2015 Golden State Warriors Illustrated: Why This Was One of the Greatest Basketball Teams of All Time infographic
Adam Rifkin stashed this in Basketball
Stashed in: Warriors!, Badass!, Charts!, Basketball, Warriors, Grantland!, Splash Brothers!
During the regular season, the Warriors ranked second in the league in offensive efficiency and first in defensive efficiency; you don’t need a profound understanding of advanced analytics to know that’s pretty good.
As you can see above, the Dubs outshot opponents in every spot on the floor.
On offense, they decorated the edges of the court with the scariest array of shooters in the league, but they also controlled the paint. This partly is because of their brilliance in transition. On defense, they protected the two most vital swaths of court space in the contemporary game: the paint and the areas beyond the arc.
While the Warriors were a superb all-around outfit, let’s be honest: Their defining weapons were Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson. A year or two ago, when Mark Jackson called these dudes the best shooting backcourt in NBA history, many were quick to roll their eyes. Now it’s just an accepted fact. Their shot charts from this season prove that they blend volume and efficiency beyond the arc in ways that nobody else can match.
Three points are more than two, and no team in NBA history has exploited that obvious arithmetic more than our new Oakland overlords. Curry broke all kinds of records this season and invented new ways to posterize dudes on the perimeter. All Thompson did was melt our face by scoring 37 points in a single quarter.
Together, these guys are reshaping how we view perimeter offense in the NBA. With the Splash Brothers as the energy source, the future of the jumper is pretty bright.
4:37 PM Jun 21 2015