Poor decision making has sabotaged the Golden State Warriors

If you were watching the Golden State Warriors take on the San Antonio Spurs last night… you were probably just as surprised as me when Draymond Green heaved a halfcourt shot in an attempt to tie the game with roughly five seconds remaining.

It doesn’t take much critical thinking to realize what Draymond was trying to do. The Spurs defended the inbound pass beautifully, stopping Curry from receiving the pass and instead forced the ball to Green.

From here, many NBA teams would opt to foul. This would have sent Green to the free-throw line, restricting the Warriors to two-points at best with a three-point deficit and under 10 seconds to play.

Green, attempting to pull a 200 IQ play, immediately chucked the ball towards the rim – assuming the Spurs were about to foul him. His goal? Earn three free throws instead of two. The outcome? He wasn’t even touched by Derrick White as the ball collided with the backboard and straight into the Spurs’ hands. Game over.

The Golden State Warriors have struggled all season long with decision making – and it’s beginning to pay its toll.

Let’s break down two major things that went wrong here. First and foremost, why, in any possible scenario, would Green think that baiting the ref into calling a shooting foul was a better option than simply handing the ball to Stephen Curry for a chance to tie the game.

Even if Green had successfully drawn a foul and a trip to the line – I think almost everyone would rather have Curry attempt a heavily contested 3-pointer than watch Green attempt to tie the game with three consecutive free throws. Green is just a 70 percent shooter from the line and had missed his only two attempts that night.

Regardless, how did the Warriors end up in this position to begin with? While the Spurs are certainly no joke, somehow defying all odds and remaining a competitive team in the West despite losing all of their star talents in recent years, the Warriors missed plenty of opportunities to put this game away.

Forget all of that, however. In the play before this, the Dubs ran a quick out of bounds play to get Curry a 3-pointer at lightning speeds. A quick screen in the backcourt freed him up for a one-on-one dance with Dejounte Murray (who is no joke either) where Curry drilled a big shot to cut the lead to one.

After two free throws from the Spurs, Golden State found themselves back where they started, only this time they could tie the game with a 3-pointer. So, what do they do…? Run the same exact play out of the time out. Is anybody surprised that Gregg Popovich sniffed this out and had his team in a good position to stop the same play the Warriors ran just a moment ago? Didn’t think so.

The Spurs blew up the play, as to be expected. This put the ball in Green’s hands, left with the obvious option of giving the ball to the greatest shooter of all-time. Except… well, you know what happened.

This was an extremely boneheaded play from a player who is genuinely one of the smartest athletes to ever play in sports. Green himself said this was ‘dumb as h***’ of him – though he still believes he had the right intentions.

This mental lapse from the Dubs pushes them out of the playoff picture and to a 12-12 record on the season. These silly mistakes must be cleaned up if the Warriors want to reach the postseason.