There have been a lot of surprises so far this NBA season, but the biggest one might be the fact that the Warriors enter Monday night's game against the Los Angeles Clippers with a record of 4-3 -- that's probably half as many losses as some thought the Warriors would have all season.
It's early and Steve Kerr has admittedly been experimenting with lots of different lineups, but one unit that's tried and true is the so-called "Hamptons Five" of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson, Andre Iguodala, Kevin Durant and Draymond Green. This is basically the Warriors' "Lineup of Death" of previous years, notably swapping in Durant for Harrison Barnes. The intimidating lineup creates Freddy Krueger matchup nightmares on offense and renders opposing offenses useless due to the length and ability to switch absolutely everything.
Only, so far this season, it hasn't. Take a look at how the lineup fared in previous years compared to this season:
- 2014-15 Death Lineup: 102 minutes, +23.3
- 2015-16 Death Lineup: 172 minutes, +44.4
- 2016-17 Hamptons Five: 224 minutes, +23
- 2017-18 Hamptons Five: 22 minutes, -5.5
Record scratch.
Granted this is an incredibly small sample size, but it can't be a coincidence that the Warriors have struggled to start the season amid a cataclysmic drop from what has been a nearly unbeatable five-man unit. It's the defensive side where the lineup as been surprisingly bad, allowing 117.2 points per 100 possessions, compared to the starting lineup's 106.5.
Of the three Warriors' lineups that have played more than 15 minutes together this season, the Hamptons Five is by far the worst.
So what on Earth is going on?
Part of this is surely due to the rough start for Iguodala, who missed the first game of the season due to lingering back issues. When you run the stats on Curry, Thompson, Durant and Green they look great, but when you throw in Iguodala ... well ...
| MIN | OFFRTG | DEFRTG | NETRTG | AST% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Andre Iguodala
ON COURT
| 22.0 | 111.6 | 117.2 | -5.5x | 66.7 |
Andre Iguodala
OFF COURT
| 106.0 | 127.1 | 104.8 | 22.3x | 76.7 |
The opening night loss to the Houston Rockets would be a good place to see how the Warriors played with someone else in there instead of Iguodala, but we can't really examine that too closely since they were also without Green to close the game -- he left in the third quarter with a knee injury. So the Warriors finished that game with a lineup of Curry, Livingston, Thompson, McCaw and Durant, which was -36.4 in the final two minutes as they watched the game slip away.
Even with Iguodala back, the Warriors didn't deploy the Hamptons Five against the Pelicans because of a desire to keep Zaza Pachulia on the court during the final minutes due to the size of Anthony Davis and DeMarcus Cousins.
Here is how the unit fared in the five games since:
- vs. Grizzlies: 5 min, +50.4 (lost, 111-101)
- vs. Mavericks: 4 min, -63.9 (won, 133-103)
- vs. Raptors: 8 min, +53.9 (won, 117-112)
- vs. Wizards: 3 min, -109.9 (won, 120-117)
- vs. Pistons: 3 min, -95.9 (lost, 115-107)
We have to note that the Mavericks game was a blowout from the start and in the Wizards game Draymond was ejected in the second quarter so the lineup couldn't finish the game, but those numbers of -63.5, -109.9 and -95.9 are real eyesores.
In Sunday night's loss to the Pistons, Iguodala replaced Omri Casspi with 2:30 left in the fourth quarter and the Warriors trailing by three, 106-103. With the Hamptons Five on the court, the Pistons closed the game on a 9-4 run to come away with the stunning victory at Oracle Arena.
So it appears a strange mix of injuries, ejections and general early-season weirdness has led to a possible anomaly from a lineup that's usually terrific. But still, it's strange and a bit concerning to see a -5.5 next to one of the most dominant lineups in the history of the NBA. You'd think that there would have been an adjustment period last season as the team adjusted to Durant entering the fold, but the same lineup was +22.7 after its first seven games of the 2016-17 season. Clearly something's not right this season.
Is it panic time? Absolutely not. Is it worth keeping an eye on? You better believe it.
Iguodala is 33 and is generally asked to guard one of the opponents' two best wing players whenever he's on the court. It's not crazy to think that he could eventually start to wear down. Not to mention that the Warriors have been playing some version of this unit for the past four seasons, which means opposing coaches have had four seasons to try to figure out a way to stop it.
While the Hamptons Five's struggles aren't likely to continue throughout the season, it appears to be one of the main reasons the Warriors have gotten off to such a relatively slow start.
