Martin or Nene out and orange alert if they are both out.

RESERVE WATCH

Number of Players Who Played at Least 6 Minutes: Nuggets 9 Warriors 8
Number of Players Who Played at Least 10 Minutes: Nuggets 8 Warriors 8

Nuggets Non-Starters Points: 32
Warriors Non-Starters Points: 23

Nuggets Non-Starters Rebounds: 16
Warriors Non-Starters Rebounds: 13

Nuggets Non-Starters Assists: 1
Warriors Non-Starters Assists: 4

This feature is under development, and it will be expanded. The complications involved explain why (a) there are no formal statistics anywhere on the internet on the subject of how much non-starters contribute to different teams and (b) why coaches are not compared statistically the way players are. There are a lot of variables that come into the use of reserves that interfere with the objective of judging their use. Statisticians call this “statistical noise,” and if you have a substantial amount of it, then what you are trying to do with your statistics becomes very difficult or next to impossible.

GEORGE KARL CONFIDENCE IN HIS TEAM RATING (Scale of 0 to 10)
2.0-He's making a run for the exits.

ESPN PLAYER RATINGS FOR THIS GAME:
You can tell how well they played at a glance. Of the advanced statistics I have seen on the internet, this one seems to have the best balance between offense and defense. Many other advanced statistics are biased in favor of good defenders, and do not reflect the heavy importance of offense in basketball. Here is the formula for the ESPN rating of a player:

Points + Rebounds + 1.4*Assists + Steals + 1.4*Blocks - .7*Turnovers + # of Field Goals Made +1/2*# of 3-pointers Made - .8*# of Missed Field Goals - .8*# of Missed Free Throws + .25 *# of Free Throws Made

All players on each team who played at least 5 minutes are shown. The number after “game,” is how well the player did in this game, whereas the number after “season” is that player’s overall average for the entire season.

NUGGETS
Allen Iverson: Game 55.1 Season 40.9
Marcus Camby: Game 40.0 Season 32.7
Carmelo Anthony: Game 38.7 Season 38.1
Linas Kleiza: Game 24.7 Season 18.0
Anthony Carter: Game 20.5 Season 20.0
Nene Hilario: Game 12.2 Season 12.2
J.R. Smith: Game 9.9 Season 15.3
Chucky Atkins: Game 9.1 Season 8.6
Eduardo Najera: Game 6.0 Season 13.8

Bobby Jones: Did Not Play-Coach’s Decision
Yakhouba Diawara: Did Not Play-Coach’s Decision
Jelani McCoy: Did Not Play-Coach’s Decision
Von Wafer: Did Not Play-Coach's Decision

Kenyon Martin: Did Not Play-Injury
Steven Hunter: Did Not Play-Injury

WARRIORS
Baron Davis: Game 60.1 Season 40.1
Stephen Jackson: Game 42.2 Season 31.8
Andris Biedrins: Game 32.7 Season 26.3
Monta Ellis: Game 23.8 Season 28.2
Al Harrington: Game 16.8 Season 23.6
Matt Barnes: Game 15.0 Season 17.0
Kelenna Azubuike: Game 13.1 Season 18.2
Mikael Pietrus: Game 9.9 Season 10.8

NOTE: these stats do not correct for the big differences in playing times. Players with small minutes would get a higher rating if they had more minutes.

OBSERVATIONS ON RATINGS:
Another one of those monster games from Iverson here, which is good for what ails you, but this dose came without the frequent nasty side effect of Melo’s game going into the tank. You can have your cake and eat it too with the Warriors happy go lucky approach to the game. Baron Davis did slightly more than Iverson, and Stephen Jackson did slightly more than Carmelo Anthony.

NUGGETS REAL PLAYER RATINGS—EXPLANATION
A Great New Feature from Nuggets 1

The straight up player rankings are obviously heavily affected by how many playing minutes the various players get. With many teams, you can rely on the coach to give his various players roughly the playing time that makes the most sense for his team. Unfortunately, you can not rely on George Karl to award playing time in just about the best way possible. He brings other factors besides actual performance into his rotation decisions. Therefore, it makes good sense to introduce a new and very important statistic that Nuggets 1 will call the Real Per Minute Player Rating which, as the name implies, is the gross ESPN player rating divided by the number of minutes. The statistic is called Real Player Rating for short.

This statistic allows everyone to see whether or not players who play only a small number of minutes are doing better than their low gross rating will indicate. At the same time, it will allow everyone to see whether players with a lot of minutes are playing worse than, as well as, or better than their gross rating shows. This is another big improvement in the Nuggets 1 never ending quest to give readers total information about the Nuggets. This statistic allows the reader, at a glance, to see exactly how well each player is doing without regard to playing time. So it gives you pure knowledge not available anywhere else..

SCALE FOR THE REAL PLAYER RATINGS
1.60 More Superstar Performance beyond the Michael Jordan Level
1.40 1.60 Superstar Performance-Michael Jordan Level
1.20 1.40 Superstar Performance
1.00 1.20 Star Performance
0.90 1.00 Outstanding Game
0.80 0.90 Very Good Game
0.70 0.80 Good Game
0.60 0.70 Mediocre Game
0.50 0.60 Poor Game
0.40 0.50 Very Poor Game
0.25 0.40 Near Disaster
Less 0.25 Total Disaster

NUGGETS-WARRIORS REAL PLAYER RATINGS
All players who played 5 minutes or more are included. Any player who played only 5-9 minutes is noted

1. Baron Davis, GS 1.541
2. J.R. Smith, Den 1.238…Smith played only 8 minutes
3. Allen Iverson, Den 1.224
4. Carmelo Anthony, Den 1.173
5. Andris Biedrins, GS 1.168
6. Marcus Camby, Den 1.053
7. Linas Kleiza, Den 1.029
8. Stephen Jackson, GS 0.898
9. Anthony Carter, Den 0.759
10. Kelenna Azubuike, GS 0.728
11. Mickael Pietrus, GS 0.707
12. Nene Hilario, Den 0.678
13. Matt Barnes, GS 0.625
14. Monta Ellis, GS 0.610
15. Al Harrington, GS 0.542
16. Chucky Atkins, Den 0.433
17. Eduardo Najera, Den 0.231

OBSERVATIONS ON THE NUGGETS-WARRIORS REAL PLAYER RATINGS
Once again, George Karl looks like an idiot for not playing J.R. Smith for more minutes. Baron Davis was by far the best player on the court, but Allen Iverson and Carmelo Antony were both extremely good as well. Andris Biedrins slightly outplayed Marcus Camby, but who cares what the centers are doing in a game like this?

NUGGET’S PLUS—MINUS
This tells you how the score changed while a player was on the court. All Nuggets who played at least 6 minutes are shown.

Anthony Carter: +8
Eduardo Najera: +6
Marcus Camby: +6
Carmelo Anthony: +4
Allen Iverson: +2
J.R. Smith: +0
Linas Kleiza: +0
Nene: -2
Chucky Atkins: -4

OBSERVATIONS ON PLUS—MINUS
The game was close the whole way through, so you can’t really tell very much from the plus-minus. You can see that Anthony Carter once again outplayed Chucky Atkins, meaning we are going to be stuck with Carter starting instead of Atkins for who knows how long.

NUGGETS MADE WHAT?
All Nuggets who played at least 6 minutes are shown. The order is from lowest to highest in real player rating.

Eduardo Najera played 26 minutes and was 1/4 and 0/2 on 3’s for 2 points, and he made 2 steals, 2 rebounds, and 1 assist.

Chucky Atkins played 21 minutes and was 2/6 and 2/5 on 3’s for 6 points, and he made 4 rebounds.

Nene played 18 minutes and was 2/5 and 1/2 from the line for 5 points, and he made 6 rebounds and 2 blocks.

Anthony Carter played 27 minutes and was 3/6 for 6 points, and he made 7 rebounds, 4 assists, and 2 steals.

Linas Kleiza played 24 minutes and was 3/7, 1/4 on 3’s, and 8/8 from the line for 15 points, and he made 5 rebounds, 1 block, and 1 steal.

Marcus Camby played 38 minutes and was 6/10 and 3/4 from the line for 15 points, and he made 16 rebounds, 2 blocks, 2 steals, and 1 assist.

Carmelo Anthony played 33 minutes and was 11/22, 0/2 on 3’s, and 8/8 from the line for 30 points, and he made 8 rebounds.

Allen Iverson played for virtually the whole game, 45 minutes, and was 12/21, 2/4 on 3’s, and 13/15 from the line for 39 points, and he made 6 assists, 2 rebounds, and 1 steal.

J.R. Smith played for 8 minutes and was 3/4 for 6 points, and he made 1 assist and 1 rebound.

NEXT UP
The next game will be Sunday, December 30 in Denver to play the Warriors at 6 pm mountain time. Neither the Nuggets nor the Warriors will be playing on back to back nights.