- Somebody other than Anthony Lamb — and presumably somebody better than Lamb — will get the 1,195 minutes he played last season.
- Kuminga probably won’t merely be a rotation piece, he could be a difference-maker this season.
- The Warriors will miss Poole’s offensive firepower and durability, but they can get more than that from Paul and others.
- Paul is good for the Warriors, even if his arrival complicates Kerr’s starting and closing lineup decisions.
- They should be a lot better on the road than they were last season. They have to be.
The number one reason is expecting their #1 ranked starting lineup to play more than 28 of 82 games.
27 games together isn’t that little. Bucks played 25, Celtics played 35 (if you count White as a starter and not Rob Williams where they played 10). Grizzlies played 11. Clippers played 13. All these teams had a better record.
The Warriors issue was their bench (which all the above teams had), and when Wiggins and obviously Curry missed time, they had terrible depth to make up for it.
Looney and Poole gave them 82, Draymond played 73, Klay played 69, which is relatively healthy.
The issue is Curry is so much better than their number 2 so whenever he doesn’t play the Warriors are just bad, and a bad bench. Bad regular season combo.
I think the second point was solved this season. I’m a real believer their bench will be significantly better this season. I’m not a believer in them holding up without Steph however, so hopefully he doesn’t get hurt again. He’s had a lot of flukey injuries, not necessarily concerning injuries in terms of his body breaking down.