As silly as it sounds, the Golden State Warriors sure do miss Mickael Pietrus.
Pietrus left Golden State with very little fanfare—actually, it was more of a good riddance. He drew the ire of fans last year because he requested a trade from the Warriors.
The reason he asked to leave was because he wanted to get more minutes and show off what he could do. He only averaged 20 minutes per game last year, and had his worst scoring average since his rookie season.
He is quoted last year as saying, "I want to be moved. I want to be moved. I want to be moved. I want to be traded."
At the end of last season Pietrus became a unrestricted free agent. This meant he could sign with any team he wanted—and he knew he didn't want back in Golden State. If he had gotten more minutes he probably would have been happier playing for the Warriors.
Another problem with Pietrus as a Warrior was that he was too aggressive. He would pick up cheap fouls and often had to be taken out after a few minutes, because he could pick three fouls in that time.
With that being said, the Warriors have clearly missed him coming off the bench. He gave the Warriors a defensive presence on the perimeter. He played tough defense—and the lack thereof has been the one consistent thing that has been plaguing the Warriors. That is what Pietrus brought each night.
So, if the Warriors are going to make a trade, they need to figure out who they can get who will come off the bench and play some solid defense for the Warriors.
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about 1 month ago
I don't miss him. He was a turnover machine. Watching him put the ball on the floor was painful. Not to mention the fouls, like you said.
He is doing well this year because he is playing more half court sets and is mopping up easy buckets off teams swarming howard. He's not very clutch under pressure.
Not to mention his, "I want to be moved" rant which was about as delicate as popping a zit with a baseball bat. We just went through that with Al. The Warriors aren't doing amazing, and the last thing they need is a player in the locker room that was already complaining WHEN THEY WERE WINNING.
I like that you stay relatively neutral, and it is definitely something worth giving some thought too. Especially since his gripe for minutes seems to be the beginning of a recurring theme on the Warriors bench. The warriors do need their bigger guards to hustle back faster though, and that is something that Pietrus did well. I think the Warriors have let go at least 5-8 ppg on fastbreaks that should be contestable. Given that Crawford has barely practiced with them I bet that this is a trend that will change. I am just using him as an example (this could be said about every guard but buike), but he went down hard a few times (when there should have been fouls) and it gave the celtics easy mismatches to quickly exploit on the other end.
Nice article, I just don't know about that first line. It sounds kind of silly. Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving.
about 1 month ago
He was a bust
about 1 month ago
This is another silly and ridiculous articles, that reeks of peculiar institution. You title the article, impressing Pietrus as a prized asset, then you go on to structure the article as if he was a bumbling liability.
I get the feeling, if you had wrote this about Tyler Hansbrough's or David Lee's presence being missed after 15 games, then the article wouldn't have been as pessimistically-Kobold as this ------for sure!.
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