The 2009 NBA draft pick took place at the Entertainment Studios in Secaucus, New Jersey, on Tuesday May 19th and the Warriors kept their pre-lottery Position of seventh place pick for next month’s first round draft.
The 2009 draft lottery is an improvement in lottery standings for the Warriors, considering that they were fourteenth place last year; but even seventh place pick will not guarantee a “star” player.
In recent drafts, the Warriors’ drafted players who they felt was their “Star Player” ended up not being as well as they had hoped. An example of this is their 2007 draft pick Marco Belinelli from Italy. Belinelli was a draft who the Warriors hoped will become and impact player in their guard position. They hoped he would add some help at scoring points along with guard Monte Ellis, but they were wrong. Belinelli, who played his 1st ever full year in the NBA, only averaged 8.9 points per game. But aside from the draft, the Warriors have some things to look forward to this upcoming season. Star player Monte Ellis will be able to start in the beginning of the season (hopefully he won’t injure his self snowboarding again). Due to Ellis 30th game suppression, the Warriors were forced to make some huge adjustments. Who is going to be that star player, and who was going to step up for the team are all some things that the Warriors had to consider during the first 30 games of the season.
The first 30 games were by far the longest 30 games for Warriors players and fans. During their first 30 games, the Warriors had the record of 8-22. This was by far the worst the Warriors have done within the past 5 seasons.
Loosing games to teams that the Warriors usually beat like the New York Knicks, the Charlotte Bobcats, and the Chicago Bulls. With the Warriors looking this bad, many fans went from “We Believe” to “Lord please!” We all knew that the Warriors were not going to the NBA playoffs this year.
The Warriors, who made it to the 2007 NBA playoffs as the number 8 seeded team played the #1 ranked Dallas Mavericks and made one of the biggest upsets in NBA history beating Dallas. In 2008, the Warriors were in a tight race, once again to become the #8 team, but a last second mistake from Coach Don Nelson made the Warriors sit home that year. So of course going into the 2008-2009 season, Warriors fans had high hopes of the team making it to the playoffs, but of course, no one’s dreams can come true.
The 2009-2010 seasons will be a season for all of us to look forward to. With all of our players, hopefully healthy, the Warriors can finally become that team that everyone knows and hopes them to be. We are going to see players such as Stephen Jackson, Monte Ellis, and Andris Biedrins are all players that we should look for to help bring the Warriors back to the promise land.
But only time will tell and we all just have to sit and wait.
-Anttwan Stanberry-
Additional information provided by Abraham Jimenez.