Richard's thumb opens a starting job, and Niang keeps winning from the bench
Golden State went 3-0 last week and Georges Niang, who did not start any of the three, was plus 49, tied with Stephen Curry for the team lead. The starting five with Will Richard was outscored by 25 in its two starts. Richard is now out with a torn thumb ligament.
Golden State won three games last week by a combined 30 points. Georges Niang started none of them and was plus 49.
That ties him with Stephen Curry for the best margin on the team over the week, in 69.6 minutes to Curry's 97. In the rest of the 149 minutes the Warriors played, they were outscored by 19. Niang made 14 of his 20 shots and 6 of his 10 threes, which helps, and three games is three games.
The starting job is the other half of the week. Steve Kerr has four starters he does not move when they are healthy: Curry, Draymond Green, Yaxel Lendeborg and Brandin Podziemski. Beside those four, the fifth starter has been four different men in seven games. Last week it was Will Richard against Phoenix and Miami, and Gui Santos, back from his knee, against Orlando.
In the two games Richard started, that five played 13.5 minutes together. It was outscored by 25.
Richard will not start the next one either. He has a torn ulnar collateral ligament in his left thumb, ESPN reported Sunday night, and is out against New Orleans on Monday with no timetable. The club had announced no treatment plan as of Sunday. Sacramento's Keegan Murray had the same injury early last season, had surgery and missed the first 15 games, per the same report.
Who played with whom#
Golden State's busiest lineup of the week, and the three most-used versions of the four regulars plus one, off ESPN's play-by-play:
| Five on the floor | Minutes | Margin |
|---|---|---|
| Curry, Green, Payton, Melton, Niang | 14.2 | +5 |
| Curry, Green, Lendeborg, Podziemski, Richard | 13.5 | -25 |
| Curry, Green, Lendeborg, Podziemski, Niang | 7.9 | +9 |
| Curry, Green, Lendeborg, Podziemski, Santos | 7.0 | -3 |
The busiest unit of the week was three reserves with Curry and Green, and it played more minutes than the Richard version of the starting five did.
None of this is a case against Richard as a player. Curry said after the Phoenix win on November 2 that Richard had turned up the energy defensively for three straight games. "Defensively, he's just been a pest out there," Curry said, per ESPN. Richard was plus 20 in 13 minutes off the bench against the Lakers on October 30. The trouble is narrower. His minutes beside the four regulars have gone badly, and that is the only job that opened.
Where Niang's minutes go#
Kerr has mostly not used Niang as a starter. He uses him to carry the stretches when two or three of the regulars are resting, and that is where the margin came from:
| Regular starters on the floor with Niang | Minutes | Margin |
|---|---|---|
| One | 16.7 | -3 |
| Two | 30.9 | +27 |
| Three | 14.1 | +16 |
| All four | 7.9 | +9 |
| Total | 69.6 | +49 |
He did close one game with all four. The five who finished overtime against Orlando on Saturday were Curry, Green, Lendeborg, Podziemski and Niang, and they finished a 126-119 win.
Over the full ten games the pattern holds at a larger size. Niang is plus 69 in 206 minutes, the best on the roster, ahead of Podziemski at plus 61 and Curry at plus 59, by ESPN's box scores. He has started twice: at Minnesota on October 28 with Santos out, and against the Clippers on November 1 with Curry and Green both out. Golden State is plus 50 for the season and minus 19 in the minutes he has not played.
Plus-minus is the noisiest number in a box score, and a bench forward's version of it is padded by the opponent's bench. It also matches what Kerr has done with the rotation. Niang has played at least 19 minutes in each of the last six games.
What Richard's absence costs#
Richard played 56 minutes last week and 171 across ten games, with three starts. Those minutes go somewhere. Santos, who missed three games with left knee tendinitis and played 12 minutes on Saturday, is listed as probable for Monday on ESPN's injury report. When Santos has started beside the four regulars this season, that five is plus 10 in 25.7 minutes, the best margin of any fifth man Kerr has tried.
So the likeliest shape for Monday is the oldest one, Santos at the fifth spot and Niang in the middle of each half. What changes is the depth behind them. ESPN's injury note names Gary Payton II and Niang as the likeliest to pick up Richard's minutes, and Kerr loses a guard he had used as both a starter and a reserve.
The homestand ends Monday. Then come Houston, San Antonio, New Orleans and Dallas, all on the road, in the next nine days.
The read: Niang plays at least 110 total minutes in the five games from New Orleans on Monday, November 9, through Dallas on Wednesday, November 18, summing the minutes in ESPN's box scores. He has averaged 22 minutes over the last six, and Richard's absence opens more. Against it: in the first five games of this season he played 97 minutes in all, and a 33-year-old who missed all of last season with a foot injury has more ways than most to come up short.
Sources: ESPN box scores and play-by-play for Golden State's ten regular-season games, October 21 to November 7; ESPN's Warriors schedule and injury report, November 9; ESPN's report on Richard's thumb, November 8.
