Getting to the line
Last year the Warriors hung around the bottom depths of the league in the free throw attempts per game category. They ranked 28th out of 30 with 20.4 per game, eight shots less than the league-leading Clippers led by foul drawing guru Lou Williams.
The Warriors have always ranked in the bottom half of the league in this department over the last five years, I would presume due to their movement based offense and perimeter oriented stars. They don’t feature overpowering players banging around in the paint, which typically is where the most fouls are drawn. Cousins would fit the bill were he healthy.
The Warriors also have two stars, Thompson and KD, who have not yet embraced the flopping epidemic going around the league, which surely limits their free throw attempts. Curry has tried to keep up with the times as of late and pulled some pages out of Harden’s book to bait defenders into his landing space with leg kicks, but he hasn’t received the whistle that Harden gets, at least not yet.
Wildly enough, Curry even got called for an offensive foul in the Finals for trying to replicate Harden’s signature move. If that’s going to be called next season, Harden might need to look for a day job.
Anyway, KD ranked 10th in the league with 6.9 attempts per game from the charity stripe, but no other Warriors ranked in the top 30. Curry, who comes in at 35, attempted only 4.9 per game. Other than these two, the Warriors have no other player even in the top 100.
So why is this such a big deal if the Dubs have been successful despite the FTA disparity against their opponents? The Warriors ranked 5th in the league in FT %, knocking them down at an 80% rate. There are easy buckets to be made here, folks.
Opponents that have figured out how to give the Warriors trouble, often have done so by getting to the line. Of course, there are other factors that play into beating the Warriors, but when Lou Williams, James Harden, and Kawhi Leonard are killing the Dubs by drawing lots of fouls, you can sense how the momentum turns and disrupts the Warriors’ flow.
In a year when points may be harder to come by than what we are accustomed to seeing with this squad, more freebies at the line would be a good way to kick start the offense.
I don’t mean to paint a horrific picture of the current state of the Warriors. No, I do not think the sky is falling or that we need to panic. However, even the best teams have weaknesses that need to be addressed, and these are some of the most glaring holes that I see in the Warriors’ roster.
Keep an eye on their performance this fall and see if these factors play a leading role in their success or struggles.